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The Collaborative International Dictionary
Lapdog

Lapdog \Lap"dog`\, n.

  1. A small dog which is or can be fondled in the lap.

  2. One who does the bidding of another; a servile follower.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
lapdog

also lap-dog, 1640s, from lap (n.) + dog (n.); figurative sense of "subservient person" is by 1950.\n\nSenator McCarthy (R-Wis) renewed his Communists-in-Government charges today and called Senator Tydings (D-Md) the Truman administration's "whimpering lap dog."

[AP news story, Aug. 7, 1950]

Wiktionary
lapdog

alt. 1 A dog which is sufficiently small and tame to be held in the lap for long durations. 2 (context figuratively usually derogatory English) One who is exceedingly obedient, unquestioning, and submissive to another party. n. 1 A dog which is sufficiently small and tame to be held in the lap for long durations. 2 (context figuratively usually derogatory English) One who is exceedingly obedient, unquestioning, and submissive to another party.

WordNet
lapdog

n. a dog small and tame enough to be held in the lap

Usage examples of "lapdog".

At the last instant the huge animal dodged lithely around him, and the historian saw that it held in its mouth a lapdog, its eyes dark pools of terror.

The yapping lapdog shrieked in alarm and raced off, bounding like a ragged ball of mud and straw.

She also shrewdly concluded that if Caesar had given his wife a lapdog, Calpurnia would now be surrounded by puppies.

Rushton continued his monologue throughout the rescue, occasionally referring to Scamp as a dustbin and a lapdog, expressions that he accompanied with a grin at Selina.

Beside him lay the scrawny Hengese lapdog that Truth said was named Roach.

The Semk seemed eager to close on the Malazan lapdogs, and were paying in blood for their desire.

Nobel laureates are his lapdogs and the United States Army has been tied up and delivered as a gift to him.

My mother pictured a daughter as a counterinsurgent: a fellow lover of lapdogs, a seconder of proposals to attend the Ice Capades.

Your Grace, himself, le Chevalier Marc Marcel de Montjoie de Vires, and one solitary FitzGerald, a guardsman named Sean something or other, who will be about as outclassed on such a council as a lapdog among as many boarhounds.

Their wool coats were unbuttoned in the warming day, and fit them like gunnysacks on lapdogs.

Chinese wallpaper and on lapdogs and satin and on the cabriolet in which Lord John now rode towards the cavalry and battle.

It's also no surprise that cane growers are turning for a bailout to their favorite slobbering lapdogs, the state politicians in Tallahassee.

Gesler's two dogs trotted past, the huge cattle dog trailing the Hengese Roach as if the hairy lapdog carried its own leash.

Of course - any natives suspected of loyalty would be fair game - including the gora-colonel's lapdog, as Ram Mangal had charmingly called me.

He was hardly back in his bed, thinking hard, when Madame Flaubert oozed in, her lapdog panting behind her.