a. Also 4 sporeles, 5 sporles. [f. SPUR sb.1 + -LESS. Cf. G. spornlos.]
1. Lacking a spur; having no spurs. Also in fig. context.
c. 1300. Pol. Songs (Camden), 7. Thou shalt ride sporeles o thy lyard.
c. 1400. Pilgr. Sowle (Caxton, 1483), V. x. 101. There come pryke forthe sporles Humylyte and ranne ageyne pryde.
1864. Lowell, Fireside Trav., 266. Digging at the sides of his mule with his spurless heels.
1880. in Mrs. Power O’Donoghue, Ladies on Horseback (1881), 251. He has never seen a spurless boot so entangled.
2. Of birds or their legs: Devoid of spurs.
1819. Stephens, in Shaw’s Gen. Zool., XI. I. 243. Argus:… the tarsi spurless: the tail ascending.
1849. D. J. Browne, Amer. Poultry Yd. (1855), 141. Bill and spurless legs less stout.
1859. Darwin, Orig. Spec., iv. (1860), 88. A hornless stag or spurless cock.
3. Bot. Having no spur or calcar.
1839. Lindley, Sch. Bot., iv. 36. Petals 4;… two convex and spurless.
1849. Craig, Spurless-violet, the plant Erpeton reniformis.
1855. Miss Pratt, Flower. Pl., V. 196. Spurless Coral root.
4. Of branches: Destitute of fruiting-spurs.
1868. Rep. U.S. Commissioner Agric. (1869), 122. These long, spurless branches can be thinned out by removing them entirely.
