Word.ws English Dictionary

feel someone's collar

feel someone's collar verb: to arrest someone.

Verb

feel someone's collar (third-person singular simple present feels someone's collar, present participle feeling someone's collar, simple past and past participle felt someone's collar)

  1. (UK, idiomatic, informal) To arrest someone.
    • If you carry on like that, the law will soon be feeling your collar.

Forms of feel someone's collar

third-person singular presentfeels someone's collar
present participlefeeling someone's collar
past participlefelt someone's collar
pastfelt someone's collar

Origin of feel someone's collar

From the image of an arresting police officer holding a suspect by the collar.

Questions about feel someone's collar

What does feel someone's collar mean?
Feel someone's collar means to arrest someone.
What part of speech is feel someone's collar?
Feel someone's collar is a verb.
What is the past tense of feel someone's collar?
The past tense of feel someone's collar is felt someone's collar.

Words near feel someone's collar in the dictionary

  1. feel one's legs
  2. feel one's oats
  3. feel one's way
  4. feel oneself
  5. feel out
  6. feel someone's collar
  7. feel someone's pain
  8. feel sorry for
  9. feel ten feet tall
  10. feel the Bern
  11. feel the burn

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: feel someone's collar (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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