L'habit ne fait pas le moine
Meaning: Appearances do not establish what someone is.
Language: French
Literally: The habit does not make the monk
Category: Daily Life
Origin: A medieval saying, in Latin as cucullus non facit monachum, and originally aimed at people who put on religious dress without the vocation. English says you cannot judge a book by its cover.
More idioms — Daily Life
- C'est de l'hébreu — It is completely incomprehensible.
- Vieux comme Hérode — Extremely ancient.
- Un combat homérique — A struggle of epic scale and duration.
- Un homme averti en vaut deux — Advance warning doubles a person's effectiveness.
- Honi soit qui mal y pense — Let anyone who reads something improper into this be the one disgraced.
- À huis clos — In closed session, with the public excluded.
More French idioms
- Mettre à l'index — To blacklist something or exclude it from acceptable use.
- Un violon d'Ingres — A serious passion pursued outside one's actual profession.
- Un coup de Jarnac — An unexpected decisive stroke, delivered within the rules but not quite sportingly.
- Jeux de mains, jeux de vilains — Horseplay ends badly.
- On ne peut être juge et partie — Nobody may rule on a matter in which they have an interest.
- Un jugement de Salomon — A ruling of great wisdom that exposes the truth by testing it.
From our untranslatable words
- L'esprit de l'escalier — Thinking of the perfect comeback only after the moment has passed — on your way down the…
- Terroir — The unique character that a place — its soil, climate and tradition — gives to a wine or…
- Râler — To complain and grumble with a certain national flair — a beloved French pastime.
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