Phraseologisms

Phraseologisms are stable combinations of words, figures of speech such as: “knuckle down”, “hang your nose”, “ask a headache”... A figure of speech, which is called a phraseological unit, is indivisible in meaning, that is, its meaning does not consist of the meanings of its constituent words. It only works as a single unit, a lexical unit.

Phraseologisms are popular expressions that do not have an author.

The meaning of phraseological units is to give an emotional coloring to an expression and enhance its meaning.

Many phraseological units can be easily replaced with one word:

headlong - quickly,

close at hand - close.

Often a direct expression turns into a figurative one, expanding the shades of its meaning.

Bursting at the seams - from the tailor's speech it acquired a broader meaning - to fall into decay.

Confuse - from the speech of railway workers it has passed into general use in the sense of causing confusion.

Examples of phraseological units and their meanings

to beat the knuckles - to mess around

To overeat henbane - to go berserk (applies to people who do stupid things

After the rain on Thursday - never

Anika the warrior - a braggart, brave only in words, far from danger

Give a head wash (bath) - soap your neck, head - strongly scold

A white crow is a person who stands out sharply from environment one or another quality

Living like a Biryuk means being gloomy and not communicating with anyone.

Throw down the gauntlet - challenge someone to an argument, competition (although no one throws down the gloves)

Wolf in sheep's clothing - evil people pretending to be kind, hiding under the guise of meekness

Having your head in the clouds - blissfully dreaming, fantasizing about who knows what

The soul sank to the ground - a man who was afraid, afraid

Don't spare your belly - sacrifice your life

Notch it on the nose - remember it firmly

Making a molehill out of a molehill - turning a small fact into a whole event

On a silver platter - get what you want with honor, without much effort

At the edge of the earth - somewhere very far away

In seventh heaven - to be in complete delight, in a state of supreme bliss

You can’t see anything - it’s so dark that you can’t see the paths, paths

To rush headlong - to act recklessly, with desperate determination

Eat a pound of salt - get to know each other well

Good riddance - go away, we can do without you

Roll up your sleeves - work hard, diligently

Phraseologisms with the word “WATER”

A storm in a teacup - big worries over an insignificant reason

It is written with a pitchfork on the water - it is not yet known how it will be, the outcome is not clear, by analogy: “grandmother said in two”

You can't spill water - great friends, about strong friendship

Carrying water in a sieve means wasting time, doing useless things. Similarly: pounding water in a mortar.

He took water into his mouth - he remains silent and does not want to answer

Carry water (on someone) - burden him with hard work, taking advantage of his flexible nature

Output to clean water- expose dark deeds, catch a lie

Get away with it - remain unpunished, without bad consequences

Money is like water - meaning the ease with which it is spent

Blowing on water after being burned by milk means being too careful, remembering past mistakes

How he looked into the water - as if he knew in advance, foresaw, accurately predicted events

How he sank into the water - disappeared, disappeared without a trace, disappeared without a trace

Like being submerged in water - sad, sad

Like water through your fingers - the one who easily escapes persecution

Like two drops of water - very similar, indistinguishable

If you don’t know the ford, don’t go into the water - a warning not to take hasty actions

Like a fish in water - to feel confident, to navigate very well, to understand something well,

Like water off a duck's back - a person doesn't care about anything

A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then - a lot of time has passed

Carrying water in a sieve is a waste of time

The seventh water on jelly is a very distant relationship

Hiding loose ends - hiding traces of a crime

Quieter than water, lower than the grass - behave modestly, unnoticed

Pounding water in a mortar is a useless task.

Phraseologisms with the word “NOS”

It is interesting that in phraseological units the word nose practically does not reveal its main meaning. The nose is an organ of smell, but in stable phrases the nose is associated primarily with the idea of ​​something small and short. Remember the fairy tale about Kolobok? When the Fox needed Kolobok to come within her reach and get closer, she asks him to sit on her nose. However, the word nose does not always refer to the organ of smell. It also has other meanings. To mutter under one's breath - to grumble, grumpily, mutter indistinctly.

Lead by the nose - this phrase came to us from Central Asia. Visitors are often surprised how small children manage to cope with huge camels. The animal obediently follows the child leading him by the rope. The fact is that the rope is threaded through a ring located in the camel’s nose. Here you want it, you don’t want it, but you have to obey! Rings were also put into the noses of bulls to make their disposition more docile. If a person deceives someone or does not fulfill his promise, then he is also said to be “led by the nose.”

To turn one's nose up means to be unjustifiably proud of something, to boast.

