a. [f. LIMB sb.1 + -LESS.] Having no limbs, deprived of a limb or limbs.

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1594.  R. Wilson, Cooler’s Proph., V. ii. 52. So flies the murderer from the mangled lims Left limles on the ground by his fell hand.

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1624.  Massinger, Renegado, IV. i. (1630), H 2 b. Till nought were left me But this poore, bleeding limblesse Truncke.

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1624.  Gataker, Transubst., 162. Whereas that which is given and received in the Eucharist, is (as Epiphanius well observeth) livelesse and limmelesse.

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1770.  Foote, Lame Lover, III. Wks. 1799, II. 86. A tree not only limbless and leafless, but very near lifeless.

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1801.  Chester Chron., 13 Nov., 4/1.

        Go, hear the limbless, wounded, moan,
The shrieks of pain, the dying groan.

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1881.  Mivart, Cat, 459. The class also contains certain limbless creatures which look like something between snakes and earthworms.

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