English

Adjective

pantywaist ‎(not comparable)

1. (informal, dated, especially of a male person) Weak, timid, effeminate, ineffectual.

   His rough, burly father was mortified by the lad's pantywaist behavior.

Noun

pantywaist ‎(plural pantywaists)

1. (informal, dated) A children's undergarment composed, in part, of panties attached to a waistband.
   • 1929 April 29, "The Altman Sale of Children's Underwear" (display advertisement), The New York Times, p. 16:

     Lace trimmed panty waists—50 cents.

2. (pejorative, dated) An ineffectual, weak, or timid person, especially a boy or young man; a sissy.
   • 1943 Jan. 24, Hal Borland, "'Baedekers' for Our Fighters: So you're going abroad, says Uncle Sam," The New York Times, p. SM14:

     Don't be misled by the British tendency to be soft-spoken and polite. The English language didn't spread across the oceans and over the mountains and jungles and swamps because these people were pantywaists.

References

• “pantywaist” in Dictionary.com Unabridged, v1.0.1, Lexico Publishing Group, 2006.
• Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., 1989.