chicken-livered

adjective

chick·​en-liv·​ered ˈchi-kən-ˌli-vərd 

: fainthearted, cowardly

Synonyms

• afraid
• milk-livered [archaic]
• yellow
• scared
• frightened
• careful
• chicken
• pusillanimous
• unheroic
• cowardly
• craven
• gutless

Examples of chicken-livered in a Sentence

a chicken-livered newspaper editor who has been afraid to take on the town's powerful business elite

Word History

First Known Use

1804, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for chicken-livered

• delivered
• quivered
• shivered
• undelivered