Meaning & use
hold your peace
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Meaning
phraseidiomold-fashionedformal
To stay silent and say nothing, especially when you would like to object or give an opinion.
Grammar: The possessive changes with the subject: she held her peace.
Patterns
- hold your peace
- speak now or forever hold your peace
He wanted to argue, but he decided to hold his peace.
If you have a problem with the plan, say so now or hold your peace.
She held her peace through the whole meeting, though she disagreed.
Word forms
| third person singular | holds your peace |
|---|---|
| past tense | held your peace |
| -ing form | holding your peace |
Common combinations
- forever hold your peace
- Speak now or forever hold your peace.
- decide to hold your peace
- I decided to hold my peace until the others had spoken.
- had to hold your peace
- She had to hold her peace although she was furious.
- hold your peace about something
- He held his peace about the mistake.
Synonyms and how they differ
- keep quiet
- Keep quiet is the everyday phrase, while hold your peace sounds old and rather formal.
- stay silent
- Stay silent is plain and neutral, whereas hold your peace suggests choosing silence despite wanting to speak.
- bite your tongue
- Bite your tongue stresses an effort to stop yourself from saying something harsh, which is stronger than simply holding your peace.
Opposites
Word family
- peace noun
- calm, or freedom from noise or conflict
- peaceful adjective
- calm and quiet
- peacefully adverb
- in a calm, undisturbed way
Commonly confused: hold your peace or hold your tongue?
hold your peace vs hold your tongue
Hold your tongue also means to stay silent, but it often suggests holding back something rude or unwise. Hold your peace is more formal and more neutral.
Practice
At the wedding, the minister said, Speak now or forever ____.
Choose one answer.
Hold your peace means to remain silent, which completes the traditional wedding phrase. Make your peace means to reconcile with someone, which does not fit.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “hold your peace”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.