Notch on the nose - Notch on the nose means: remember firmly, once and for all. It seems to many that this was said not without cruelty: it is not very pleasant if you are offered to make a notch on your own face. Unnecessary fear. The word nose here does not mean the organ of smell at all, but just a memorial tablet, a tag for notes. In ancient times, illiterate people always carried such tablets with them and made all kinds of notes on them with notches and cuts. These tags were called noses.

Nodding off means falling asleep.

Curious Varvara's nose was torn off at the market - don't interfere in someone else's business.

On the nose - this is how they talk about something that is about to happen.

Don't poke your nose into someone else's business - in this way they want to show that a person is overly, inappropriately curious, interfering in what he shouldn't.

Nose to nose - on the contrary, close.

Keep your nose in the wind - in the glorious times of the sailing fleet, movement on the sea was completely dependent on the direction of the wind and the weather. No wind, calm - and the sails drooped, more like a rag. A nasty wind blows into the bow of the ship - you have to think not about sailing, but about dropping all the anchors, that is, “standing at anchor” and removing all the sails so that the air flow does not throw the ship ashore. To go out to sea, a fair wind was required, which inflated the sails and directed the ship forward into the sea. The vocabulary of sailors associated with this received imagery and entered our literary language. Now “keep your nose to the wind” - in figuratively means to adapt to any circumstances. “Drop anchor”, “become anchored” - stop in motion, settle somewhere; “Sitting by the sea and waiting for the weather” is an inactive expectation of change; “Full sail” – moving towards the intended goal full swing, quickly as possible; Wishing someone a “fair wind” means wishing them good luck.

Hanging his nose or Hanging his nose - if suddenly a person is depressed or just sad, it happens about him that they say that he seems to be “hanging his nose,” and they can also add: “by a fifth.” Quinta, translated from Latin, means “fifth.” Musicians, or more precisely, violinists, call this the first string of a violin (the highest one). When playing, the violinist usually supports his instrument with his chin and his nose almost touches this string closest to him. The expression “hanging your nose on a fifth,” perfected among musicians, entered fiction.

I was left with my nose - without what I was counting on.

Right under your nose - close.

To show your nose is to tease someone by putting your thumb to your nose and waving your other finger.

With a gulkin's nose - very little (a gulkin is a dove, a dove has a small beak).

To poke your nose into other people's affairs is to be interested in other people's affairs.

To leave with your nose - the roots of the expression “to leave with your nose” are lost in the distant past. In the old days, bribery was very common in Rus'. Neither in institutions nor in court was it possible to achieve a positive decision without an offering, a gift. Of course, these gifts, hidden by the petitioner somewhere under the floor, were not called the word “bribe.” They were politely called "bring" or "nose". If the manager, judge or clerk took the “nose”, then one could be sure that the case would be resolved favorably. In case of refusal (and this could happen if the gift seemed small to the official or the offering from the opposite party had already been accepted), the petitioner went home with his “nose”. In this case, there was no hope for success. Since then, the words “to go away with your nose” have come to mean “to suffer defeat, fail, lose, stumble, without achieving anything.

Wipe your nose - if you manage to surpass someone, they say that you wiped your nose.

To bury your nose is to immerse yourself completely in some activity.

Well-fed, drunk and with tobacco on his nose - means a satisfied and satisfied person with everything.

Phraseologisms with the word “MOUTH, LIPS”

The word mouth is included in a number of phraseological units, the meanings of which are associated with the process of speaking. Food enters the human body through the mouth - a number of stable expressions one way or another indicate this function of the mouth. There are not many phraseological units with the word lip.

You can't put it in your mouth - they say if the food is cooked tasteless.

Lip is not a fool - they say about a person who knows how to choose the best.

Silencing someone means preventing them from speaking.

Porridge in the mouth - a person speaks slurred.

There was no poppy dew in the mouth - this means that the person has not eaten for a long time and needs to be fed urgently.

The milk on the lips has not dried - they say if they want to show that someone is still young and inexperienced.

Taking water into your mouth means silencing yourself.

To pout your lips means to be offended.

To open your mouth is to freeze in amazement at something that has captured your imagination.

Your mouth is full of trouble - they say when there are so many things to do that you don’t have time to cope with them.

A wide open mouth is a sign of surprise.

Phraseologisms with the word “HAND”

To be at hand - to be available, to be in close proximity

Warm your hands - take advantage of the position

To hold in hands - not to give free rein, to hold in strict obedience

As if taken off by hand, it quickly disappeared, passed

Carry in your arms - provide special affection, attention, appreciate, pamper

Working hard - working hard

Turning up your arm means accidentally being nearby

To fall under the hot hand means to run into a bad mood

The hand does not rise - it is in no way possible to perform the action due to an internal prohibition

Hand in hand - holding hands, together, together

Hand washes hand - people connected by common interests protect each other

I can't get my hands on it - I just don't have the energy or time to do anything.

