turn up one's nose
Verb
  1. To make the gesture of raising one's nose, as a sign of scorn, contempt or disgust.
    • 1972, Émile Zola, George Holden (translator), Nana, Penguin Books,
      The actors paused, their arms hanging limply by their sides, while Fontan turned up his nose and asked with a sneer :
      'What do you mean? What's not like that?'
  2. (idiomatic, with "at") To regard with contempt or scorn; to treat with contempt or scorn; to ignore or disregard in a contemptuous or scornful way.
    • And cared (shall I say?) not a d—— for their damming;
      So they first read him out of their church, and next minute
      Turned round and declared he had never been in it.
    • 1958, annotated translation based on documents deriving from postulated c.85 Greek text attributed to Luke (ἐξεμυκτήριζον δὲ καὶ οἱ ἄρχοντες σὺν αὐτοῖς λέγοντες· Ἄλλους ἔσωσε, σωσάτω ἑαυτόν, εἰ οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ Χριστὸς ὁ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐκλεκτός.). Lockman Foundation, The Amplified New Testament, used in 1965 Zondervan Corporation, The Amplified Bible, Luke 23:35:
      ... but the rulers scoffed and sneered (turned up their noses) at Him, saying, He rescued others; let Him now rescue Himself, if He is the Christ (the Messiah) of God, His Chosen One!
  3. (idiomatic, with "at") To refuse, especially with disgust, contempt or scorn; to refuse with apparent disregard about offending the offerer.
    I tried to help, but they turned up their noses at my advice.
Related terms Translations Translations


This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.002
Offline English dictionary