lickspittle

plural lickspittles · alternative lick-spittle

1. A fawning toady; a base sycophant.

   "I've found you out and know you thoroughly, you mean, whining lickspittle!"

   1857, Charlotte Brontë, “chapter 5”, in The Professor

   5 more examples

   "You're a suck, a suck and a lickspittle, that's what you are," said the pale man, his voice trembling with passion.

   1920, Sherwood Anderson, “chapter 21”, in Poor White

   His preposterous insults were legendary, and there are accounts of his small-hour attacks on petty moralists and literary lickspittles in obscure Madrid dives where he chain-smoked and drank gallons of gin.

   1993 January 8, James Kirkup, “Obituary: Juan Benet”, in The Independent

   In Ottawa, Senator Marjory LeBreton claimed in a speech on Wednesday that allegations of spending abuses by her colleagues were “hyped-up media stories” that were inevitable in a “town populated by Liberal elites and their media lickspittles.”

   2013 May 23, “Note to politicians: Stop blaming the media for your problems (Editorial)”, in Globe and Mail, Canada

   “I frankly couldn't give a cat's knuckle about Gizmo. I mean, he's just kind of this fluttering lickspittle that is always bouncing about, always behind Nandor. But Nandor likes him.” “Oh, shut up, Colin Robinson. You're giving me the pip.”

   2021 September 2, Paul Simms, “The Prisoner” (1:01 from the start), in What We Do in the Shadows, season 3, episode 1, spoken by Colin Robinson (Mark Proksch)

   Like a moustachioed pantomime villain relishing boos and hisses from the audience, Trump is oblivious to warnings and protestations from the sane world and simply contemptuous of the lickspittle mob desperately hoping to go unnoticed.

   2026 January 24, Michael Pascoe, “America’s mighty economic power has feet of clay”, in Michael West Media

   Synonyms: brown-noser, flatterer, sycophant, toady

2. broadlyThe practice of giving empty flattery for personal gain.

present singular third person lickspittles · participle present lickspittling · participle past lickspittled · past lickspittled · alternative lick-spittle

1. intransitivetransitiveTo play the toady; take the role of a lickspittle to please (someone).

   "[Y]ou take his side, and that is wrong! ...If some young school teacher, or some young lad, lickspittles to him, it's bad enough."

   1886, Aylmer and Louise Maude, The Light Shines in Darkness, translation of original by Leo Tolstoy, act 1