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Squirm vs Cower - What's the difference?

squirm | cower |

As verbs the difference between squirm and cower

is that squirm is to twist one’s body with snakelike motions while cower is to crouch or cringe, or to avoid or shy away from something, in fear or cower can be (obsolete|transitive) to cherish with care.

As a noun squirm

is a twisting, snakelike movement of the body.

squirm

English

Verb

(en verb)
  • To twist one’s body with snakelike motions.
    • The prisoner managed to squirm out of the straitjacket.
  • * 1918 , (Edgar Rice Burroughs), Chapter IV
    • ...around us there had sprung up a perfect bedlam of screams and hisses and a seething caldron of hideous reptiles, devoid of fear and filled only with hunger and with rage. They clambered, squirmed and wriggled to the deck, forcing us steadily backward, though we emptied our pistols into them.
  • * 1922 , (Virginia Woolf), (w, Jacob's Room) Chapter 1
    • "Throw it away, dear, do," she said, as they got into the road; but Jacob squirmed away from her...
  • To twist in discomfort, especially from shame or embarrassment.
    • I recounted the embarrassing story in detail just to watch him squirm .
  • * 2010 , , Questionable Content 1686: Twist in the Wind
    • MARIGOLD: Should I tell them I know?
    DORA: Nah, let ’em squirm . Let’s go get some pie.
  • To evade (a question, an interviewer etc).
  • (figuratively) To move in a slow, irregular motion.
  • * {{quote-news
    • , year=2011 , date=February 5 , author=Michael Kevin Darling , title=Tottenham 2 - 1 Bolton , work=BBC citation , page= , passage=The Dutchman then missed a retaken second spot-kick, before the Trotters hit back when Daniel Sturridge's shot squirmed under Heurelho Gomes. }}

    Derived terms

    * squirmage * squirmish * squirmishness * squirmy

    Synonyms

    * (twist with snakelike motions) writhe, wriggle * (twist in discomfort) fidget

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A twisting, snakelike movement of the body.

    • cower

    English

    Etymology 1

    From (etyl) kuren or from Scandinavian ((etyl) . Unrelated to coward, which is of Latin origin.

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To crouch or cringe, or to avoid or shy away from something, in fear.
    • He'd be useless in war. He'd just cower in his bunker until the enemy came in and shot him, or until the war was over.
  • * Dryden
    • Our dame sits cowering o'er a kitchen fire.
  • * Goldsmith
    • Like falcons, cowering on the nest.
    See also
    * coward * cowardice

    Etymology 2

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (obsolete) To cherish with care.
    • (Webster 1913)