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smooth someone's feathers. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
smooth someone's feathers, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
smooth someone's feathers in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
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smooth someone's feathers, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.
English
Etymology
From the expression ruffle someone's feathers.
Verb
smooth someone's feathers (third-person singular simple present smooths someone's feathers, present participle smoothing someone's feathers, simple past and past participle smoothed someone's feathers)
- To soothe (someone) who has had their feathers ruffled; to pacify (someone) who is upset.
1882, William George Hamley, Traseaden Hall: "when George the Third was King", page 127:L'Estrange bowed and offered his arm, while Mr Millis smoothed his ruffled feathers, and went back to the other young men , — smoothed his feathers, because it would never have answered to let others see that Mr Millis had got the worst of an encounter of any kind.
2007, Denise A. Bates, House of Bull, page 584:She's mad at me for letting you go; so you help me smooth her feathers tonight.
2019, Gillian Gill, Virginia Woolf: And the Women Who Shaped Her World, page 192:Subsequently, Leslie's two wives smoothed his feathers, deferred to him, bolstered him, allowed him to “say exactly what he thought, however inconvenient, and do exactly what he liked” (page 110).