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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

... large and nervous party of fugitives of mixed nationalities and professions—consuls, charges, attaches, and innocent, agitated citizens—was summarily grabbed and ordered into indefinite limbo. ...

— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers

... the past. We should not do so, although every rag of printed paper swept from the gutter would have some connection with the past day's event. But its significance, the significance of the words printed upon it is so small, that we relegate it into the limbo of the accidental and meaningless. There is no vital connection between the many torn bits of paper—only an accidental connection. Each bit of paper has reference to some actual event: a bus-ticket, an envelope, ...

— Fantasia of the Unconscious • D. H. Lawrence

... we have worked out the best possible system of education for women. But that there was opposition to giving women the same educational facilities as men was not saying that there was or ever had been a conspiracy on foot to keep her in intellectual limbo because she was a woman. The history of learning shows clearly enough that women have always shared in its rise. In the great revival of the sixteenth century they took an honorable part. "I see the robbers, hangmen, adventurers, hostlers ...

— The Business of Being a Woman • Ida M. Tarbell

... councilors. They agreed, unconsciously, in a mute love for the muddy field through which they tramped, with eyes narrowed close by the concentration of their minds. At length they drew breath, let the argument fly away into the limbo of other good arguments, and, leaning over a gate, opened their eyes for the first time and looked about them. Their feet tingled with warm blood and their breath rose in steam around them. The bodily exercise made them both feel more direct and less self-conscious ...

— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf

... and the consequent sterility of the milk, the evil eye and the cattle dying, etc., etc.,—it will take more than altar denunciations, believe me,—it will take years of vigorous education to relegate these ideas into the limbo of exploded fantasies. And the people won't be comfortable without them. You take away the poetry, which is an essential element in the Gaelic character, and you make the people prosaic and critical, which is the worst thing possible for ...

— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan

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