D'estoc et de taille
Meaning: With everything one has, by every available means.
Language: French
Literally: With point and with edge
Category: Daily Life
Origin: The two ways of using a sword: estoc is the thrust with the point, taille the cut with the edge. Fighting with both meant abandoning any restriction on method.
More idioms — Daily Life
- Ne connaître ni d'Ève ni d'Adam — Not to know someone at all.
- Fauché comme les blés — Completely broke.
- S'inscrire en faux — To formally deny something and challenge its truth.
- Cherchez la femme — There is a woman behind this somewhere.
- Jeter l'argent par les fenêtres — To spend recklessly and pointlessly.
- Croire dur comme fer — To believe something with complete and unshakeable conviction.
More French idioms
- Le fer de lance — The leading element of an effort; the part that goes in first.
- Avoir le feu sacré — To be driven by genuine, burning vocation.
- Être tout feu tout flamme — To be full of ardent enthusiasm.
- Faire fi de quelque chose — To scorn something; to dismiss it as beneath notice.
- Des grosses ficelles — Crude, obvious tricks that fool nobody.
- Cousu de fil blanc — So obvious that the deception is plainly visible.
From our false friends
- Ignorer — Actually means 'to be unaware of' or 'not to know'. J'ignore la réponse = I don't know th…
- Déception — Actually means 'disappointment'. For deception (a trick), say tromperie.
- Monnaie — Actually means 'change' or 'coins'. Money in general is l'argent.
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