| 释义 |
▪ I. pickthank, n. and a. arch. and dial.|ˈpɪkθæŋk|
[f. the phrase to pick a thank or thanks: see pick v.1 8 b, and pick-.]
A. n. One who ‘picks a thank’, i.e. curries favour with another, esp. by informing against some one else; a flatterer, sycophant; a tale-bearer, tell-tale.
1500–20Dunbar Poems xxii. 43 To be a pykthank I wald preif. 1551Gray's N.-Y. Gift to Somerset 86 in Furniv. Ballads fr. MSS. I. 423 Refuse those pikethanckes that Imagyn lyes! 1565–73Cooper Thesaurus, Delâtor,..a secrete accusour or complayner: a tell tale: a picke thanke. 1596Shakes. 1 Hen. IV, iii. ii. 25. a 1641 Bp. R. Montagu Acts & Mon. (1642) 289 These speeches that pick-thank reported to Antipater, with exaggerations of his own to make them more odious. 1710L. Milbourne Resist. Higher Powers 24 When other pick-thanks might be ready to inform against them. 1820Scott Abbot vi, I had been called pickthank and tale-pyet. 1879Sala Paris herself again (1880) I. xvii. 279 What a pickthank..that simple party of English people might have thought me.
B. adj. (attrib. use of n.) Given to ‘picking thanks’; flattering, sycophantic; tale-bearing; basely officious.
1561J. Awdelay Frat. Vacab. 14 This is a pickthanke knaue, that would make his Maister beleue that the Cowe is woode. 1600Dekker Gentle Craft Wks. 1873 I. 15 He sets more discord in a noble house, By one daies broching of his pick-thanke tales, Than can be salved again in twentie yeares. 1692R. L'Estrange Josephus, Antiq. xvi. xvi. (1733) 446 He..never fail'd of some pick-thank Story or other to carry away with him. 1850L. Hunt Autobiog. xii. (1860) 200 An effeminate parader of phrases of endearment and pickthank adulation.
Hence † ˈpickthankly a., of the character of a pickthank; † ˈpickthankness, the quality or character of being a pickthank.
1702C. Mather Magn. Chr. iii. ii. xiii. (1852) 410 The Arch-Bishop, instead of being offended as the pick-thankly reporter hoped he would have been, fell a laughing heartily. 1672Marvell Reh. Transp. i. 284 But for the pickthankness of some of the Clergy, who will alwayes presume to have the thanks and honour of it.
▪ II. ˈpickthank, v. rare.
[f. prec. n.]
intr. To play the pickthank, curry favour with (a person); † trans. to obtain by sycophancy (obs.). Hence ˈpickthanking vbl. n. and ppl. a.
Sometimes app. misused for to pick faults, pick holes.
1621Lady M. Wroth Urania 43 While he did credit pickthanking Counsellors. 1642Rogers Naaman 308 Many there bee who..to flatter and pickethanke with their Masters..do great things. a1734North Exam. ii. iv. §95 (1740) 278 He did it to pick-thank an Opportunity of getting more Money. [1830Examiner 132/2 The most fastidious and pick-thanking critic. 1863Cowden Clarke Shaks. Char. v. 131 How constantly Shakespeare releases himself from the pick-thanking of his critics.] |