Noun
- 1. primitive, primitive person, person, individual, someone, somebody, mortal, soul
- usage: a person who belongs to an early stage of civilization
- 2. primitive, formula, expression
- usage: a mathematical expression from which another expression is derived
- 3. primitive, word
- usage: a word serving as the basis for inflected or derived forms; "`pick' is the primitive from which `picket' is derived"
Adjective
- 1. crude, primitive, rude, early (vs. late)
- usage: belonging to an early stage of technical development; characterized by simplicity and (often) crudeness; "the crude weapons and rude agricultural implements of early man"; "primitive movies of the 1890s"; "primitive living conditions in the Appalachian mountains"
- 2. archaic, primitive, early (vs. late)
- usage: little evolved from or characteristic of an earlier ancestral type; "archaic forms of life"; "primitive mammals"; "the okapi is a short-necked primitive cousin of the giraffe"
- 3. primitive, noncivilized (vs. civilized), noncivilised
- usage: used of preliterate or tribal or nonindustrial societies; "primitive societies"
- 4. primitive, naive, untrained (vs. trained)
- usage: of or created by one without formal training; simple or naive in style; "primitive art such as that by Grandma Moses is often colorful and striking"
WordNet 3.0 Copyright © 2006 by Princeton University.
All rights reserved.Definition and meaning of primitive (Dictionary)