Word.ws English Dictionary

held one's nose

held one's nose is the simple past and past participle of hold one's nose.

Meaning of hold one's nose

Verb

hold one's nose (third-person singular simple present holds one's nose, present participle holding one's nose, simple past and past participle held one's nose)

  1. To pinch one's nostrils closed with one's fingers, usually to block out an unpleasant smell.
  2. (figuratively) To reluctantly overcome one's revulsion.
    • To the public, AIG symbolized everything that had gone wrong with the system […] But like the president, I understood that we had to hold our noses and save the company in order to protect the frail financial system.2010, Hank Paulson, On The Brink

Questions about held one's nose

What is held one's nose the simple past and past participle of?
Held one's nose is the simple past and past participle of hold one's nose.

Words near held one's nose in the dictionary

  1. held one's head high
  2. held one's horses
  3. held one's jaw
  4. held one's liquor
  5. held one's nerve
  6. held one's nose
  7. held one's nose up
  8. held one's own
  9. held one's peace
  10. held one's pee
  11. held one's piss

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: held one's nose (page history and authors); hold one's nose (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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