fallow

/ˈfæloʊ/

/ˈfæləʊ/

Other forms: fallows

Something that is fallow is left unused. If you’re smart but lazy, someone might say you have a fallow mind.

We use the word to talk about any unused resource, it started as a work about land. Fallow comes from the old English word for plowing, and refers to the practice of leaving fields unplowed in rotation — when a field lies fallow, the soil regains nutrients that are sucked up by over-planting.

Definitions of fallow

1. adjective

   left unplowed and unseeded during a growing season
   “fallow farmland”

   synonyms:

   unbroken, unploughed, unplowed

   (of farmland) not plowed
2. adjective

   undeveloped but potentially useful
   “a fallow gold market”

   synonyms:

   undeveloped, unexploited

   undeveloped or unused
3. noun

   cultivated land that is not seeded for one or more growing seasons
   type of:

   cultivated land, farmland, ploughland, plowland, tillage, tilled land, tilth

   arable land that is worked by plowing and sowing and raising crops