Hands itch - about a great desire to do something

Just a stone's throw away - very close, very close

Grasp with both hands - agree with pleasure with some proposal

To rake in the heat with someone else's hands - to enjoy the fruits of someone else's work

Golden hands - about someone who skillfully, skillfully does everything, copes with any job

Phraseologisms with the word “HEAD”

Wind in the head is an unreliable person.

It slipped my mind - I forgot.

My head is spinning - there are too many things to do, responsibilities, information.

Giving your head to be cut off means promising.

Out of the blue - unexpected.

To fool one's head is to deceive, to divert from the essence of the matter.

Don't lose your head - be responsible for your actions.

Examine from head to toe - everything, carefully, carefully.

Headlong - risky.

If they don't pat you on the head, they'll scold you.

From a sore head to a healthy one - blame someone else.

Upside down - the opposite.

To rack your brains over a task is to think hard.

Headlong - very quickly.

Phraseologisms with the word "EAR"

The word ear is included in phraseological units that are somehow related to hearing. Harsh words primarily affect the ears. In many established expressions, the word ears does not mean the organ of hearing, but only its outer part. I wonder if you can see your ears? Using a mirror in this case is not allowed!

Keep your eyes open - a person is tensely waiting for danger. Vostry is an old form of the word acute.

Prick up your ears - listen carefully. A dog's ears are pointed and the dog erects its ears when listening. This is where the phraseological unit arose.

You can't see your ears - they say about a person who will never get what he wants.

To plunge head over heels into something - they say to a person if he is completely absorbed in some activity. You can be deeply in debt – if there are a lot of debts.

Blushed to the ears - they say when a person is very embarrassed.

Loose ears - this is what they say about a person who listens to someone too trustingly.

Listening with all your ears means listening carefully.

Listen with half an ear or listen out of the corner of your ear - listen without much attention.

Ears wither - it’s extremely disgusting to listen to anything.

It hurts the ears - they say when something is unpleasant to listen to.

Phraseologisms with the word “TOOTH”

There are quite a large number of stable expressions with the word tooth in the Russian language. Among them there is a noticeable group of phraseological units in which teeth act as a kind of weapon of defense or attack, threat. The word tooth is also used in phraseological units denoting various deplorable human conditions.

To be in the teeth is to impose, to bother.

Armed to the teeth - they say about a person who is dangerous to attack, because he can give a worthy rebuff.

Talking with your teeth is a distraction.

Tit for tat - abusive (tendency to abuse), unyielding, “as it comes back, so it will respond.”

A tooth doesn't touch a tooth - they say if someone is frozen from extreme cold or from trembling, excitement, or fear.

To give a tooth is to mock, to ridicule someone.

To eat with a tooth - to drive, to squeeze.

To bare your teeth is to mock.

Eating teeth means gaining experience.

Scratching your teeth means talking nonsense, nonsense.

Try it on the tooth - find out, try it directly.

Something is too tough for someone - it’s difficult to bite off, it’s beyond your strength, beyond your abilities.

There is nothing to put on the tooth - they say when there is nothing to eat.

Not even a blow - absolutely nothing (not knowing, not understanding, etc.).

To look someone in the mouth is to find out everything about a person.

To raise a tooth is to mock.

Showing your teeth means demonstrating your evil nature, your desire to quarrel, to threaten someone.

Putting your teeth on a shelf means starving when there is no food left in the house.

Speak through teeth - barely open your mouth, reluctantly.

Grit your teeth - do not lose heart, do not despair, start the fight.

To sharpen or have a grudge against someone is to be angry, to strive to cause harm.

Phraseologisms with the word “CHEST, BACK”

The words chest and back are included in oppositely colored phraseological units. However, there are also positively colored phraseological units with the word back.

To stand up or stand with your chest for something - to rise to defense, to defend steadfastly.

Riding on someone's back means achieving your goals by using someone to your advantage.

They bend their back - to work, or to bow.

Hunch your back - work.

To ride on someone's back is to use someone for some of your own purposes.

To do something behind someone’s back - so that he doesn’t see, doesn’t know, secretly from someone.

Place your hands behind your back - cross them at the back.

On your own back (to experience, to learn something) - from your own bitter experience, as a result of troubles, difficulties, adversities that you yourself had to endure.

A knife in the back or a stab in the back is a treacherous, treasonous act, a blow.

Turn your back - leave, leave to the mercy of fate, stop communicating with someone.

