sycophantic

Word family

syc·o·phan·tic /ˌsɪkəˈfæntɪk◂/ adjectiveadj formal

praising important or powerful people too much because you want to get something from them – used to show disapproval 溜须拍马的，阿谀奉承的〔含贬义〕

sycophantic journalists

好溜须拍马的新闻记者

a sycophantic letter

一封阿谀奉承的信

—sycophancy /ˈsɪkəfənsi/ noun [uncountableU]

Examples from the Corpus

sycophantic• But he is angriest at and reserves his strongest denunciation for the intelligentsia, whom he accuses of sycophantic devotion to Yeltsin.• There was his clique of sycophantic friends, many of them middle-aged, who were too fawning and deferential.• Tactics that shunted money into the hands of prime ministers or sycophantic merchants did not generally help the citizens of a nation.• It has never been the intention of Guitarist to augment dealer ads with sycophantic reviews, either.• The extremism of the antagonistic, Western, post-Stalinist critic is mirrored in the extremism of the sycophantic Stalinist party apparatchik.• It's hard to envisage the usual knighthoods for sycophantic tabloid editors, several of whom pointed out his failings.• You get very fed up with people being sycophantic, toadying to you, as a symptom of success.

Chinese

Syllable

Corpus

BNC: 33723 COCA: 37114