Word.ws English Dictionary

stiff upper lips

stiff upper lips is the plural of stiff upper lip.

Meaning of stiff upper lip

Noun

stiff upper lip (plural stiff upper lips)

  1. (idiomatic) The quality of being resolute and showing self-restraint, stereotypically associated with the British; especially as keep a stiff upper lip.
    • I thought now the jig was mighty nigh up with me, but I determined to keep a stiff upper lip.1834, David Crockett, A Narrative of the Life of David Crockett, page 130

Questions about stiff upper lips

What is stiff upper lips the plural of?
Stiff upper lips is the plural of stiff upper lip.

Words near stiff upper lips in the dictionary

  1. stiff skin syndrome
  2. Stiff Street
  3. stiff up
  4. stiff upper lip
  5. stiff upper lippy
  6. stiff upper lips
  7. stiff-arm
  8. stiff-armed
  9. stiff-arming
  10. stiff-arms
  11. stiff-backed

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: stiff upper lips (page history and authors); stiff upper 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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