To pave the way with one's chest means to achieve a good position in life; he achieves everything through hard work and overcomes all the difficulties that befall him.

Hiding behind someone else's back means shifting your responsibilities or responsibilities onto someone else.

To work without straightening your back is diligent, diligent, hard and hard. They can be used to praise a roughly working person.

Straighten your back - gain self-confidence, cheer up.

Show your back - leave, run away.

To stand behind someone's back is to secretly, secretly lead someone.

Phraseologisms with the word “LANGUAGE”

Language is another word often found in phraseological units, since language is extremely important for a person, it is with it that the idea of ​​​​the ability to speak and communicate is associated. The idea of ​​speaking (or, conversely, silence) can be traced in one way or another in many phraseological units with the word language.

Running with your tongue out is very fast.

Keep your mouth shut - remain silent, do not say too much; be careful in your statements.

Long tongue - they say if a person is a talker and likes to tell other people's secrets.

How a cow licked it with its tongue - about something that quickly and without a trace disappeared.

Find a common language - achieve mutual understanding.

Step on the tongue - silence.

Hanging your tongue on your shoulder means you are very tired.

To get on the tongue is to become the subject of gossip.

Bite your tongue - shut up, refrain from speaking.

Loosen the tongue - encourage someone to talk; give someone the opportunity to speak.

To loosen one's tongue - without restraining oneself, losing control over oneself, blurting out, saying unnecessary things.

A peck on your tongue is an angry wish to an angry chatterbox.

To pull your tongue is to say something that is not entirely appropriate to the situation.

To shorten the tongue - to make someone silent, to prevent insolence from speaking, unnecessary things.

Scratching your tongue (scratching your tongue) means talking in vain, chattering, idle talk.

To scratch one's tongue is to gossip, slander.

The devil pulled his tongue - an unnecessary word escapes the tongue.

A tongue without bones - they say if a person is talkative.

Your tongue is slurred—you can’t say anything clearly.

The tongue is stuck to the larynx - suddenly become silent, stop speaking.

Swallow your tongue - shut up, stop talking (about someone’s reluctance to talk).

The tongue is well-spoken - they say about a person who speaks freely and fluently.

Phraseologisms with the word “LITTLE”

Almost - about, almost

The spool is small but expensive - value is not determined by size

Small small smaller - one smaller than the other (about children)

The bird is small, but the nail is sharp - insignificant in position, but inspires fear or admiration for its qualities

A small dog until old age, a puppy - a small person always seems younger than his age, does not make a solid impression

You never know - 1. anything, any 2. not significant, not important 3. excitement, what if...

Little by little - slowly, little by little

Slowly - slowly

From young to old - all ages

Little by little (drink) – a little, a small portion

Play small - make a small bet (in games)

From an early age - from childhood

The smallest part is an insignificant part of something.

Correct and appropriate use of phraseological units gives speech special expressiveness, accuracy and imagery.

Ecology of life: Often, to achieve a certain speech effect, simple words are not enough. Irony, bitterness, love, mockery...

Speech is a way of communication between people. To achieve complete mutual understanding and express your thoughts more clearly and figuratively, many lexical techniques are used, in particular, phraseological units (phraseological unit, idiom) – stable figures of speech that have independent meaning and are characteristic of a particular language.

Often, simple words are not enough to achieve a certain speech effect. Irony, bitterness, love, mockery, your own attitude to what is happening - all this can be expressed much more succinctly, more precisely, more emotionally.

We often use phraseological units in everyday speech, sometimes without even noticing - after all, some of them are simple, familiar, and familiar from childhood. Many of the phraseological units came to us from other languages, eras, fairy tales, and legends.

“The game is not worth the candle” and other popular expressions

Augean stables

First clear out these Augean stables, and then you can go for a walk.

Meaning. A cluttered, polluted place where everything is in complete disarray.

Origin. An ancient Greek legend tells us that King Augeas lived in ancient Elis, a passionate lover of horses: he kept three thousand horses in his stables. However, the stalls in which the horses were kept had not been cleaned for thirty years, and they were overgrown with manure up to the roof.

Hercules was sent to Augeas' service, and the king instructed him to clean the stables, which no one else could do.

Hercules was as cunning as he was powerful. He directed the waters of the river into the gates of the stables, and a stormy stream washed away all the dirt from there within a day.

The Greeks sang this feat along with the other eleven, and the expression “Augean stables” began to be applied to everything neglected, polluted to the last limit, and generally to denote great disorder.

Arshin swallow

It stands as if it had swallowed an arshin.

Meaning. Standing unnaturally straight.

