headless

From Middle English heedles, hevedles, from Old English hēafodlēas (“headless”), equivalent to head +‎ -less. Cognate with Dutch hoofdloos (“headless”), Danish hovedløs (“headless”), Swedish huvudlös (“headless”), Icelandic höfuðlaus (“headless”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈhɛdləs/
• Rhymes: -ɛdləs

headless (not comparable)

1. Without a head; decapitated.

   How did the headless horseman see to chase Ichabod?

2. Without leadership.

   The headless army blundered along after the death of their general, accomplishing nothing.

   • 1614, Walter Ralegh [i.e., Walter Raleigh], The Historie of the World […], London: […] William Stansby for Walter Burre, […], →OCLC, (please specify |book=1 to 5):

     His forsaken soldiers, being now a headless company, and no longer an army to be feared, obtained nevertheless a reasonable composition from the Carthaginians […]

3. (linguistics, of a phrase or compound) Not having a head morpheme or word.
4. (computing) Running without a graphical user interface; running without any attached output device (e.g., monitor) or input device (e.g., keyboard, mouse).
   • 2003, William Boswell, Inside Windows Server 2003, Addison-Wesley, →ISBN, page 62:

     /redirect. Used for console redirection in headless servers.

   • 2007, Carla Schroder, Linux Networking Cookbook, O’Reilly Media, published 2008, →ISBN, page 47:

     Routers typically run headless, without a keyboard or monitor.

   • 2010, Charles Bell et al., MySQL High Availability: Tools for Building Robust Data Centers, O'Reilly Media, →ISBN, page 278:

     This is not unexpected for a Windows system running as a virtual machine or a headless server […]

5. (of beer) Without a head of foam.
6. (obsolete) Heedless.
   • 1579, E. K. (Edward Kirke?), Notes on Spenser’s The Shepheardes Calender

     If any one will rashly blame such his choice of old and unwonted words, him may I more justly blame and condemn, either of witless headiness in judging, or of headless hardiness in condemning.

   • 1579, Immeritô [pseudonym; Edmund Spenser], The Shepheardes Calender: […], London: […] Hugh Singleton, […], →OCLC; reprinted as H[einrich] Oskar Sommer, editor, The Shepheardes Calender […], London: John C. Nimmo, […], 1890, →OCLC:

     THENOT: Cuddy, I wot thou kenſt little Good, / So vainly to advance thy headleſs Hood.

7. (obsolete, firearms) Rimless, not having a cartridge case rim (flange).

   A headless shell doesn't have a flange.