Word.ws English Dictionary

pure as the driven snow

pure as the driven snow adjective: extremely pure; totally pure (typically "pure" in the sense of "virtuous").

Adjective

pure as the driven snow (not comparable)

  1. (simile) Extremely pure; totally pure (typically "pure" in the sense of "virtuous").

Forms of pure as the driven snow

alternative formpure as driven snow
alternative formpure as the driven

Origin of pure as the driven snow

According to Gary Martin, the term refers to "snow that has blown into drifts and is untrodden and clean". He also notes records of the similar phrase "white as driven snow" since 1611.

Questions about pure as the driven snow

What does pure as the driven snow mean?
Pure as the driven snow means extremely pure; totally pure (typically "pure" in the sense of "virtuous").
What part of speech is pure as the driven snow?
Pure as the driven snow is an adjective.

Words near pure as the driven snow in the dictionary

  1. pure
  2. pure air
  3. pure and simple
  4. pure as driven snow
  5. pure as the driven
  6. pure as the driven snow
  7. pure blue
  8. Pure Brightness Festival
  9. pure cancer
  10. pure collector
  11. pure collectors

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: pure as the driven snow (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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-pure as the driven snow.ogg.

Cite this entry: “pure as the driven snow.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/pure_as_the_driven_snow. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.