Payer en monnaie de singe
Meaning: To pay with worthless promises instead of money.
Language: French
Literally: To pay in monkey money
Category: Animals
Origin: A medieval Paris ordinance let traveling entertainers cross the Petit-Pont toll-free if they made their monkey perform for the keeper. The performance discharged the debt, which is exactly what the phrase now accuses someone of offering.
More idioms — Animals
- La montagne accouche d'une souris — A vast effort or grand announcement produces something trivial.
- La mouche du coche — Someone who bustles importantly while contributing nothing.
- On n'attrape pas les mouches avec du vinaigre — Gentleness achieves what harshness cannot.
- Prendre la mouche — To take sudden and disproportionate offense.
- Ours mal léché — A boorish, ill-mannered person.
- Un oiseau rare — An exceptional find; someone with an unlikely combination of qualities.
More French idioms
- Les moutons de Panurge — People who follow the crowd without thinking.
- Charger la mule — To pile on far too much; to overcharge someone.
- Ne pas valoir un pet de lapin — To be entirely worthless.
- Chassez le naturel, il revient au galop — You cannot permanently suppress your real character.
- C'est la mer à boire — It is an impossible or endless task — most often used in the negative.
- Faire son miel de quelque chose — To turn something to one's own advantage.
From our untranslatable words
- Épanouissement — The full flourishing of a person — blooming into your most complete, radiant self. More t…
- Ressourcement — The act of returning to one's roots or origins to find renewal — going back to a place, t…
- Dépaysement — The disorienting yet often pleasant feeling of being far from home, immersed in the unfam…
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