Origin. The Turkish word “arshin”, meaning a measure of length of one cubit, has long become Russian. Before the revolution, Russian merchants and craftsmen constantly used arshins - wooden and metal rulers seventy-one centimeters long. Imagine what a person must look like after swallowing such a ruler, and you will understand why this expression is used in relation to prim and arrogant people.

Overeat henbane

In Pushkin’s “The Tale of the Fisherman and the Fish,” the old man, indignant

with the shameless greed of his old woman, he angrily tells her:

“Why, woman, have you eaten too much henbane?”

Meaning. Behaving absurdly, viciously, like a madman.

Origin. In the village, in the backyards and landfills, you can find tall bushes with dirty yellowish flowers with purple veins and unpleasant smell. This is henbane - very poisonous plant. Its seeds resemble poppy seeds, but whoever eats them becomes like a madman: he raves, goes on a rampage, and often dies.

Buridanov's donkey

He rushes about, cannot decide on anything, like Buridan’s donkey.

Meaning. An extremely indecisive person, hesitating between equally valuable decisions.

Origin. Philosophers of the late Middle Ages put forward a theory according to which the actions of living beings depend not on their own will, but solely on external causes. The scientist Buridan (more precisely Buridan), who lived in France in the 14th century, confirmed this idea with such an example. Take a hungry donkey and put on both sides of his muzzle, at equal distances, are two identical armfuls of hay. The donkey will have no reason to prefer one of them to the other: after all, they are exactly alike. He will not be able to reach for either the right or the left and will eventually die from hunger.

Let's go back to our sheep

However, enough about this, let's get back to our sheep.

Meaning. An appeal to the speaker not to be distracted from the main topic; a statement that his digression from the topic of conversation was over.

Origin. Let's return to our sheep - a tracing from the French revenons a nos moutons from the farce “The Lawyer Pierre Patlin” (c. 1470). With these words, the judge interrupts the speech of the rich clothier. Having initiated a case against the shepherd who stole a sheep from him, the clothier, forgetting about his litigation, showers reproaches on the shepherd's defender, lawyer Patlen, who did not pay him for six cubits of cloth.

Versta Kolomenskaya

Everyone will immediately pay attention to a Kolomna mile like you.

Meaning. This is what they call a very tall person, a brute.

Origin. In the village of Kolomenskoye near Moscow there was the summer residence of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. The road there was busy, wide and considered the main one in the state. And when huge milestones were erected, the likes of which had never been seen in Russia, the glory of this road increased even more. The savvy people did not fail to take advantage of the new product and dubbed the lanky man the Kolomna milepost. That's what they still say.

Lead by the nose

The smartest man, he fooled his opponent by the nose more than once or twice.

Meaning. Deceive, mislead, promise and fail to deliver.

Origin. The expression was associated with fairground entertainment. Gypsies took bears to show by wearing a nose ring. And they forced them, poor fellows, to do various tricks, deceiving them with the promise of a handout.

Hair on end

Horror gripped him: his eyes rolled out, his hair stood on end.

Meaning. This is what they say when a person is very frightened.

Origin. “Standing on end” means standing at attention, on your fingertips. That is, when a person gets scared, his hair seems to stand on tiptoes on his head.

That's where the dog is buried!

Ah, that's it! Now it’s clear where the dog is buried.

Meaning. That's the thing, that's the real reason.

Origin. There is a story: the Austrian warrior Sigismund Altensteig spent all his campaigns and battles with his beloved dog. Once, during a trip to the Netherlands, a dog even saved its owner from death. The grateful warrior solemnly buried his four-legged friend and a monument was erected on his grave, which stood for more than two centuries - until early XIX century.

Later, the dog monument could only be found by tourists with the help of local residents. At that time, the saying “That’s where the dog is buried!” was born, which now has the meaning: “I found what I was looking for,” “I got to the bottom of it.”

But there is a more ancient and no less probable source of the saying that has come down to us. When the Greeks decided to give the Persian king Xerxes a battle at sea, they put old men, women and children on ships in advance and transported them to the island of Salamis.

They say that a dog that belonged to Xanthippus, the father of Pericles, did not want to part with its owner, jumped into the sea and swam after the ship to Salamis. Exhausted from fatigue, she died immediately.

According to the testimony of the ancient historian Plutarch, a cinema sema was erected for this dog on the seashore - a dog monument, which was shown to the curious for a very long time.

Some German linguists believe that this expression was created by treasure hunters who, out of fear of the evil spirits supposedly guarding every treasure, did not dare to directly mention the purpose of their search and conventionally began to talk about a black dog, implying the devil and the treasure.

Thus, according to this version, the expression “that’s where the dog is buried” meant: “that’s where the treasure is buried.”

