bottle up


verb(tr, adverb)
  1. to restrain (powerful emotion)

  2. to keep (an army or other force) contained or trapped: the French fleet was bottled up in Le Havre

Words Nearby bottle up

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

How to use bottle up in a sentence

  • They wanted to sink the Merrimac at a narrow point in the harbor, and bottle up the Spanish fleet beyond it.

    Historic Adventures | Rupert S. Holland
  • So we cocked the bottle up on a rock and went back to the pirate-cave-entrance place to finish a game of smugglers.

    Us and the Bottleman | Edith Ballinger Price
  • We bottle up ourselves and defy the world's cork-screws—all save the Thoracic.

    How to Analyze People on Sight | Elsie Lincoln Benedict and Ralph Paine Benedict
  • But the year has been a sobering one, and what used to flash, they bottle up.

    Kenny | Leona Dalrymple
  • Perfume with essence (otto) of roses; give a very pale pink hue with tincture of cochineal, filter and bottle up.

Other Idioms and Phrases with bottle up

bottle up

Repress, contain, hold back; also, confine or trap. For example, The psychiatrist said Eve had been bottling up her anger for years, or The accident bottled up traffic for miles. This idiom likens other kinds of restraint to liquid being contained in a bottle. [Mid-1800s]

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.