anonymous, a.
(əˈnɒnɪməs)
[f. Gr. ἀνώνυµος (whence also in L. anōnymos, anōnymus), f. ἀν priv. + ὄνοµα, in æolic ὄνυµα, name; + -ous. Often used in Gr. form early in 17th c.]
1. Nameless, having no name; of unknown name.
| 1601 Holland Pliny (1634) II. 274 Anonymos, finding no name to be called by, got therupon the name Anonymos. A Plant this is brought out of Scythia to vs. 1631 Whimzies 22 Hee is anonymos, and that wil secure him. 1675 Ogilby Brit. 24 The confluence of an Anonimous Rill with the Tame. 1712 Steele Spect. No. 546 ¶4 Amongst the crowd of other anonymous correspondents. 1794 Paley Evidences ii. vi. §41 These altars..were called anonymous, because there was not the name of any particular deity inscribed upon them. 1866 G. Macdonald Ann. Q. Neighb. xxxiii. 560 Clothed in the coat of darkness of an anonymous writer. |
b. Hence subst. A person whose name is not given, or is unknown.
| 1603 Harsnet Pop. Impost. 49 Killico, Hob and a third anonymos, are booked downe for 3 graund Commaunders. 1654 Whitlock Mann. Eng. 208 It were..wisdome it selfe, to read all Authors as Anonymo's, looking on the Sence, not Names of Books. 1832 Miss Porter Hungarian Bro. 15 To become certain that my anonymous is a woman. |
2. transf. Bearing no author's name; of unknown or unavowed authorship.
| 1676 Evelyn Mem. (1857) II. 111 An anonymous book, called Naked Truth. 1796 Morse Amer. Geog. I. 576 Observations from an anonymous pamphlet. 1831 Brewster Newton (1855) II. xv. 65 The anonymous attacks upon Newton. 1841 Myers Cath. Th. iii. §17. 62 Many of the books which they [the Jewish Scriptures] contain are anonymous. |
3. Unacknowledged, illegitimate. rare.
| 1881 Daily News 1 Feb. 5/8 The anonymous daughter of a King, who became enamoured of her mother while on a visit to Paris. |
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▸ Indistinguishable from others of its kind; unexceptional; bland, generic, nondescript.
| 1929 W. Faulkner Sound & Fury 330 A maroon velvet cape with a border of mangy and anonymous fur. 1975 L. Clarkson Death, Dis. & Famine in Pre-Industrial Eng. i. 4 An anonymous and uneventful life. 1991 N.Y. Times 13 Nov. c12/2 Gone are the days when everyone but an elite few drank anonymous plonk except at weddings. 2004 T. C. Boyle Inner Circle 417 Some anonymous diner in a town I've already forgotten. |
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▸ Of a person: generally unknown, unrecognized, or uncelebrated.
| 1932 W. Faulkner Light in August viii. 187 The odorreek of all anonymous men. 1953 Manch. Guardian Weekly 23 Apr. 2 Foreign Ministers, advisers, and anonymous brain trusters. 1976 Maclean's 3 May 67/1 No proficient Canadian novelist is as anonymous as John Buell, whose last novel..received..barely a mention here. 2000 C. Bohjalian Trans-sister Radio (2001) iii. 32 Most transgendered people are simply anonymous members of their communities. |
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▸ Of a place, institution, etc.: lacking a sense of community; impersonal.
| 1943 Amer. Sociol. Rev. 8 643 The type and individuality of the community, whether it be a cluster of isolated homesteads,..or an anonymous town or city. 1951 R. Hoggart Auden v. 137 Isolation in a vast anonymous Metroland such as New York. 1985 C. Jencks Mod. Movements in Archit. (ed. 2) Introd. 16 The popular Press attacked the whole idea of housing 1,600 people in a vast, anonymous, inhuman beehive. 2005 N.Y. Mag. 7 Feb. 34/1 The breaking up of vast, anonymous, 7,000-student educational gristmills into smaller, more intimate schools. |