couchant
Americanadjective
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lying down; crouching.
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Heraldry. (of an animal) represented as lying on its stomach with its hind legs and forelegs pointed forward.
adjective
Etymology
Origin of couchant
1400–50; late Middle English < Middle French, present participle of coucher to lay or lie. See couch, -ant
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
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 ● Jan. 23, 2026
“What I want to see before I die,” Frederick Douglass wrote, “is a monument representing the negro, not couchant on his knees like a four-footed animal, but erect on his feet like a man.”
From Washington Post ● Dec. 31, 2020
Which is the proper symbol for the Tories, asked the Manchester Guardian, lion rampant or hen couchant?
From Time Magazine Archive
Viewed from this situation, it certainly, if it resembles any animate object in nature, has something of the appearance of a terrible couchant lion, whose stupendous head menaces Spain.
From The Bible in Spain - Vol. 2 [of 2] by George Henry Borrow
"Cousinly questioned," says the King, And kingly flashes his eye; "Let the hog beware of the lion's lair, Though the lion couchant lie."
From The Deluge and Other Poems by John Presland
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.
