docility

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Related to docility: ebullience, denounce, aloof, condone, quietly, scrutinized

doc·ile

(dŏs′əl, -īl′)

adj.

1. Ready and willing to be taught; teachable.

2. Yielding to supervision, direction, or management; tractable.

[Latin docilis, from docēre, to teach; see dek- in Indo-European roots.]

doc′ile·ly adv.

do·cil′i·ty (dŏ-sĭl′ĭ-tē, dō-) n.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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Noun

docility - the trait of being agreeably submissive and manageable

tractability, tractableness, flexibility - the trait of being easily persuaded

docility

noun compliance, obedience, meekness, submissiveness, manageability, ductility, amenability, pliancy, tractability, biddableness The baby's docility had surprised him.

Collins Thesaurus of the English Language – Complete and Unabridged 2nd Edition. 2002 © HarperCollins Publishers 1995, 2002

Translations

لين، دَماثَه

poslušnost

føjelighedmedgørlighed

Fügsamkeit

docilité

tanulékonyság

hlÿîni, òægî, auîsveipni

medgjørlighet

uslulukuysallık

温顺

docility

[dəʊˈsɪlɪtɪ] N → docilidad f

Collins Spanish Dictionary - Complete and Unabridged 8th Edition 2005 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1971, 1988 © HarperCollins Publishers 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2005

docility

[dɒˈsɪlɪti] n [person, animal] → docilité f

Collins English/French Electronic Resource. © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

docility

n → Sanftmut f

Collins German Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged 7th Edition 2005. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1980 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1997, 1999, 2004, 2005, 2007

docility

[dəʊˈsɪlɪtɪ] n → docilità

Collins Italian Dictionary 1st Edition © HarperCollins Publishers 1995

docile

(ˈdəusail) , ((American) ˈdosl) adjective

(of a person or animal) quiet and easy to manage. a docile child/pony.

ˈdocilely adverb

doˈcility (douˈsiliti) noun

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References in classic literature ?

The artist prefers a hilly country because it is picturesque; the engineer a flat one because it is convenient; the man of pleasure likes what he calls "a fine woman"--she suits him; the fashionable young gentleman admires the fashionable young lady--she is of his kind; the toil-worn, fagged, probably irritable tutor, blind almost to beauty, insensible to airs and graces, glories chiefly in certain mental qualities: application, love of knowledge, natural capacity, docility, truthfulness, gratefulness, are the charms that attract his notice and win his regard.

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"I have ascended it," replied the Scotchman, with docility.

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It was not till four years after Strickland's death that Maurice Huret wrote that article in the Mercure de France which rescued the unknown painter from oblivion and blazed the trail which succeeding writers, with more or less docility, have followed.

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It was a spectacle to stir the dullest soul when this gallant band marched out of the yard in full regimentals, with Captain Dove a solemn, big-headed boy of eleven issuing his orders with the gravity of a general, and his Falstaffian regiment obeying them with more docility than skill.

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They would follow me like dogs, rubbing their great snouts against my body in awkward evidence of affection, and respond to my every command with an alacrity and docility which caused the Martian warriors to ascribe to me the possession of some earthly power unknown on Mars.

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many of the elder zoologists with a certain vestigial docility

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Whenever she interrupted him--and she did it, over and over again, without ceremony--he submitted with a senile docility and admiration, at once absurd and shocking to see.

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Having thus pointed the moral and reduced his flock to a fitting state of docility, he dismissed them once more to their labors and withdrew himself to his own private chamber, there to seek spiritual aid in the discharge of the duties of his high office.

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He helped his sister with blind love and docility in her household duties.

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While the regular and trained hirelings of the king marched with haughtiness to the right of the line, the less pretending colonists took their humbler position on its left, with a docility that long practice had rendered easy.

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Upon these, and the like reasonings, their opinion is, that parents are the last of all others to be trusted with the education of their own children; and therefore they have in every town public nurseries, where all parents, except cottagers and labourers, are obliged to send their infants of both sexes to be reared and educated, when they come to the age of twenty moons, at which time they are supposed to have some rudiments of docility. These schools are of several kinds, suited to different qualities, and both sexes.

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They watched it with intense interest as it licked the hands accustomed to feed it, and were struck with the mild expression of its countenance, and its perfect docility.