a. [f. THORN sb. + -LESS.] Having no thorns; free from thorns; without a thorn.
1776. Withering, Brit. Plants (1796), II. 461. [Mespilus germanica] Thornless: leaves spear-shaped, cottony underneath: flowers solitary, sitting.
1803. Visct. Strangford, Poems of Camoens, To Night (1810), 66. I … Have never yet been one of those Whose love has prov’d a thornless rose!
1825. H. Alford, in Life, 17. Perennial and thornless flowers bloom only in the Paradise above.
Hence Thornlessness.
1857. Livingstone, Trav., xviii. 345. The thornlessness of the vegetation is especially noticeable.
1888. N. Y. Times., 12 Feb., 12/5. A certain Polish Countess, wishing to symbolize the humility and thornlessness of her affection, always received him in a boudoir thickly carpeted with rose leaves.
