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Glite Dictionary
🛣️ A small road 🌾 Rural or simple
back road

back road

1 3.6
Relating to the countryside and a simple, not fancy way of life
  • adjective
translation icon : rural
  • Crazy back roads.

Examples

  • About halfway along its course, at a back-road bridge in Maryland known as Porter's Crossing, the Pocomoke is more than fifty feet across.

    Academic text (1998)

  • Shelby: Back roads, huh?

    Savage Salvation (2022)

  • "Hell, the border isn't even marked yet at these back-road crossings?"

    Fiction book (1994)

  • The quaint bed-and-breakfast was located on a back road far from the busy city center.

  • Driving along the back road, we enjoyed the peaceful scenery away from the hustle and bustle.

  • She preferred the charm of a back road café over the crowded restaurants in town.

Synonyms

backcountry
vsback road
  • US
5.4

In wild areas far from towns and roads

implies a simple, unsophisticated character rather than neutral geography

Antonyms

urban area
41 2.7

A place with many people and buildings like a city

How Rural

remote
218 3.6
back road
1 3.6
rural
392 2.5
suburban
234 3.5
urban
571 2.5

Surface Forms

back road positive

Morphology

back + road

The primary meaning 'a rural or out-of-the-way road' follows straightforwardly from combining 'back' (at the rear/less prominent) with 'road' (a path for vehicles): a road away from main routes. Although the secondary figurative sense of 'unsophisticated' is metaphorical, the locational/compositional meaning is clear and would be recoverable by a B1 learner who knows both words.

Etymology

Back road The adjective back road comes from those same quiet country roads far from main streets. Because these roads suggest a simple, homey life, calling something back road says it is 'rural' or 'simple'.