Faire son deuil de quelque chose
Meaning: To accept that something is lost and give up on it.
Language: French
Literally: To make one's mourning for something
Category: Daily Life
Origin: Deuil is the formal mourning period, so the phrase treats a surrendered hope with the same finality as a death. It is stronger than merely giving up — it means processing the loss and closing it.
More idioms — Daily Life
- Jeter son dévolu sur quelque chose — To settle firmly on something one intends to have.
- À Dieu ne plaise — God forbid.
- Dieu reconnaîtra les siens — Act without discriminating and let a higher authority sort out the innocent.
- Mon petit doigt m'a dit — I know something you did not expect me to know.
- Dorer la pilule — To make an unpleasant fact easier to accept by dressing it up.
- Qui dort dîne — Sleep takes the place of a meal you cannot afford.
More French idioms
- Se la couler douce — To take life very easy indeed.
- Des mesures draconiennes — Punishingly severe rules.
- Péter une durite — To lose one's temper completely.
- À l'eau de rose — Insipidly sentimental, especially of fiction.
- L'échapper belle — To have a narrow escape.
- Faire l'école buissonnière — To play truant.
From our proverbs
- Brag's a good dog, but Holdfast is a better. — Boasting accomplishes nothing; actually keeping what you have through persistence and rel…
- Brag's a good dog, but that he hath lost his tail. — Boasting loses you the respect that makes bragging worthwhile in the first place.
- Brag's a good dog if he be well set on; but he dare not bite. — Empty boasting lacks substance—confidence unsupported by real ability cannot sustain itse…
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