FrenchFaire le gendarme
Meaning: Acting authoritarian or enforcing rules with excessive zeal.
Literally: To play the policeman
Example: “À la maison, c'est toujours moi qui fais le gendarme pour les devoirs.” — At home, I'm always the one who has to lay down the law about homework.
English equivalent: To lay down the law
Origin: Gendarme comes from gens d'armes, men-at-arms, and today names France's military police, who keep order in the countryside. Playing the gendarme is taking on that role uninvited, enforcing the rules in a household, a classroom or among friends. French also has the old verb se gendarmer, already in the Académie française's first dictionary (1694), for getting worked up, often over a trifle. The phrase itself has no documented history.
Equivalents in other languages
Persian: گربه را دم حجله کشتن (gorbe rā dam-e hejle koshtan) Literally: To kill the cat at the wedding-chamber door
English: lay down the law
More French idioms
- Avoir des étoiles dans les yeux Being dreamy, hopeful, or enchanted by romantic ideals.
- Faire un couac Making an embarrassing mistake or producing a discordant sound.
- Quand les poules auront des dents Never — it describes something that will simply never happen.
- Il y a anguille sous roche Something suspicious is quietly going on beneath the surface.
- Ménager la chèvre et le chou To try to please both sides of a conflict without committing to either.
- Avoir la gueule de bois To be hungover.
Explore another collection: False Friends
Words that look familiar in another language but mean something else entirely.
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