footlicker
English
Etymology
From foot + licker. Compare bootlick.
Noun
footlicker (plural footlickers)
- A sycophant; a fawner; a toady.
- 1610–1611, William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act IV, scene i]:
- […] Do that good miſcheefe, which may make this Iſland / Thine owne for euer, and I thy Caliban, / For aye thy foot-licker.
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Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for footlicker in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.)