"one's back is up" meaning in English

See one's back is up in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Phrase

Audio: En-au-one's back is up.ogg [Australia]
Etymology: From the way a cat, when angry, raises or arches its back. Head templates: {{head|en|phrase}} one's back is up
  1. (idiomatic) One is offended or angry. Tags: idiomatic Related terms: get one's back up

Download JSON data for one's back is up meaning in English (2.0kB)

{
  "etymology_text": "From the way a cat, when angry, raises or arches its back.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "phrase"
      },
      "expansion": "one's back is up",
      "name": "head"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "phrase",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with language name categories using raw markup",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with language name categories using raw markup",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English sentences",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
          "parents": [
            "Terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1835, William Hayley, The Life and Letters of William Cowper",
          "text": "My back is up, and I cannot hear the thought of wooing him any farther, nor would do it, though he were as pig a gentleman (look you) as Lucifer himself.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2011, Jeannie Watt, The Baby Truce, page 84",
          "text": "And I want you to be nice to Patty. For some reason her back is up.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2014, Kristin Butcher, Cabin Girl",
          "text": "Now my back is up. “Yes, the witch,” I hiss.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "One is offended or angry."
      ],
      "id": "en-one's_back_is_up-en-phrase-S2fxqlG9",
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) One is offended or angry."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "get one's back up"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-one's back is up.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/4/43/En-au-one%27s_back_is_up.ogg/En-au-one%27s_back_is_up.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/43/En-au-one%27s_back_is_up.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "word": "one's back is up"
}
{
  "etymology_text": "From the way a cat, when angry, raises or arches its back.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "phrase"
      },
      "expansion": "one's back is up",
      "name": "head"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "phrase",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "get one's back up"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English entries with language name categories using raw markup",
        "English idioms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English phrases",
        "English sentences",
        "English terms with audio links",
        "English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
        "English terms with quotations"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1835, William Hayley, The Life and Letters of William Cowper",
          "text": "My back is up, and I cannot hear the thought of wooing him any farther, nor would do it, though he were as pig a gentleman (look you) as Lucifer himself.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2011, Jeannie Watt, The Baby Truce, page 84",
          "text": "And I want you to be nice to Patty. For some reason her back is up.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2014, Kristin Butcher, Cabin Girl",
          "text": "Now my back is up. “Yes, the witch,” I hiss.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "One is offended or angry."
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) One is offended or angry."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-one's back is up.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/4/43/En-au-one%27s_back_is_up.ogg/En-au-one%27s_back_is_up.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/43/En-au-one%27s_back_is_up.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "word": "one's back is up"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-24 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (46b31b8 and c7ea76d). 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.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.