Add the first number

For such deeds, of course, they should get paid the first day!

Meaning. Severely punish or scold someone

Origin. Well, what, this expression is familiar to you... And where did it come from on your unfortunate head! You won't believe it, but... from the old school, where students were flogged every week, regardless of whether they were right or wrong. And if the mentor overdoes it, then such a spanking would last for a long time, until the first day of the next month.

Rub glasses

Don't believe it, they're trying to bully you!

Meaning. To deceive someone by presenting the matter in a distorted, incorrect, but beneficial light for the speaker.

Origin. We are not talking about glasses that are used to correct vision. There is another meaning for the word "points": the red and black marks on playing cards. For as long as there have been cards, there have been dishonest players and cheaters. In order to deceive their partner, they resorted to all sorts of tricks. By the way, they knew how to quietly “rub in points” - turn a seven into a six or a four into a five, on the go, during the game, by gluing in a “point” or covering it with a special white powder. It is clear that “to cheat” came to mean “to cheat”, hence special words were born: “fraud”, “fraud” - a trickster who knows how to embellish his work, pass off the bad as very good.

Voice in the wilderness

Work in vain, you will not convince them, your words are the voice of one crying in the wilderness.

Meaning. Denotes vain persuasion, appeals that no one heeds.

Origin. How do they pass it on? biblical stories, one of the ancient Hebrew prophets called out from the desert to the Israelites to prepare the way for God: to lay roads in the desert, to make the mountains lower, the valleys to be filled, and the crookedness and unevenness to be straightened. However, the calls of the hermit prophet remained “the voice of one crying in the wilderness” - they were not heard. The people did not want to serve their fierce and cruel god.

Goal like a falcon

Who says a good word to me? After all, I'm an orphan all around. Goal like a falcon.

Meaning. Very poor, beggar.

Origin. Many people think that we're talking about about the bird. But she is neither poor nor rich. In fact, the “falcon” is an ancient military battering gun. It was a completely smooth (“bare”) cast iron block attached to chains. Nothing extra!

Naked truth

This is the state of affairs, the naked truth without embellishment.

Meaning. The truth is as it is, without mincing words.

Origin. This expression is Latin: Nuda Veritas [nuda veritas]. It is taken from the 24th ode of the Roman poet Horace (65 - 8 BC). Ancient sculptors allegorically depicted truth (truth) in the form of a naked woman, which was supposed to symbolize the true state of affairs without silence or embellishment.

Onion grief

Do you know how to cook soup, dear onion.

Meaning. A klutz, an unlucky person.

Origin. The caustic volatile substances contained in abundance in the onion irritate the eyes, and the housewife, while crushing the onion for her cooking, sheds tears, although there is not the slightest grief. It is curious that tears caused by the action of irritants chemical composition different from sincere tears. Fake tears contain more protein (this is not surprising, since such tears are designed to neutralize caustic substances that enter the eye), so fake tears are slightly cloudy. However, every person knows this fact intuitively: there is no faith in muddy tears. And onion grief is not called grief, but a passing nuisance. Most often, they turn half-jokingly, half-sorrowfully to a child who has done something strange again.

Two-Faced Janus

She is deceitful, cunning and hypocritical, a real two-faced Janus.

Meaning. Two-faced, hypocritical person

Origin. In Roman mythology, the god of all beginnings. He was depicted with two faces - a young man and an old man - looking in opposite directions. One face is turned to the future, the other to the past.

In the bag

Well, that's it, now you can sleep peacefully: it's all in the bag.

Meaning. Everything is fine, everything ended well.

Origin. Sometimes the origin of this expression is explained by the fact that in the days of Ivan the Terrible, some court cases were decided by lot, and the lot was drawn from the judge’s hat. However, the word “hat” came to us no earlier than in the days of Boris Godunov, and even then it was applied only to foreign headdresses. It is unlikely that this rare word could have found its way into a popular saying at that time.

There is another explanation: much later, clerks and clerks, when dealing with court cases, used their hats to receive bribes.

If only you could help me,” says the plaintiff to the clerk in a sarcastic poem. A.K. Tolstoy, - I would pour ten rubles into my hat, by the way. Joke? “Rash now,” said the clerk, holding up his cap. - Come on!

It is very possible that the question: “Well, how am I doing?” - clerks often answered with a sly wink: “It’s in the bag.” This is where the saying could have come from.

Money doesn't smell

He took the money and didn’t wince, money doesn’t smell.

Meaning. It is the availability of money that is important, not the source of its origin.

