Avoir le cul entre deux chaises
Meaning: To be indecisive, caught between two options.
Language: French
Literally: To have one's butt between two chairs
Category: Daily Life
Origin: The Académie française's own 1694 dictionary already has the idea, if not the modern wording: of a man who had staked his hopes on two different things and secured neither, it says he finds himself entre deux selles le cul à terre — between two stools, backside on the ground. The image needing no explanation: try to sit on two chairs set apart and you succeed at neither, ending up worse off than if you had picked one. The current phrasing is attested by the end of the 18th century, in a dictionary of Provençal and the Comtat Venaissin, and cul (backside) eventually displaced the more decorous selles (stools) as the wording spread through the 19th and 20th centuries.
More idioms — Daily Life
- Les carottes sont cuites — It's too late, nothing can be done.
- Ich verstehe nur Bahnhof — I don't understand anything at all.
- Schwein haben — Getting unexpectedly lucky — rooted in medieval tournaments where the last-place finisher…
- Da liegt der Hund begraben — That's the crux of the matter.
- 猫の手も借りたい (Neko no te mo karitai) — I'm so busy I'll take help from anyone.
- Estar en la edad del pavo — To be at an awkward teenage phase.
More French idioms
- Mettre son grain de sel — To give an unsolicited opinion.
- Casser les pieds à quelqu'un — To annoy or bore someone greatly.
- Avoir le beurre et l'argent du beurre — To want to have it both ways.
- Noyer le poisson — To confuse the issue deliberately; to dodge a question.
- Chercher midi à quatorze heures — To overcomplicate a simple matter.
- Appeler un chat un chat — To call things by their proper name; to speak bluntly.
From our untranslatable words
- L'esprit de l'escalier — Thinking of the perfect comeback only after the moment has passed — on your way down the…
- Terroir — The unique character that a place — its soil, climate and tradition — gives to a wine or…
- Râler — To complain and grumble with a certain national flair — a beloved French pastime.