couchant

American  

[kou-chuhnt] / ˈkaʊ tʃənt /

adjective

1. lying down; crouching.

2. Heraldry. (of an animal) represented as lying on its stomach with its hind legs and forelegs pointed forward.

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couchant British  

/ ˈkaʊtʃənt /

adjective

1. (usually postpositive) heraldry in a lying position

   a lion couchant

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Etymology

Origin of couchant

1400–50; late Middle English < Middle French, present participle of coucher to lay or lie. See couch, -ant

Example Sentences

Gen. Ambrose Burnside as commander of the Army of the Potomac, “but if the couchant lion postpones his spring too long, people will begin wondering whether he is not a stuffed specimen after all.”

From The Wall Street Journal

We see Kim getting dressed or undressed, lounging poolside or couchant on beds or “in my closet in Miami trying on clothes.”

From The New Yorker

Ahead could be discerned the famous rock, although viewed from an altitude and "end on" its well-known appearance as a lion couchant was absent.

From Project Gutenberg

Other positions must be named with care and the prowling “lion passant” distinguished from the rampant beast, as well as from such rarer shapes as the couchant lion, the lion sleeping, sitting or leaping.

From Project Gutenberg

The centre, which is in the light, is occupied by a couchant lion growling, his one paw on a bundle of arrows, the symbol of the United Provinces.

From Project Gutenberg