Word.ws English Dictionary

back-patty

back-patty adjective: self-congratulatory or self-aggrandizing.

Adjective

back-patty (comparative more back-patty, superlative most back-patty)

  1. (idiomatic) Self-congratulatory or self-aggrandizing.
    • We can all start off feeling back-patty and warm with our secret selves, having identified a literary allusion.1969 May, book review, The Strayed Reveller, number 3, page 7
    • But before we get all back-patty about our leaps and bounds in the progress of human endeavor, it is worth remembering that the world of science can seem extraordinarily backward when it comes to those with two X chromosomes.2018, Elizabeth Foley, Beth Coates, What Would Cleopatra Do?: Life Lessons from 50 of History's Most Extraordinary Women, page 102

Forms of back-patty

comparativemore back-patty
superlativemost back-patty

Origin of back-patty

From back-pat + -y.

Questions about back-patty

What does back-patty mean?
Back-patty means self-congratulatory or self-aggrandizing.
What part of speech is back-patty?
Back-patty is an adjective.

Words near back-patty in the dictionary

  1. back-pages
  2. back-pat
  3. back-pats
  4. back-patted
  5. back-patting
  6. back-patty
  7. back-pedal
  8. back-pocket
  9. back-pocketed
  10. back-pocketing
  11. back-pockets

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: back-patty (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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