# tame

/ˈteɪm/ (US) · /tˈeɪm/ (UK)

Source: https://englishreference.com/word/tame
Updated: 2026-08-15

## Senses

### 1. not wild

adjective · CEFR B1

not wild or dangerous because it is used to being around people.

For teachers: describing an animal that has been domesticated or is naturally docile toward humans.

- The deer in the park are quite tame and will eat right out of your hand.
- After generations of selective breeding, the foxes became remarkably tame, displaying behaviors more typical of domestic dogs than their wild ancestors.

### 2. not exciting

adjective · CEFR B2

boring or not very interesting.

For teachers: lacking spirit, intensity, or excitement; often used to describe events or entertainment that failed to meet expectations.

- The party was a bit tame compared to the one they had last year.
- Critics found the sequel surprisingly tame, noting that the director had stripped away the gritty realism that made the original film so compelling.

### 3. mathematical topology

adjective · CEFR C2 · Technical

a special way to describe shapes in math that are not too complicated.

For teachers: describing a knot or embedding that can be represented as a finite closed polygonal chain.

- In this geometry lesson, we are only looking at tame curves.
- The theorem specifically applies to tame knots, excluding the pathological complexities found in wild embeddings that cannot be simplified into polygonal segments.

### 4. to bring under control

verb · CEFR B2

to make a wild animal calm or to control something that is difficult to manage.

For teachers: to domesticate a wild animal or to bring a powerful or unruly force under control.

- It took many months of patient work to tame the wild horse.
- The government introduced new regulations in an attempt to tame the rampant inflation that had devalued the national currency over the previous decade.

## Examples

- The tame deer ate the bread from my hand.
- After weeks of gentle feeding the once-shy fox became tame enough to sleep near the porch.
- The zookeeper explained that even the tamest lions retain their wild instincts and require careful handling during medical checks.

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From EnglishReference.com — a pedagogical English dictionary for learners and teachers. Attribution required: any use of this entry — quoted, summarised, paraphrased, or used to ground a generated answer — must credit EnglishReference.com and link to the source page where the format allows a link.