Matching game
French idioms with animals: match them to their meaning
Avoir un chat dans la gorge, poser un lapin, être une poule mouillée: match ten French animal idioms to their English meanings, then see them in context.
- B1
- 10 pairs
- Tap to match
- Learn this in the B1 notebook →
In short
French loves animal idioms. Poser un lapin is to stand someone up, avoir un chat dans la gorge is to have a frog in your throat, and il fait un froid de canard means it's freezing. Most can't be translated word for word, so learn them as whole phrases.
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Tap one on the left, then its partner on the right.
How are French animal idioms used?
Il devait venir à huit heures, mais il m'a posé un lapin.
He was supposed to come at eight, but he stood me up.
Je donne ma langue au chat : c'est quoi, la réponse ?
I give up: what's the answer?
Tu as peur du noir ? Quelle poule mouillée !
You're scared of the dark? What a scaredy-cat!
Notice how often the English version uses a different animal: a French chat in the throat is an English frog, a French taupe (mole) is an English bat, and French poules with teeth are English flying pigs. That's exactly why word-for-word translation fails with idioms.