IdiomAnimals
English
Englishblack sheep
Meaning: An outcast.
Example: “Uncle Ray, who ran off to join a circus, was always the black sheep of the family.”
Equivalents in other languages
Spanish: Ser la oveja negra Literally: To be the black sheep
Origin: A black lamb turning up in a white flock was bad news for a shepherd: its wool could not be dyed and fetched less, and folklore sometimes read the dark fleece as a mark of the devil. English proverbs had a black sheep in every flock by the 16th century, and by the late 18th the phrase meant the member of a family who has gone wrong.
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