flatter
UK /ˈflætə/ · US /ˈflætɚ/ verb, noun
Also a form of flat
Forms flatters flattering flattered
- verb To compliment someone, often (but not necessarily) insincerely and sometimes to win favour.
- verb To enhance or gratify someone's vanity by praising them.
- verb To portray someone to advantage. “Her portrait flatters her.”
- verb To encourage or cheer someone with (usually false) hope.
- verb (usually reflexive) To cheer or please (with the idea that); congratulate oneself, especially when the perception is false. “Before the results came out, I flattered myself that I had done well on the test. It turned out I was the worst in the class!”
- verb (obsolete, intransitive) In phrasal verb "to flatter with": to encourage, inspire with hope.
- noun A type of set tool used by blacksmiths.
- noun A flat-faced fulling hammer.
- noun A drawplate with a narrow, rectangular orifice, for drawing flat strips such as watch springs.
- noun Someone who flattens, purposely or accidentally. Also flattener.
- noun (UK, New Zealand, slang) Someone who lives in a rented flat.
Synonyms
butter up lay it on thick puff stroke someone's ego brush up to collogue flatterize glaver gloze jolly make fair weather palaver preen soothe speak well of stroke tickle the ear blandish
Antonyms
Etymology
*From Middle English flatteren, flateren (“to flutter, float, fawn over”), probably a conflation of Old English floterian, flotorian (“to flutter, float, be disquieted”), from Proto-West Germanic *flotrōn, from Proto-Germanic *flutrōną (“to be floating”), from Proto-Indo-European *plewd- (“to flow, swim”), equivalent to float + -er; and Old Norse flaðra (“to fawn on someone, flatter”), from Proto-Germanic *flaþrōną (“to fawn over, flutter”), from Proto-Indo-European *peled- (“moisture, wetness”), *pel- (“to gush, pour out, fill, flow, swim, fly”). Cognate with Scots flatter, flotter (“to float; splash; cover with liquid”), Middle Dutch flatteren (“to embellish, flatter, caress”), German flattern (“to flutter”).
*The word was also falsely associated with Middle French flatter (“to flatter, to caress with the flat of the hand”), from Old French flater (“to deceive by concealing the truth, to stroke with the palm of the hand”), from Frankish *flat (“palm, flat of the hand”), from Proto-Germanic *flatą, *flatō (“palm, sole”), from *flataz (“flat”), probably from Proto-Indo-European *pleth₂-, *pleh₂- (“flat, broad, plain”); related to Old High German flazza (“palm, flat of the hand”), Old High German flaȥ (“level, flat”), Old Saxon flat (“flat”), Old Norse flatr (“flat”) (whence English flat), Old Frisian flet, flette (“dwelling, house”), Old English flet, flett (“ground floor, dwelling”). More at flat.
From flat (“to make flat, flatten”) + -er (agent suffix).
From flat (“dwelling, apartment”) + -er (residency suffix).
From flat + -er (comparative suffix). Compare Icelandic flatari (“flatter, more flat”).
Webster’s 1913
- noun One who, or that which, makes flat or flattens.
- noun (a) A flat-faced fulling hammer.
- verb To treat with praise or blandishments; to gratify or attempt to gratify the self-love or vanity of, esp. by artful and interested commendation or attentions; to blandish; to cajole; to wheedle.
- verb To raise hopes in; to encourage or favorable, but sometimes unfounded or deceitful, representations.
Etymology [OE. flateren, cf. OD. flatteren; akin to G. flattern to flutter, Icel. fla to fawn, flatter: cf. F. flatter. Cf. Flitter, Flutter, Flattery.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “flatter”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details