Origin. To urgently replenish the treasury, the Roman Emperor Vespasian introduced a tax on public urinals. However, Titus reproached his father for this. Vespasian brought the money to his son's nose and asked if it smelled. He answered negatively. Then the emperor said: “But they are from urine...” Based on this episode, a catchphrase developed.

Keep in a black body

Don't let her sleep in bed

By the light of the morning star,

Keep the lazy girl in the black body

And don’t take the reins off her!

Meaning. To treat someone harshly, strictly making you work hard; to oppress someone.

Origin. The expression comes from Turkic expressions associated with horse breeding, meaning - to eat in moderation, to be malnourished (kara kesek - meat without fat). The literal translation of these phrases is “black meat” (kara - black, kesek - meat). From the literal meaning of the expression comes “to keep in a black body.”

Bring to white heat

Vile guy, drives me crazy.

Meaning. Make you angry to the limit, drive you crazy.

Origin. When metal is heated during forging, it glows differently depending on the temperature: first red, then yellow and finally blinding white. At a higher temperature, the metal will melt and boil. An expression from the speech of blacksmiths.

Smoke rocker

In the tavern the smoke stood like a yoke: songs, dances, shouting, fighting.

Meaning. Noise, din, disorder, turmoil.

Origin. In old Rus', huts were often heated in a black way: the smoke escaped not through the chimney, but through a special window or door. And they predicted the weather by the shape of the smoke. The smoke comes in a column - it will be clear, dragging - towards fog, rain, a rocker - towards the wind, bad weather, or even a storm.

Egyptian executions

What kind of punishment is this, just Egyptian executions!

Meaning. Disasters that bring torment, severe punishment

Origin. Goes back to the biblical story of the exodus of the Jews from Egypt. For Pharaoh’s refusal to release the Jews from captivity, the Lord subjected Egypt to terrible punishments - ten Egyptian plagues. Blood instead of water. All the water in the Nile and other reservoirs and containers turned into blood, but remained transparent for the Jews. Execution by frogs. As was promised to Pharaoh: “They will go out and enter into your house, and into your bedroom, and into your bed, and into the houses of your servants and your people, and into your ovens, and into your kneading bowls. Toads filled the entire land of Egypt.

Invasion of midges. As a third punishment, hordes of midges fell upon Egypt, attacking the Egyptians, clinging to them, getting into their eyes, noses, and ears.

Dog flies. The country was flooded with dog flies, from which all animals, including domestic ones, began to attack the Egyptians.

Cattle pestilence. All Egyptians' livestock died out; only the Jews were not affected by the attack. Ulcers and boils. The Lord commanded Moses and Aaron to take a handful of furnace soot and throw it up in front of Pharaoh. And the bodies of the Egyptians and the animals were covered with terrible sores and boils. Thunder, lightning and fiery hail. A storm began, thunder roared, lightning flashed, and a hail of fire fell on Egypt. Locust invasion. A strong wind blew, and behind the wind hordes of locusts flew into Egypt, devouring all the greenery down to the last blade of grass on the land of Egypt.

Unusual darkness. The darkness that fell on Egypt was thick and dense, you could even touch it; and candles and torches could not dispel the darkness. Only the Jews had light.

Execution of the firstborn. After all the first-born children in Egypt (except for the Jewish ones) died in one night, Pharaoh gave up and allowed the Jews to leave Egypt. Thus began the Exodus.

Iron curtain

We live as if behind an iron curtain, no one comes to us, and we don’t visit anyone.

Meaning. Obstacles, obstacles, complete political isolation of the country.

Origin. At the end of the 18th century. An iron curtain was lowered onto the theater stage to protect spectators in case of a fire. At that time, open fire was used to illuminate the stage - candles and oil lamps.

This expression acquired political overtones during the First World War. On December 23, 1919, Georges Clemenceau declared in the French Chamber of Deputies: “We want to put an iron curtain around Bolshevism so as not to destroy civilized Europe in the future.”

Yellow press

Where did you read all this? Don't trust the yellow press.

Meaning. A low-quality, deceitful press, greedy for cheap sensations.

Origin. In 1895, the New York World newspaper began regularly publishing a series of comic strips called “The Yellow Kid.” Its main character, a boy in a long yellow shirt, made funny comments about various events. In early 1896, another newspaper, the New York Morning Journal, lured the creator of the comic strip, artist Richard Outcault. Both publications thrived on publishing scandalous materials. A dispute broke out between competitors over the copyright of “Yellow Baby.” In the spring of 1896, the editor of the New York Press, Erwin Wordman, commenting on this litigation, contemptuously called both newspapers “the yellow press.”

