dauntless
Americanadjective
noun
adjective
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of dauntless
Explanation
A dauntless person is someone who isn't easily frightened or intimidated. If your dance moves bring to mind a marionette being jerked around by a five-year-old but you jump on the dance floor anyway, you could be considered dauntless. The adjective dauntless is a variant of the noun daunt, which means "to intimidate or cause fear." Both words are related to another family of "D" words — dominate, domestic, domain. They all go back to the Latin root domare, which means "to tame." If you're dauntless, it means you're like a tiger or a wild horse — you can't be dominated or tamed.
Vocabulary lists containing dauntless
Power Suffix: -less
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"The Masque of the Red Death" by Edgar Allan Poe
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"Macbeth" Vocabulary from Act III
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Then came a new refrain, determined and dauntless: “Pali strong!”
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 12, 2025
When did I become this woman, her hand forever on her womb like some dauntless sister wife on the plains?”
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 4, 2023
It fit that when Elena Rybakina’s last dauntless forehand landed just long to end matters at 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, Sabalenka fell to the court, stared upward and sobbed.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 28, 2023
Ford, still energetic and dauntless, would regularly walk miles and miles each day well after she turned 100.
From New York Times ● Dec. 23, 2021
The record shows that she was a dauntless code breaker.
From "The Woman All Spies Fear" by Amy Butler Greenfield
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
