as in afraid
having or showing a shameful lack of courage
a chicken-livered newspaper editor who has been afraid to take on the town's powerful business elite
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
Example Sentences
Recent Examples of Synonyms for chicken-livered
Adjective
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Maybe a lot of producers are Melissas, afraid of the present, looking toward a past that never really existed.—
Jackson McHenry,
Vulture,
21 Apr. 2026 -
Miami is exceptionally good at finding role players , so don’t be afraid to trade a Kel’el Ware, Jaime Jaquez Jr, etc.—
Ira Winderman,
Sun Sentinel,
21 Apr. 2026
Adjective
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In perhaps one of their most public twinning moments, the mom and daughter don yellow coats and complementary hats at Epsom Downs Racecourse.—
Kate Hogan,
PEOPLE,
21 Apr. 2026
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The blue band represents the predictions from a dark matter-and-dark energy dominated Universe that follows the rules of Einstein’s general relativity, while the yellow band represents the predictions from a dark matter-free Universe that follows the rules of MOND.—
Big Think,
Big Think,
21 Apr. 2026
Adjective
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So Tristian stood, waiting for his moment, preparing himself to do what everyone else was too scared to do.—
Empress Rasheem,
Baltimore Sun,
19 Apr. 2026
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People are scared, at the bottom line.—
Los Angeles Times,
Los Angeles Times,
19 Apr. 2026
Adjective
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Soapy Water Stink bugs tend to drop when frightened, so fill a cup with soapy water and hold it under the stink bug.—
Arricca Elin SanSone,
Southern Living,
10 Apr. 2026
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Their height and heft frightened and thrilled spectators, earning dinosaurs a permanent place in the public imagination, Coules said.—
Scottie Andrew,
CNN Money,
5 Apr. 2026
Adjective
-
This requires careful monitoring of key parameters such as sugar and acidity from veraison through to harvest.—
Maureen Mackey , Kelly McGreal,
FOXNews.com,
11 Apr. 2026
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Somewhere within him is the spirit of the patriotic teenager and the careful lower-court judge who rejected any notion of party loyalty or judicial agenda.—
Peter S. Canellos,
The Atlantic,
10 Apr. 2026
Adjective
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Some also have lost lawyers, dismayed by the pusillanimous behavior of their leaders.—
Michael Hiltzik,
Los Angeles Times,
28 May 2025
-
The second believed the United States could attain comprehensive security through military-technological means and saw diplomacy as a quixotic or pusillanimous enterprise that dishonored and weakened the country.—
A. Wess Mitchell,
Foreign Affairs,
22 Apr. 2025
Adjective
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That larger significance is remarkably unheroic and fatalistic.—
Gabriel Winslow-Yost,
Harper's Magazine,
23 Sep. 2024
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In the world of The Boys, based on the gleefully scabrous 2000s indie comic-book series of the same name by writer Garth Ennis and artist Darick Robertson, superheroes are real, pop-culture-dominating, and with rare exceptions, entirely unheroic.—
Brian Hiatt,
Rolling Stone,
13 June 2024
Adjective
-
My senators are too cowardly to talk to me.—
,
FOXNews.com,
6 Apr. 2026
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It’s populated by craven, cowardly traitors.—
Voice of the People,
New York Daily News,
25 Mar. 2026
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Cite this Entry
“Chicken-livered.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/chicken-livered. Accessed 22 Apr. 2026.
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