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brown-nose
[ broun-nohz ]
verb (used without object)
- to curry favor; behave obsequiously.
verb (used with object)
- to seek favors from (a person) in an obsequious manner; fawn over.
noun
- Also brown-noser. a toady; sycophant.
brown-nose
1verb
- to be abjectly subservient (to); curry favour (with)
noun
- an abjectly subservient person; sycophant
brown nose
2noun
- vet science a form of light sensitization in cattle
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Word History and Origins
Origin of brown-nose1
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Word History and Origins
Origin of brown-nose1
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Idioms and Phrases
Solicit favor obsequiously, toady. For example, Harry was always brown nosing, but it didn't help his grades . This term originated in the military in the late 1930s, where it meant “to curry favor”; it alludes to ass-kissing when the backside being kissed is less than clean. Despite its scatological origin, today this slangy term is not considered particularly vulgar.Discover More
Example Sentences
Presently a brown nose appeared between the house and my hiding place.
Each was coal black except for a V-shaped white mark on the breast and a brown nose.
But the mother, who raised her brown nose suddenly from the cool mold out of which she had been digging lily-bulbs, had seen dogs.
Miss Amber had managed to shove her brown nose in front, with Regulator at her saddle girth.
Clay's dog put up his brown nose for a little attention, and got it.
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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
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