Avoir la queue entre les jambes
Meaning: To slink off humiliated.
Language: French
Literally: To have one's tail between one's legs
Category: Animals
Origin: A dog that has been beaten or cowed clamps its tail down, which is legible across species and languages. English formed the identical phrase from the same observation.
More idioms — Animals
- Manger à tous les râteliers — To take advantage from all sides at once, with no loyalty to any.
- Une bête de somme — Someone worked relentlessly at heavy, thankless labor.
- Se faire prendre pour un pigeon — To be duped as an easy mark.
- Avoir les portugaises ensablées — To be hard of hearing.
- Laid comme un pou — Extremely ugly.
- Le plancher des vaches — Dry land, as seen from the sea.
More French idioms
- Secouer comme un prunier — To shake someone violently.
- Le marchand de sable est passé — The children are getting sleepy.
- Un pique-nique — A meal eaten outdoors to which everyone contributes.
- Cracher dans la soupe — To disparage the thing that sustains you.
- Trempé comme une soupe — Drenched to the skin.
- Payer rubis sur l'ongle — To pay in full, immediately and to the last penny.
From our untranslatable words
- Épanouissement — The full flourishing of a person — blooming into your most complete, radiant self. More t…
- Ressourcement — The act of returning to one's roots or origins to find renewal — going back to a place, t…
- Dépaysement — The disorienting yet often pleasant feeling of being far from home, immersed in the unfam…
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