Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Without scathe or harm; without mischief, injury, or damage; unharmed.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Without scathe or harm; without mischief, injury, or damage; unharmed.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English scatheles, skathelæs ("scathless"), from Old English *sceaþlēas, equivalent to scathe +‎ -less. Cognate with Old Frisian skadlos, schadlos ("scatheless"), Dutch schadeloos ("harmless"), Middle Low German schadelōs, Middle High German schadelōs, Danish skadesløs ("harmless"), Swedish skadeslös ("harmless"), Icelandic skaðlaus ("harmless").

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Examples

  • Perish all shame, perish all glory; may he, saved by my effort, go scatheless wherever his heart desires.

    The Argonautica 2008

  • There is no scatheless rapture. love and time put me in this condition.

    Excerpt: Thirteen Moons by Charles Frazier 2006

  • But if ye shun the clashing rocks and come scatheless inside Pontus, straightway keep the land of the Bithynians on your right and sail on, and beware of the breakers, until ye round the swift river Rhebas and the black beach, and reach the harbour of the Isle of Thynias.

    The Argonautica 2008

  • Moreover, I will give you a splendid staff of riches and wealth: it is of gold, with three branches, and will keep you scatheless, accomplishing every task, whether of words or deeds that are good, which I claim to know through the utterance of Zeus.

    Hesiod, Homeric Hymns, and Homerica 2007

  • My feet have fallen in evil ways but Thou hast brought me forth scatheless and hast made me a scourge for the Powers of Evil.

    Wings in the Night Howard, Robert E. 2006

  • Were not the work indeed presented through you, my learned friends, I should scarce hope that it could come out scatheless and complete; for you have in general been the faithful witnesses of almost all the instances from which I have either collected the truth or confuted error.

    On the Motion of the Heart and Blood in Animals 2005

  • The bad men, said he, the weak and worthless, blunder into danger and burn their feet, but the good men, they who have any character, they who have that within them which can reflect credit on their alma mater, they come through scatheless.

    Barchester Towers 2004

  • Of course it was reported all through the assemblage that Harry was dead, and there was a pathetic scene between him and his mother when it was found that he had escaped scatheless from the fall.

    Barchester Towers 2004

  • Quinborough was a little town of 3,000 inhabitants clustering round the gates of a great Whig Marquis, which had been spared, — who can say why? — at the first Reform Bill, and having but one member had come out scatheless from the second.

    The American Senator 2004

  • “Others have gone through the same fire before,” he said to himself, as he walked downstairs, “and have come out scatheless.”

    The Small House at Allington 2004

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