Avoir des oursins dans la poche / Avoir des oursins dans le porte-monnaie
Meaning: To be tight-fisted.
Language: French
Literally: To have sea urchins in one's pocket
Category: Animals
Origin: The picture explains itself, and the word has a small puzzle of its own: oursin, from the middle of the 16th century, is taken by some as a deformation of ourson, a bear cub, and by others from the Occitan orsin de mar. The creature — also called hérisson de mer, sea hedgehog, and châtaigne de mer, sea chestnut — is covered in spines that nobody wants to drive into a finger. A man with a pocketful of them would very sensibly leave his hand out of it, and to anyone unaware of what he is keeping in there, that reluctance to reach for his money looks exactly like meanness.
More idioms — Animals
- Ça ne casse pas trois pattes à un canard — It's nothing special or impressive.
- Avoir le cafard — To feel depressed or down.
- Poser un lapin — To stand someone up on a date.
- Avoir d'autres chats à fouetter — To have more important things to do.
- Da steppt der Bär — It's going to be a great party.
- Ich glaub mein Schwein pfeift — I can't believe it! That's outrageous!
More French idioms
- Sur la paille — Reduced to real poverty.
- Avoir un nom à coucher dehors — To have a name nobody can pronounce or remember.
- Coûter la peau des fesses / Coûter les yeux de la tête — To cost an absolute fortune.
- Être dans les petits papiers de quelqu'un — To be in someone's good books; to enjoy their favor.
- Faire un pataquès — To make a clumsy verbal slip, or a blunder generally; also, to make an enormous fuss over…
- Patin couffin — And so on and so forth; et cetera.
From our compliments & insults
- Tu déchires — You're awesome — you totally rock.
- Bête comme ses pieds — Really not very bright.
- Avoir un poil dans la main — To be incurably lazy.
Browse all compliments & insults →
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