sycophancy en · NOUN
Etymology
From Latin sȳcophantia, from Ancient Greek σῡκοφᾰντῐ́ᾱ (sūkophăntĭ́ā), equivalent to sycophant + -cy.
Meanings
-
(countable, uncountable) The fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery; fawningness.
“I don’t want to get myself into trouble,” he added, “but she’s very, she’s a great woman.” Victoria [Starmer] looked a little creeped out. Her husband might be a master Trump-wrangler, an expert at sycophancy and genuflection, but she wasn’t.
2025 July 28, John Crace, “Sidekick Starmer can’t get a word in as The Donald dominates world’s most one-sided double act”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:I have always been taken aback at the high number of people in whom an astonishingly high income led to additional sycophancy as they became more dependent on their clients and employers and more addicted to making even more money.
2010, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, page 21:
- (countable, qualifier:artificial intelligence, uncountable) The tendency of a language model to produce answers that flatter or agree with a user’s beliefs or biases rather than giving accurate or truthful information, or to give strategically false answers when it infers that it is being evaluated in terms of alignment.
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| sycophancies | Number=Plur | lexicographic |
Translations (20)
ja おべっか (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · de Speichelleckerei (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · nl vleierij (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · it sicofantia (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · bg подлизурство (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · fa تملق (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · kk жағымпаздық (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · fr lèche-culterie (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · ko 사대주의 (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · ru лизоблюдство (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · fr flatterie (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · nl pluimstrijkerij (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · cs podlézavost (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · cmn 阿諛奉承 /阿谀奉承 (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · ca sicofància (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · fr cirage de pompes (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · kk жарамсақтық (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · fr flagornerie (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · cs patolízalství (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery) · it servilismo (fawning behavior of a sycophant; servile flattery)