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pliant

UK/ˈplaɪənt/US/ˈplaɪənt/
adjectiveC1Very rare — outside the 30,000 commonest English words, so you will meet it in writing rather than in speechneutral

Pliant means easily bent, or easily influenced. A pliant branch, a pliant parliament, pliant and willing.

Of a material it is neutral and of a person it is not, since calling somebody pliant says they can be pushed. It is a relative of pliable and of pliers, all from the Old French for folding.

Definitions of pliant

  1. 1adjectivepliantEasily bent, or easily influenced.C1

    “The young willow branches are pliant enough to weave into baskets.”

pliant is a quality.

Where it comes from

Old French ploiant is the participle of ploiier, to fold, from Latin plicare.

  1. Proto-Indo-European

    *pleḱ-

  2. Old French

    ploiant

  3. Middle English

    pliaunt

  4. English, today

    pliant

Built from

  • ploiier · Old French — to fold

From Middle English pliaunt, from Old French ploiant, present participle of ploiier (“to fold”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Song of Ice and Fire

Practise this word

pliant in the wild

  • The first two characteristics are particularly for yanagi-ba-bocho, and its name 'yanagi' is from long and pliant characteristics of a willow branch.

    Yanagi ba

  • Armatocereus (from Latin armatus, "armed" and cereus, "pliant/soft") is a genus of mostly tree-like cacti from South America (Ecuador and Peru).

    Armatocereus

  • Combining the flavour of aged parmesan with a pliant texture, Parrano is marketed as an Italian-style cheese.

    Parrano cheese

  • The name derives from the Greek lygos, a pliant twig, and desme, a bundle, because of the fascicled twiggy or rush-like stems of the plants.

    Lygodesmia

  • Leaving nothing to chance, in 1959 he had the Constitution amended to transfer the presidential election to the National Assembly, which was a pliant tool of the regime.

    1958 Portuguese presidential election

1 / 2

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

Related words

the ploiier family

pliable

pliant — used too rare to measure · point at the bar for the others