Idiomatic expressions are locutions specific to a language, often colorful, and sometimes with the value of a popular saying. Most of the time, they cannot be translated word by word, but remain a good way to measure the cultural proximity of two languages. Besides, knowing the most used idiomatics of a language is a funny and interesting stage of its learning, as they tell a lot about its popular culture and its history rooted in a given time and place.
Here are some French idiomatics using numbers. Do you know more of them?
- Avoir deux pieds gauches/deux mains gauches: to have two left feet
- Faire d'une pierre, deux coups: to kill two birds with one stone
- Couper la poire en deux: to meet someone halfway (literally, to cut the pear in two)
- Jamais deux sans trois: if one thing happened already twice, there are good chances it will happen a third one (literally, never two without three)
- Être tiré à quatre épingles: to be well-dressed (literally, to be stretched with four pins)
- Ne rien faire de ses dix doigts: to be lazy (literally, to do nothing with one's ten fingers)
- Se mettre sur son trente et un: to put on one's best attire (literally, to dress up on one's thirty-one)
Idiotismes numériques en français (in French)
Expressões idiomáticas numéricas do francês (in Portuguese)
Expresiones idiomáticas numéricas del francés (in Spanish)
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