on sufferance en · ADP
Pronunciation
- (Australia) audio
Meanings
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(idiomatic) Unwillingly agreed to or barely tolerated.
In former days every tavern of repute kept such a room for its own select circle, a club, or society, of habitués, who met every evening, for a pipe and a cheerful glass.[…]Strangers might enter the room, but they were made to feel that they were there on sufferance: they were received with distance and suspicion.
1892, Walter Besant, chapter III, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC:I wasn't whole-hearted about the decision but couldn't think of a better one, so went along with it on sufferance for the time being.
Translations (2)
ru скрепя́ се́рдце (unwillingly agreed to) · ga le caolchuid (unwillingly agreed to)