Un cheval de Troie
Meaning: A gift or arrangement that conceals a hostile purpose.
Language: French
Literally: A Trojan horse
Category: Animals
Origin: From the hollow wooden horse by which the Greeks entered Troy, as told in the Odyssey and the Aeneid. Computing borrowed the term for concealed malware, which is now the sense most people meet first.
More idioms — Animals
- C'est le chien de Jean de Nivelle — Said of someone who makes himself scarce precisely when he is called.
- Les chiens ne font pas des chats — Children inevitably resemble their parents.
- Les chiens aboient et la caravane passe — Criticism from bystanders does not stop those who are getting on with it.
- Ne pas attacher son chien avec des saucisses — To be extremely tight-fisted.
- Un temps de chien — Filthy, miserable weather.
- Donner de la confiture à un cochon — To waste something fine on someone incapable of appreciating it.
More French idioms
- Mettre les bouchées doubles — To work twice as hard in order to catch up.
- La dive bouteille — Wine, treated with mock reverence.
- Boire le calice jusqu'à la lie — To endure an ordeal all the way to its most humiliating end.
- La cerise sur le gâteau — A final touch that completes something already good — often said sarcastically of a last…
- Ni chair ni poisson — Neither one thing nor the other; impossible to classify.
- Clouer le bec à quelqu'un — To silence someone completely, usually with an unanswerable reply.
From our false friends
- Actuel — Actually means 'current' or 'present-day'. Actuellement = currently — not 'actually'.
- Blesser — Actually means 'to wound' or 'to injure'. Je suis blessé = I am injured — not blessed.
- Location — Actually means 'rental'. Une location de voiture = a car rental. For location (place), sa…
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