WHOLESOME

Pronunciation (US): (GB):

I. (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Sound or exhibiting soundness in body or mind

Example:

a grin on his ugly wholesome face

Classified under:

Adjectives

Similar:

healthy (having or indicating good health in body or mind; free from infirmity or disease)

Derivation:

wholesomeness (the quality of being beneficial and generally good for you)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Conducive to or characteristic of physical or moral well-being

Example:

wholesome food

Classified under:

Adjectives

Similar:

alimental; alimentary; nourishing; nutrient; nutritious; nutritive (of or providing nourishment)

heart-healthy (of foods that are low in fats and sodium and other ingredients that may foster heart disease)

good for you; healthy; salubrious (promoting health; healthful)

hearty; satisfying; solid; square; substantial (providing abundant nourishment)

organic (of or relating to foodstuff grown or raised without synthetic fertilizers or pesticides or hormones)

salubrious (favorable to health of mind or body)

Also:

healthful (conducive to good health of body or mind)

healthy (having or indicating good health in body or mind; free from infirmity or disease)

sound (financially secure and safe)

Antonym:

unwholesome (detrimental to physical or moral well-being)

Derivation:

wholesomeness (the quality of being beneficial and generally good for you)

Credits

Context examples:

It developed what little executive ability I possessed, and I was aware of a toughening or hardening which I was undergoing and which could not be anything but wholesome for “Sissy” Van Weyden.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

Folklore, legends, myths and fairy tales have followed childhood through the ages, for every healthy youngster has a wholesome and instinctive love for stories fantastic, marvelous and manifestly unreal.

(The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum)

She was always on friendly terms with her brother-in-law; and in the children, who loved her nearly as well, and respected her a great deal more than their mother, she had an object of interest, amusement, and wholesome exertion.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

It is true, I sometimes made a shift to catch a rabbit, or bird, by springs made of Yahoo’s hairs; and I often gathered wholesome herbs, which I boiled, and ate as salads with my bread; and now and then, for a rarity, I made a little butter, and drank the whey.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

Other helps had Jo—humble, wholesome duties and delights that would not be denied their part in serving her, and which she slowly learned to see and value.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

The best fruit in England—every body's favourite—always wholesome.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

They were a perfect nest of roses; they looked so wholesome and fresh.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

The army officer he found good-natured and simple, a healthy, wholesome young fellow, content to occupy the place in life into which birth and luck had flung him.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Besides, that would be all recreation and indulgence, without the wholesome alloy of labour, and I do not like to eat the bread of idleness.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

I acknowledged no natural claim on Adele's part to be supported by me, nor do I now acknowledge any, for I am not her father; but hearing that she was quite destitute, I e'en took the poor thing out of the slime and mud of Paris, and transplanted it here, to grow up clean in the wholesome soil of an English country garden.