complaisant

UK/kəmˈpleɪsənt/US/kəmˈpleɪsənt/

adjectiveC2Very rare — outside the 30,000 commonest English words, so you will meet it in writing rather than in speechToo rare in one of the two pools to compare — fewer than 20 uses in speech or in writing

Complaisant means eager to please and to go along with others. A complaisant husband, complaisant and agreeable, too complaisant by half.

It is a different word from complacent, which means smugly satisfied, and the pair is confused constantly. It carries a hint of going along with things that should have been resisted.

Definitions of complaisant

1adjectivecomplaisantEager to please and to go along with others.C2
“The complaisant clerk agreed to every demand, however unreasonable.”

complaisant is a quality.

Also accepted in games: accommodating

Where it comes from

French complaisant comes from complaire, to please, from Latin complacere.

Latin
complaceō — please well
French
complaisant — willing to please
English, today
complaisant

Built from

com- · Latin — with
placeō · Latin — please

From French complaisant (“willing to please”), from complaire, from Latin complaceō (“please well”), from com- (“with”) + placeō (“please”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

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