subservient
AdjectiveUS[suhb-sur-vee-uhnt]/səbˈsɝviənt/4 syllables
Open English WordNet
Adjective (3)
- compliant and obedient to authority“editors and journalists who express opinions in print that are opposed to the interests of the rich are dismissed and replaced by subservient ones — G. B. Shaw”Opposite insubordinateSimilar subordinate
- serving or acting as a means or aid“instrumental in solving the crime”Synonyms: implementalinstrumentalOpposite unhelpfulSimilar helpful
- abjectly submissive; characteristic of a slave or servant“slavish devotion to her job ruled her life”“a slavish yes-man to the party bosses — S.H.Adams”“she has become submissive and subservient”Synonyms: slavishsubmissiveOpposite unservileSimilar servile
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onerousadjective
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Webster's Dictionary (1913)
Sub·serv′i·ent adjective
Origin: L. subserviens, -entis, p. pr. See Subserve.
Fitted or disposed to subserve; useful in an inferior capacity; serving to promote some end; subordinate; hence, servile, truckling.
Scarce ever reading anything which he did not make subservient in one kind or other.— Bp. John Fell
These ranks of creatures are subservient one to another.— John Ray
Their temporal ambition was wholly subservient to their proselytizing spirit.— Edmund Burke
Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913), from GCIDE 0.54