La bave du crapaud n'atteint pas la blanche colombe
Meaning: Insults from a contemptible source cannot touch the person they target.
Language: French
Literally: The toad's slobber does not reach the white dove
Category: Animals
Origin: A pairing of two long-standing symbols — the toad as the base and venomous creature, the white dove as purity — set so that the low cannot reach the high. Usually delivered as a dignified retort to an insult.
More idioms — Animals
- Savoir où le bât blesse — To know exactly where the real difficulty or sore point lies.
- Faire un bœuf — To improvise music together; to hold a jam session.
- Rire comme un bossu — To laugh helplessly and without restraint.
- Rabattre le caquet à quelqu'un — To shut someone up; to take an insolent person down a peg.
- Caracoler en tête — To lead by a wide margin, especially in a race or in polls.
- Muet comme une carpe — Completely silent; saying absolutely nothing.
More French idioms
- Compter pour du beurre — To count for nothing; to be disregarded.
- Mettre du beurre dans les épinards — To improve one's financial situation; to make life a bit more comfortable.
- Beurré comme un p'tit Lu — Thoroughly drunk.
- Un compte d'apothicaire — A needlessly complicated calculation, usually one padded in the biller's favor.
- Tailler une bavette — To have a long, friendly chat.
- Une auberge espagnole — A place or discussion in which you find only what you yourself brought to it.
From our tongue twisters
- Un beau ver vert dans un verre vert verra un ver vert. — Ver (worm), vert (green), and verre (glass) are near-homophones — distinguishing them at…
- Didon dîna, dit-on, du dos d'un dodu dindon dont le dodu dos dodine. — A 'd' / 'din' / 'dod' avalanche that seems designed to jam the tongue in third gear.
- Un chasseur sachant chasser doit savoir chasser sans son chien. — The classic French 'ch' / 's' tangler.
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