supple
Americanadjective
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bending readily without breaking or becoming deformed; pliant; flexible.
a supple bough.
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characterized by ease in bending; limber; lithe.
supple movements.
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characterized by ease, responsiveness, and adaptability in mental action.
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compliant or yielding.
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obsequious; servile.
verb (used with or without object)
adjective
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bending easily without damage
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capable of or showing easy or graceful movement; lithe
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mentally flexible; responding readily
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disposed to agree, sometimes to the point of servility
verb
Other Word Forms
- suppleness noun
- unsupple adjective
- unsuppleness noun
- unsupply adverb
Etymology
Origin of supple
1250–1300; (adj.) Middle English souple flexible, compliant < Old French: soft, yielding, lithe < Latin supplic- (stem of supplex ) submissive, suppliant, equivalent to sup- sup- + -plic-, variously explained as akin to plicāre to fold 1, bend (thus meaning “bent over”; complex ), or to plācāre to placate 1 (thus meaning “in the attitude of a suppliant”); (v.) Middle English supplen to soften, derivative of the noun (compare Old French asoplir )
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.
His language is supple and his portraits of characters invariably delightful.
The Grateful Dead’s commitment to loose improvisation, to stretching songs out until they became gummy and supple, helped set it apart from more traditional rock groups.
That makes me feel comfortable when it’s technical and not actually getting lost in this thing of like, “I need complete silence. My body needs to be supple and ready.”
From Los Angeles Times
Last week, one of Italy's top luxury brands, Prada, invited journalists to its Scandicci factory outside Florence, showing the step-by-step transformation of supple leather into luxury handbags.
From Barron's
Showy but intimate, talky yet supple, it’s murmuring assurances to rebut the very doubts he’s raising.
From Los Angeles Times
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.
