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单词 timorous
释义

Definition of timorous in English:

timorous

adjective ˈtɪm(ə)rəsˈtɪm(ə)rəs
  • Showing or suffering from nervousness or a lack of confidence.

    a timorous voice
    Example sentencesExamples
    • They've swiped the Hippocratic Oath: first, do no harm - and as a result their rhetoric and critiques are timorous and toothless.
    • Man, these people are just too stupid to be trusted with appointments - and too timorous to deserve to a university position from which to dribble out the contents of their weak little minds.
    • At the moment, however, he is tackling arguably his most challenging subject, one which many lesser and more timorous artists would not dare contemplate for fear that it might ruin their fragile reputations.
    • In terms of modern PC attitudes toward war and national solidarity, it's a big bucket of cold water down the pants of the timorous, and it reminds you how unapologetic popular patriotism used to be.
    • But sadly it is all too typical of the dismissive attitude adopted by those at the Executive who seem to think that an airy-fairy, and probably timorous, arts lobby will go away if told that everything will be all right.
    • So there are enormous consequences for all of us when the owners elect not to act like owners, but like timorous lackeys desperate to please management.
    • Neil Gatland as Malvolio displays an austere exterior well suited to his bitter antagonism with Sir Toby and yet is very funny to watch when at last it cracks into a hopeful, timorous smile.
    • If it had been, a particularly vicious correction must have occurred to turn Britain back into the timorous, conservative country it became in the Seventies.
    • But the thinking behind it is consistent with the rather timorous, hands-off approach to recent conflicts.
    • There is still a strong impression that the party's political approach remains timorous and lacks creativity when it comes to figuring out new responses to old problems.
    • The best departments will encourage an entrepreneurship of information and ideas, which in turn requires daring, not conformity, and a cool-eyed rather than a timorous attitude to risk.
    • And deep in their tiny, timorous hearts they know it.
    • But the idea that a woman cannot be expected to cope with going into a witness box, where she will be publicly identified, is equally stereotypical: it implies a degraded notion of weak and timorous women.
    • Girls, allegedly timorous and lacking in confidence, now outnumber boys in student government, in honor societies, on school newspapers, and in debating clubs.
    • Some are behemoths in the truest sense of the word, massive as oil tankers, others, small knock-kneed and timorous and as prone to panic attacks as barking deer.
    • The Welshman, who had stepped away from Livingston's timorous back line, seemed almost to be in the prone position when he wheeled to thrash a low volley inside the left-hand post.
    • And we have become a surprisingly timorous nation because we don't ask our leaders, our politicians serious questions.
    • I still cannot quite believe that this cowering timorous country of ours has produced such an extravagant masterpiece, and it has achieved something that not many modern buildings do - it has won the affection of those who use it.
    • Eileen wants a man with ‘a nice face, kind eyes and a gentle voice,’ but can only break out of her meek and timorous shell in her fantasies.
    • Even a timorous proposal to convert taxis from diesel to less-polluting petrol five years ago failed to win legislative support.
    Synonyms
    easily frightened, lacking courage, fearful, apprehensive, faint-hearted
    trembling, quaking, cowering, weak-kneed
    shy, diffident, bashful, self-effacing, shrinking, unassuming, unassertive, reserved, retiring, reticent, quiet, timid, nervous, modest, demure, coy, meek, humble
    informal wimpish, sissy, yellow, yellow-bellied, chicken, gutless, trepidatious
    archaic poor-spirited, recreant

Derivatives

  • timorously

  • adverb ˈtɪm(ə)rəsliˈtɪm(ə)rəsli
    • ‘I wanna give you one of these, Chester,’ he said, and timorously gave him a copy of his book.
      Example sentencesExamples
      • And he timorously puts up his hand and asks the drill sergeant when they get their rifles.
      • The Cold War and the nuclear threat got us into the habit of timorously cowering at the prospect of any great action.
      • It's their actions that send our hands flying to our eyes, he says, and our need to understand their motives that then gives us the courage to peep timorously through our fingers.
      • I have considered carefully whether one should cling timorously to the coastline in search of a defining principle before being willing to right such a wrong.
  • timorousness

