Word.ws English Dictionary

buttoned one's lip

buttoned one's lip is the simple past and past participle of button one's lip.

Meaning of button one's lip

Verb

button one's lip (third-person singular simple present buttons one's lip, present participle buttoning one's lip, simple past and past participle buttoned one's lip)

  1. (idiomatic) To remain silent, especially in order to keep a secret or to avoid saying something inappropriate.
    • "Yes," put in Solomon. "I've been tipped off to this guy Mars, and you'd better tell him to button up his lip and not start anything."1910, Jim Nasium, "The Baseball League on the Styx," The Sunday Press (Pittsburgh), 15 May, p. 2 (retrieved 19 July 2010)

Questions about buttoned one's lip

What is buttoned one's lip the simple past and past participle of?
Buttoned one's lip is the simple past and past participle of button one's lip.

Words near buttoned one's lip in the dictionary

  1. buttonballs
  2. buttonbush
  3. buttonbushes
  4. buttondown
  5. buttoned
  6. buttoned one's lip
  7. buttoned through
  8. buttoned up
  9. buttoned up one's lip
  10. buttoned-down
  11. buttoned-up

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: buttoned one's lip (page history and authors); button one's lip (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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