yellowbelly

[ yel-oh-bel-ee ]

/ ˈyɛl oʊˌbɛl i /

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See synonyms for yellowbelly on Thesaurus.com

noun, plural yel·low·bel·lies.

Slang. a person who is without courage, fortitude, or nerve; coward.

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Origin of yellowbelly

First recorded in 1790–1800; yellow + belly

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

How to use yellowbelly in a sentence

She attends hip-hop and belly dance classes (known as Arabic dance in Iran) just to shine more at parties.
Iran’s Becoming a Footloose Nation as Dance Lessons Spread|IranWire|January 2, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Abraham, a yellow cab driver and student, feels that blacks are targeted unfairly by the police.
Ground Zero of the NYPD Slowdown|Batya Ungar-Sargon|January 1, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Some of the items Indonesian military aircraft saw were long yellow tubes.
Wreckage, Bodies of AirAsia Crash Found|Lennox Samuels|December 30, 2014|DAILY BEAST
With the first set I did, the colors of the couch determined that the rest of it would be blue and yellow and white.
#Setinthestreet: Your Street Corner Is Their Art Project|James Joiner|December 24, 2014|DAILY BEAST

He holds them on his belly and looks at them with a magnifying glass, studying possible escape routes.
Alfred Hitchcock’s Fade to Black: The Great Director’s Final Days|David Freeman|December 13, 2014|DAILY BEAST
The pink flowers are the largest while those of a yellow color are the smallest.
Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce|E. R. Billings.
The flowers grow in clusters from the extremities of the stalk; they are yellow externally and of a delicate red within.
Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce|E. R. Billings.
There is a companion who condoleth with his friend for his belly's sake, and he will take up a shield against the enemy.
The Bible, Douay-Rheims Version|Various
He was cast down to think that he might have spared himself the trouble of donning his beautiful yellow doublet from Paris.
St. Martin's Summer|Rafael Sabatini
In the presence of bromin the chloroform, which settles to the bottom, assumes a yellow color.
A Manual of Clinical Diagnosis|James Campbell Todd

British Dictionary definitions for yellowbelly (1 of 2)

yellow belly

noun

dialect a native of Lincolnshire, esp of the fens

British Dictionary definitions for yellowbelly (2 of 2)

yellow-belly

noun plural -lies

a slang word for coward

Australian another name for callop

Derived forms of yellow-belly

yellow-bellied, adjective

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012