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American Dictionary of the English Language

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Obsequious


OBSE'QUIOUS, adjective [from Latin obsequium, complaisance, from obsequor, to follow; ob and sequor.]

1. Promptly obedient or submissive to the will of another; compliant; yielding to the desires of others, properly to the will or command of a superior, but in actual use, it often signifies yielding to the will or desires of such as have no right to control.

His servants weeping, obsequious to his orders, bear him hither.

2. Servilely or meanly condescending; compliant to excess; as an obsequious flatterer, minion or parasite.

3. Funereal; pertaining to funeral rites. [Not used.]