curry favor
English
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curry favor
Where it comes from
Originally from a French poem Roman de Fauvel, written in the early 1300s; Fauvel was a conniving stallion, and the play was a satire on the corruption of social life. The name Fauvel points to the French fauve (“chestnut, reddish-yellow, or fawn”), another sense of fauve meaning the class of wild animals whose coats are at least partly brown, and the medieval belief that a fallow horse was a symbol of deceit and dishonesty. The phrase curry Fauvel, then, referred to currying (“combing”) the horse, and was altered (as folk etymology) by later speakers to curry favor.
verb curries favor · currying favor · curried favor · curry favour
- To seek to gain favor by flattery or attention. […]always promising to pay, promising to pay, tomorrow, and dying today, insolvent; seeking to curry favor, to get custom, by how many modes, only not state-prison offences;[…]
Translations
Every language
verb to seek to gain favor by flattery
| 日本語 | 機嫌を取る kigen o toru, 胡麻をする goma o suru |
|---|---|
| 中文 | 巴結 /巴结 bājie |
| हिन्दी | चापलूसी करना chāplūsī karna |
| Français | flatter, cirer les bottes |
| Deutsch | sich einschmeicheln, sich anbiedern, sich einschleimen |
| Русский | заи́скивать zaískivatʹ, подли́зываться podlízyvatʹsja |
| Tiếng Việt | lấy lòng, xu nịnh, nịnh, nịnh nọt, nịnh hót |
| العربية | يتملق yatamallaq |
Talk about this word "curry favor." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/curry%20favor. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026. curry favor. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/curry%20favor "curry favor." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/curry%20favor.Cite this
@misc{curry_favor_2026,
title = {curry favor},
howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
year = {2026},
url = {https://micwyn.com/word/curry%20favor},
urldate = {2026-11-06}
}
