bow out

/ (baʊ) /


verb
  1. (adverb; usually tr often foll by of) to retire or withdraw gracefully

Words Nearby bow out

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

How to use bow out in a sentence

  • He used to shoot arrows with a bow out of the door of the house and hit a mark on a tree that was opposite him.

  • Edith leaned over the terrace wall, and took the double-bass bow out of the tall clump of sweet peas.

    Dodo's Daughter | E. F. Benson
  • I took a bow out of a man's hand, and then an arrow, and fitted it to the string; he made signs that he shot birds with it.

    Life of John Coleridge Patteson | Charlotte M. Yonge
  • And all this Inter-Solar man would do now was to bow out and try poaching elsewhere.

    Plague Ship | Andre Norton
  • He pulled the violin and bow out of the old baize bag and fiddled as we walked.

    The Belovd Vagabond | William J. Locke

Other Idioms and Phrases with bow out

bow out

Depart, withdraw, resign, as in After five years as chairman, I felt it was time I bowed out, or We'll have to beat them; they'll never bow out. [First half of 1900s]

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.