  • noun ˈtɪm(ə)rəsnəsˈtɪm(ə)rəsnəs
    • This startling performance was followed by the even greater upheaval of 1838 when he gave an address to the Harvard Divinity School that was a religious counterpart to his trashing of scholarly timorousness and convention.
      Example sentencesExamples
      • But Hobbes did take both scepticism and philosophy seriously, and there was a kind of courage in his doing so which far outweighed his famous personal timorousness.
      • His other dominant characteristic was a certain timorousness.
      • Chaos was beginning to overtake the townships, as children, outraged by the timorousness of their parents, seized the initiative themselves.
      • I note that she herself falls short of recommending specific books or topics, and thus can be accused of the same timorousness that she ascribes to the text writers.

Origin

Late Middle English (in the sense 'feeling fear'): from Old French temoreus, from medieval Latin timorosus, from Latin timor 'fear', from timere 'to fear'.

 
 

Definition of timorous in US English:

timorous

adjectiveˈtim(ə)rəsˈtɪm(ə)rəs
  • Showing or suffering from nervousness, fear, or a lack of confidence.

    a timorous voice
    Example sentencesExamples
    • At the moment, however, he is tackling arguably his most challenging subject, one which many lesser and more timorous artists would not dare contemplate for fear that it might ruin their fragile reputations.
    • But sadly it is all too typical of the dismissive attitude adopted by those at the Executive who seem to think that an airy-fairy, and probably timorous, arts lobby will go away if told that everything will be all right.
    • The Welshman, who had stepped away from Livingston's timorous back line, seemed almost to be in the prone position when he wheeled to thrash a low volley inside the left-hand post.
    • The best departments will encourage an entrepreneurship of information and ideas, which in turn requires daring, not conformity, and a cool-eyed rather than a timorous attitude to risk.
    • If it had been, a particularly vicious correction must have occurred to turn Britain back into the timorous, conservative country it became in the Seventies.
    • And deep in their tiny, timorous hearts they know it.
    • They've swiped the Hippocratic Oath: first, do no harm - and as a result their rhetoric and critiques are timorous and toothless.
    • And we have become a surprisingly timorous nation because we don't ask our leaders, our politicians serious questions.
    • There is still a strong impression that the party's political approach remains timorous and lacks creativity when it comes to figuring out new responses to old problems.
    • In terms of modern PC attitudes toward war and national solidarity, it's a big bucket of cold water down the pants of the timorous, and it reminds you how unapologetic popular patriotism used to be.
    • I still cannot quite believe that this cowering timorous country of ours has produced such an extravagant masterpiece, and it has achieved something that not many modern buildings do - it has won the affection of those who use it.
    • Neil Gatland as Malvolio displays an austere exterior well suited to his bitter antagonism with Sir Toby and yet is very funny to watch when at last it cracks into a hopeful, timorous smile.
    • But the idea that a woman cannot be expected to cope with going into a witness box, where she will be publicly identified, is equally stereotypical: it implies a degraded notion of weak and timorous women.
    • Girls, allegedly timorous and lacking in confidence, now outnumber boys in student government, in honor societies, on school newspapers, and in debating clubs.
    • Man, these people are just too stupid to be trusted with appointments - and too timorous to deserve to a university position from which to dribble out the contents of their weak little minds.
    • But the thinking behind it is consistent with the rather timorous, hands-off approach to recent conflicts.
    • Some are behemoths in the truest sense of the word, massive as oil tankers, others, small knock-kneed and timorous and as prone to panic attacks as barking deer.
    • Eileen wants a man with ‘a nice face, kind eyes and a gentle voice,’ but can only break out of her meek and timorous shell in her fantasies.
    • So there are enormous consequences for all of us when the owners elect not to act like owners, but like timorous lackeys desperate to please management.
    • Even a timorous proposal to convert taxis from diesel to less-polluting petrol five years ago failed to win legislative support.
    Synonyms
    easily frightened, lacking courage, fearful, apprehensive, faint-hearted

Origin

Late Middle English (in the sense ‘feeling fear’): from Old French temoreus, from medieval Latin timorosus, from Latin timor ‘fear’, from timere ‘to fear’.

 
 
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更新时间:2024/9/22 8:32:52