white-livered
Americanadjective
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lacking courage; cowardly; lily-livered.
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lacking in vitality or spirit; pale; unhealthy.
adjective
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lacking in spirit or courage
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pallid and unhealthy in appearance
Etymology
Origin of white-livered
First recorded in 1540–50
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.
That will separate the men from the boys, the ones with guts and the ones too white-livered to face Hoffa and his racketeers.
From Time Magazine Archive
I have spared him--he's a white-livered hound!--both once and twice, and we must go to the end with it since no better can be!
From Historical Romances: Under the Red Robe, Count Hannibal, A Gentleman of France by Weyman, Stanley J.
The one twit him with being a white-livered coward, the other consider him to be either a sneak or a "deep fellow."
From A Plea for the Criminal Being a reply to Dr. Chapple's work: 'The Fertility of the Unfit', and an Attempt to explain the leading principles of Criminological and Reformatory Science by Kayll, James Leslie Allan
“He’s a coward as well as a fool,” he said afterwards in the bosom of his family; “a white-livered fool who hasn’t the nerve to look at a sick child.”
From In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim by Burnett, Frances Hodgson
What your old friend has said is true: I’m a cur and a white-livered coward to sneak in on you the way I did.”
From Captain Pott's Minister by Cooper, Francis L. (Francis Le Roy)
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.
