bootlicker
/ˈbuːtlɪkə
/noun informal
An obsequious or servile person: he’s got bootlickers telling him what a big star he’s going to be...
- We would rather be that voice than the voice of the sycophants and bootlickers and those hoping for a spot at the trough.
- But while most of the defendants there were grovellers and bootlickers, he was not.
- Everyone knows that the helium-voiced bootlickers don't know a thing about the environment.
Synonyms
sycophant, obsequious person, toady, fawner, flatterer, creep, crawler, lickspittle, truckler, groveller, doormat, kowtower, spaniel, Uriah Heep
North American informal suck-up, brown-nose, brown-noser
British vulgar slang arse-licker, arse-kisser, bum-sucker
North American vulgar slang ass-kisser, suckhole
archaic toad-eater
Derivatives
bootlicking
- What precedent is there for such servile bootlicking?
- I confess, I'm a sycophant, even if my bootlicking inclines less toward, oh say, administration officials than foul-mouthed and amusing anti-propagandists.
- An additional point is this: there's been a lot of really, really bad, banal, sugar-coated and bootlicking traditional art.