groveled

variants or grovelled
past tense of grovel
1
as in recoiled
to draw back or crouch down in fearful submission the way in which the abused dog would grovel whenever its owner came near

Synonyms & Similar Words

Relevance
2
as in crawled
to move slowly with the body close to the ground because of their anatomy, bats can only grovel while moving along the ground

Synonyms & Similar Words

Example Sentences

Recent Examples of Synonyms for groveled
Verb
  • Some recoiled at the launch and others quit their positions.
    Nick Penzenstadler, USA Today, 25 Sep. 2025
  • Videos recorded by witnesses at the Utah Valley University event showed Kirk being shot in the neck and bleeding heavily as his body recoiled.
    Martha McHardy, MSNBC Newsweek, 11 Sep. 2025
Verb
  • This time, of the five live roaches, the least shy sashayed across the floor in front of the cookline and crawled under a dining area table.
    David J. Neal, Miami Herald, 11 Oct. 2025
  • Bamboo Penny’s 5270 W 116th Place, Leawood A live cockroach crawled on the wall next to the rice cooker at this Leawood Thai restaurant.
    Eleanor Nash, Kansas City Star, 6 Oct. 2025
Verb
  • But none of the band members ever flinched over the divide that formed over their pre- and post-Vheissu sound.
    Brian Davids, HollywoodReporter, 30 Sep. 2025
  • These images of an expanding Kong appeared on the screen and the actors on stage in front of it flinched in horror as the dwarfing image of Kong’s bigness loomed menacingly behind them.
    Christopher Smith, Oc Register, 10 Sep. 2025
Verb
  • QuikTrip dropped 1% to 80 points while Buc-ee’s slid 1%, tying Love’s in fifth place with 79 points.
    Meghan Overdeep, Southern Living, 14 Oct. 2025
  • Penn State abruptly fired James Franklin on Sunday after the Nittany Lions slid from a 3-0 start into a three-game losing streak that included an unexpected 22–21 home loss to Northwestern, leaving the program 3-3 and winless in Big Ten play.
    Rowan Fisher-Shotton, MSNBC Newsweek, 14 Oct. 2025
Verb
  • Anyone living in one of the dozens of surrounding villages, such as Nazareth, who was not rounded up must have cowered in fear behind closed doors or hidden in the various underground cisterns and hewn chambers beneath the ancient houses and courtyards of the Jewish villages.
    Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 30 Sep. 2025
  • In one incident, a predator, confirmed by a state biologist to have been a wolf, attacked an elk on the front steps of a home in Sierra County as the college-age son of the owner cowered inside, alone and afraid amid the growls and thumps that were shaking the front door.
    Sacbee.com, Sacbee.com, 18 Sep. 2025
Verb
  • In August, Kravitz told Meyers that her mom's pet snake, Orpheus, had gotten loose and slithered into a small hole in the corner of the bathroom.
    Bryan West, USA Today, 9 Oct. 2025
  • Walton Goggins slithered into the 2025 Emmys with some apt nods to The White Lotus.
    Jessica Wang, Entertainment Weekly, 14 Sep. 2025
Verb
  • During a hospital stay, Roy’s enfeebled mother fixates on the caste and religious affiliations of the doctors treating her—the sort of thing that will be familiar to anyone who has cringed at a diminished elder’s unfiltered prejudices.
    Rebecca Mead, New Yorker, 3 Sep. 2025
Verb
  • The dance began with Irwin crouched atop a Jeep suped up for safari, with the junior conservationist correspondingly decked in the head-to-toe khaki uniform made famous by his dad.
    Ryan Coleman, Entertainment Weekly, 17 Sep. 2025
  • In one instance, a colleague entered Aber’s office to find an inmate crouched under his desk, according to an affidavit filed against Aber in the criminal case.
    Shelly Bradbury, Denver Post, 16 Sep. 2025
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Browse Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

“Groveled.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/groveled. Accessed 18 Oct. 2025.

Last Updated: - Updated example sentences
Love words? Need even more definitions?

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!