Contentless?

Question

Somehow I only find "contentless" in the sense of "discontent". However I wonder if it can also mean "without content" (substance). I prefer it to "content-free", at least in the context I'm using it.

GPY · Accepted Answer

When I first saw the word in your subject line I thought of the "without content" meaning. The "discontented" meaning is not very familiar to me, and in a quick scan of various search results I could find no examples of its use in that sense. I wonder if it may be an old meaning.

Anonymous · Answer

Thanks, I find the "discontented" meaning strange myself, to be honest. It's offered in an English-German Dictionary and the FreeDictionary:
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/contentless

http://www.dict.cc/?s=contentless

And some grammar correction tool marked it as an unknown form, so I asked. But it seems to be understandable as "without content".

GPY · Answer

Anonymoushttp://www.thefreedictionary.com/contentless

This entry is copied from an old 1913 dictionary (a favourite with some websites as it is out of copyright). Wiktionary also lists the "discontented" meaning (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/contentless), but the example they give is from Shakespeare.

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