Lickspittles

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A person who flatters or serves another excessively, often to gain favor or advantage
2. someone who shows subservience and sycophancy
3. an individual characterized by obsequiousness, often sacrificing their integrity for approval

Etymology: "Lickspittles" is the plural of "lickspittle," a compound of "lick" and "spittle," with "spittle" meaning saliva. The image is a servant so eager to please that he would lick the spit off a superior's boots or floor, a picture of abject flattery. The Oxford English Dictionary records the compound in its second edition (1989). The verb "to lickspittle" may have been formed by back-formation from "lickspittling," the noun for the act of such fawning. In that case the verb came after the noun, reversing the usual order in which a noun is derived from a verb.

Synonyms: toadies, sycophants, flatterers, bootlickers, fawners

Antonyms: critics, opposers, rebels, dissenters, nonconformists