primitive Definition

primitive
adj

1. Relating or belonging to earliest times or the earliest stages of development.

Thesaurus: ancient, earliest, early, old, primeval, archaic, primordial.
2. Simple, rough, crude or rudimentary.

Thesaurus: simple, rudimentary, crude, Neanderthal, uncivilized, naive, undeveloped, untrained, childlike, untutored, rough, rude, unsophisticated, uncultivated, unrefined; Antonym: advanced, civilized, developed.
3. art.
Simple, naïve or unsophisticated in style.
4. biol.
Original; belonging to an early stage of development.

noun

1. An unsophisticated person or thing.
2a. A work by an artist in naïve style;
2b. An artist who produces such a work.

Derivative: primitively
adverb

Derivative: primitiveness
noun

Etymology: 15c: from Latin primitivus, meaning ‘first of its kind', from primus first.