Word.ws English Dictionary

life-blood

life-blood is the alternative form of lifeblood.

Meaning of lifeblood

Noun

lifeblood (usually uncountable, plural lifebloods)

  1. (usually) Blood that is needed for continued life; blood regarded as the seat of life.
    • [Y]ou desire his mana, yet you respect his tabu, for in you and him alike runs the common life-blood.1920, Edward Carpenter, Pagan and Christian Creeds, New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., page 62
  2. (figuratively, usually) That which is required for continued existence or function.
    • Gasoline is the lifeblood of the modern city.
    Synonyms:
    essence

Forms of life-blood

plurallife-bloods

Questions about life-blood

What is life-blood the alternative form of?
Life-blood is the alternative form of lifeblood.

Words near life-blood in the dictionary

  1. life-affirming
  2. life-and-death
  3. life-arrow
  4. life-arrows
  5. life-bearing
  6. life-blood
  7. life-buoy
  8. life-buoys
  9. life-car
  10. life-care
  11. life-cars

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: life-blood (page history and authors); lifeblood (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “life-blood.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/life-blood. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.