LIMBO • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Limbo

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/lˈɪmboʊ/ Listen

noun

Limbus, Limbo n.

(Scholastic Theol.) An spiritual region where certain classes of souls were supposed to await the last judgment. "As far from help as Limbo is from bliss." "A Limbo large and broad, since called The Paradise of fools." Note: The limbus patrum was considered as a place for the souls of good men who lived before the coming of our Savior. The limbus infantium was said to be a similar place for the souls of unbaptized infants. To these was added, in the popular belief, the limbus fatuorum, or fool's paradise, regarded as a receptacle of all vanity and nonsense.

Hence: Any real or imaginary place of restraint or confinement; a prison; as, to put a man in limbo.

Hence: A state of waiting, or uncertainty, in which final judgment concerning the outcome of a decision is postponed, perhaps indefinitely; neglect for an indefinite time; as, the proposal was left in limbo while opponents and proponents refused to compromise.

(Anat.) A border or margin; as, the limbus of the cornea.

Limbo n. A West Indian dance contest, in which participants must dance under a pole which is lowered successively until only one participant can successfully pass under, without falling. It is often performed at celebrations, such as weddings.

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Etymology of 'Limbo'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Limbo" Quotes from Famous Books

... others of his time, in regard to changes of level of the land and the origin of the crystalline rocks, that it did contain the principles upon which modern palaeontology is founded, while those of Cuvier are now in the limbo—so densely ...

— Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution - His Life and Work • Alpheus Spring Packard

... their guns and powder-kegs away, forgot their chief, and all thoughts of loyalty, and fled on the instant, fear lifting their heels high in the air; or, tugging at their eye-balls, and kneading the senses confusedly, they saw, heard, and suspected nothing, save that the limbo of fetishes had ...

— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson

... concealment, nor disguise. And yet no phantoms were ever more unreal than they to those who seek them. Who are they? The officers have been summoned on many occasions; but each and every time in some manner or way they had contrived to elude them. There are some who have consigned them to the limbo of illusion. But ...

— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint

... arrival; and, as was perversely ruled, it was just here that an accident occurred that might well have been judged impossible. The easel, in fact, with its huge canvas, was overset, carrying many things into limbo as they fell; and with the fate that too often pursues the unfortunate, Murphy therefore found himself suddenly buried beneath a mixed assortment of articles to which he had hitherto been strange. To add to the rest, a whole string ...

— 'Murphy' - A Message to Dog Lovers • Major Gambier-Parry

... who paid him sportive homage, and pretty women, as he illustrated, by means of a wineglass, two knives, and a saltspoon, his new invention for having one's boots fastened by electricity, which was to do for Marconigrams, expose radium as a foolish fraud, and consign clock-work to limbo. "You don't touch the buttons and the invention does ...

— The Twelfth Hour • Ada Leverson

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