COWARDLY • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Cowardly

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/kˈaʊərdli/ Listen

adjective

Cowardly adj.

Wanting courage; basely or weakly timid or fearful; pusillanimous; spiritless. "The cowardly rascals that ran from the battle."

Proceeding from fear of danger or other consequences; befitting a coward; dastardly; base; as, cowardly malignity. "The cowardly rashness of those who dare not look danger in the face."

Synonyms: Timid; fearful; timorous; dastardly; pusillanimous; recreant; craven; faint-hearted; chicken-hearted; white-livered.

adverb

Cowardly adv. In the manner of a coward.

See images of 'Cowardly'

Etymology of 'Cowardly'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Cowardly" Quotes from Famous Books

... that the winds and storms make war to this day upon men, wrecking their canoes, tearing down their houses and fences and ruining all their handiwork. Not only does man hold out against these attacks, but, in revenge for the cowardly desertion of Tu by his weaker brethren, men, his people, prey upon the fish and upon the plants that give food whether wild ...

— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves

... my life. Listen, Fan. That cowardly, sickly little boy you fought for in the street, that day in Winnebago, showed every sign of growing up a cowardly, sickly man. You're the real reason for his not doing so. Now, wait a minute. I was an impressionable little ...

— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber

... that he set this trap almost daily, and daily took a great number of birds whose necks he wrung and had them cooked for him with rice by his silly mother; that it was a sin in any case to take little birds by such cowardly means, but that since amongst these birds there were larks and thrushes and plump blackbirds and other sweet musicians of the air, whose innocent lives were spent in singing the praises of God, his sin became ...

— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini

... that the present generation of continental Europe, which has been for fifteen months a daily witness of Great Britain's barbarous and infamous conduct of the war—the unexampled massacres, the shameless political falsity and hypocrisy, the cowardly ill-treatment of prisoners and wounded!—cannot possibly make any move towards reconciliation.—PROF. E. ...

— Gems (?) of German Thought • Various

... believe it," he said, turning very pale, "Bragelonne should be informed of it to-morrow; indeed he should, if I thought that poor La Valliere had forgotten the vows she had exchanged with Raoul. But no, it would be cowardly to betray any woman's secret; it would be criminal to disturb a ...

— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas

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