See feel one's oats in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
Download JSON data for feel one's oats meaning in English (3.5kB)
{
"etymology_text": "Originally American English, an allusion to the behavior of a horse that has been well fed on oats.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "feels one's oats",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "feeling one's oats",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "felt one's oats",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "felt one's oats",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "feel<,,felt> one's oats"
},
"expansion": "feel one's oats (third-person singular simple present feels one's oats, present participle feeling one's oats, simple past and past participle felt one's oats)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [
"Entries with incorrect language header",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w"
}
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1865, George Alfred Townsend, The Life, Crime, and Capture of John Wilkes Booth",
"text": "Next to the officer is a shabby-looking boy, whose seat is by the right jamb of the jail door. Of all boys just old enough to feel their oats, this boy is the most commonplace.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1906, Andy Adams [pseudonym], “The Double Trail”, in Cattle Brands",
"text": "The old man feeling his oats, as he leaned with his back against the bar, said to us with a noticeable degree of pride, \"Lads, I'm proud of every one of you. Men who will fight to protect my interests has my purse at their command.\"",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1922, Max Brand [pseudonym; Frederick Schiller Faust], Alcatraz",
"text": "\"Them hosses are feeling their oats,\" said McGuire. \"Can't tell what they'd be up to the minute I turned my back on 'em. Might jump that old fence and be off, for all I know.\"",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1931, Emily Hahn, Beginners Luck",
"text": "“You’re feeling your oats,” said Gin. “It makes you expect too much of the world, feeling your oats. You can’t help thinking there must be something to do about it. There isn’t; because whatever you do about it, it’s not settled.”",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2004 October 29, Michelle Grattan, “Change ahead in Senate's new dawn”, in The Age, Australia, retrieved 2008-11-05",
"text": "The Nationals gave the Coalition its Senate majority and yesterday were feeling their oats.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2006 November 16, Candace Rondeaux, “Forming Families, One Adoption at a Time”, in Washington Post, retrieved 2008-11-05",
"text": "\"It's a tough road because kids at that time are developmentally feeling their oats,\" Beverage said.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To feel energetic or frisky; to behave in a vigorous or bold manner; to feel empowered and important."
],
"id": "en-feel_one's_oats-en-verb-ffvcTIDd",
"links": [
[
"energetic",
"energetic"
],
[
"frisky",
"frisky"
],
[
"vigorous",
"vigorous"
],
[
"bold",
"bold"
],
[
"empowered",
"empowered"
],
[
"important",
"important"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(originally of horses) To feel energetic or frisky; to behave in a vigorous or bold manner; to feel empowered and important."
],
"related": [
{
"word": "oatsy"
},
{
"word": "sow one's wild oats"
}
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-feel one's oats.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/6/6a/En-au-feel_one%27s_oats.ogg/En-au-feel_one%27s_oats.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6a/En-au-feel_one%27s_oats.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"word": "feel one's oats"
}
{
"etymology_text": "Originally American English, an allusion to the behavior of a horse that has been well fed on oats.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "feels one's oats",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "feeling one's oats",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "felt one's oats",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "felt one's oats",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "feel<,,felt> one's oats"
},
"expansion": "feel one's oats (third-person singular simple present feels one's oats, present participle feeling one's oats, simple past and past participle felt one's oats)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"related": [
{
"word": "oatsy"
},
{
"word": "sow one's wild oats"
}
],
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English terms with audio links",
"English terms with quotations",
"English verbs"
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1865, George Alfred Townsend, The Life, Crime, and Capture of John Wilkes Booth",
"text": "Next to the officer is a shabby-looking boy, whose seat is by the right jamb of the jail door. Of all boys just old enough to feel their oats, this boy is the most commonplace.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1906, Andy Adams [pseudonym], “The Double Trail”, in Cattle Brands",
"text": "The old man feeling his oats, as he leaned with his back against the bar, said to us with a noticeable degree of pride, \"Lads, I'm proud of every one of you. Men who will fight to protect my interests has my purse at their command.\"",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1922, Max Brand [pseudonym; Frederick Schiller Faust], Alcatraz",
"text": "\"Them hosses are feeling their oats,\" said McGuire. \"Can't tell what they'd be up to the minute I turned my back on 'em. Might jump that old fence and be off, for all I know.\"",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1931, Emily Hahn, Beginners Luck",
"text": "“You’re feeling your oats,” said Gin. “It makes you expect too much of the world, feeling your oats. You can’t help thinking there must be something to do about it. There isn’t; because whatever you do about it, it’s not settled.”",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2004 October 29, Michelle Grattan, “Change ahead in Senate's new dawn”, in The Age, Australia, retrieved 2008-11-05",
"text": "The Nationals gave the Coalition its Senate majority and yesterday were feeling their oats.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2006 November 16, Candace Rondeaux, “Forming Families, One Adoption at a Time”, in Washington Post, retrieved 2008-11-05",
"text": "\"It's a tough road because kids at that time are developmentally feeling their oats,\" Beverage said.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To feel energetic or frisky; to behave in a vigorous or bold manner; to feel empowered and important."
],
"links": [
[
"energetic",
"energetic"
],
[
"frisky",
"frisky"
],
[
"vigorous",
"vigorous"
],
[
"bold",
"bold"
],
[
"empowered",
"empowered"
],
[
"important",
"important"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(originally of horses) To feel energetic or frisky; to behave in a vigorous or bold manner; to feel empowered and important."
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-feel one's oats.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/6/6a/En-au-feel_one%27s_oats.ogg/En-au-feel_one%27s_oats.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6a/En-au-feel_one%27s_oats.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"word": "feel one's oats"
}
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-05 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
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