Alive Smoking Room

A. S. Pushkin wrote an epigram to the critic M. Kachenovsky, which began with the words:

"How! Is Kurilka the journalist still alive? It ended with wise advice:

“...How to extinguish a stinking splinter? How can I kill my Smoking Room? Give me some advice.”

- “Yes... spit on him.”

Meaning. An exclamation when mentioning someone's continued activity or existence despite difficult conditions.

Origin. There was an old Russian game: a lit splinter was passed from hand to hand, chanting: “The Smoking Room is alive, alive, alive, alive, not dead!..” The one whose splinter went out, began to smoke, and smoke, lost.

Gradually, the words “the Smoking Room is alive” began to be applied to certain figures and to various phenomena, which, logically, should have disappeared long ago, but, despite everything, continued to exist.

Behind seven seals

Well, of course, because this is a sealed secret for you!

Meaning. Something incomprehensible.

Origin. Goes back to the biblical expression “a book with seven seals” - a symbol of secret knowledge inaccessible to the uninitiated until seven seals are removed from it, III from the prophetic New Testament book “Revelations of St. John the Evangelist." “And I saw in the right hand of Him who sat on the throne, a book written inside and outside, sealed with seven seals. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice: “Who is worthy to open this book and to open its seals?” And no one in heaven, nor on earth, nor under the earth could open this book and look into it. The Lamb, who “was slain and redeemed us to God with his blood, opened the seals of the book. After the opening of six seals, the seal of God was placed on the inhabitants of Israel, according to which they were accepted as true followers of the Lord. After the opening of the seventh seal, the Lamb ordered John to eat the book: “... it will be bitter in your belly, but in your mouth it will be sweet as honey,” in order to talk about the future renewal of the whole world and dispel the fears of believers about the future of Christianity, which Jews, pagans and false teachers are fighting on all sides.”

Nick down

And get this in your head: you won’t be able to deceive me!

Meaning. Remember it firmly, once and for all.

Origin. The word “nose” here does not mean the organ of smell. Oddly enough, it means “memorable tablet”, “record tag”. In ancient times, illiterate people carried such sticks and tablets with them everywhere and made all kinds of notes and notches on them. These tags were called noses.

The truth is in the wine

And next to the neighboring tables sleepy footmen hang around,

And the rabbit-eyed drunks shout “In vino Veritas.”

Meaning. If you want to find out exactly what a person is thinking, treat him to wine.

Origin. This is the famous Latin expression: In vino Veritas (in wine veritas). It is taken from the work “Natural History” by the Roman scientist Pliny the Elder (1st century AD). where it is used to mean: what is on the sober mind is on the tongue of the drunk.

It is not worth it

You shouldn't do this. The game is clearly not worth the candle.

Meaning. The effort expended is not worth it.

Origin. The phraseological expression is based on a card term, which means that the stakes in the game are so insignificant that even the winnings will be less than the funds spent on candles to illuminate the card table.

To the head analysis

Well, brother, you've come late to the very basic analysis!

Meaning. Be late, show up when it’s all over.

Origin. The saying arose in those days when in our frosty country people, coming to church in warm clothes and knowing that it was forbidden to go inside with a hat, put their three hats and caps at the very entrance. At the end of the church service, when everyone left, they took them apart. Only those who were clearly in no hurry to go to church came to the “head-by-side analysis.”

How to get chickens into cabbage soup

And he ended up with this case like chickens in cabbage soup.

Meaning. Bad luck, unexpected misfortune.

Origin. A very common saying that we repeat all the time, sometimes without any idea of ​​its true meaning. Let's start with the word "chicken". This word in old Russian means “rooster”. But “cabbage soup” was not in this proverb before, and it was pronounced correctly: “I got caught in the plucking like a chicken,” that is, I was plucked, “unlucky.” The word “plucking” was forgotten, and then people, willy-nilly, changed the expression “to plucking” to “into cabbage soup.” When she was born is not entirely clear: some think that even under Demetrius the Pretender, when she was “plucked”; the Polish conquerors fell; others - what's in Patriotic War 1812, when the Russian people forced Napoleon's hordes to flee.

King for a day

I would not trust their generous promises, which they give out right and left: caliphs for an hour.

Meaning. About a man who accidentally found himself on a short time endowed with power.

Origin. The Arabic fairy tale “A Waking Dream, or Caliph for an Hour” (collection “A Thousand and One Nights”) tells how the young Baghdadi Abu-Shssan, not knowing that the caliph Grun-al-Rashid is in front of him, shares with him his cherished dream - become caliph at least for a day. Wanting to have fun, Harun al-Rashid pours sleeping pills into Abu Hassan’s wine, orders the servants to take the young man to the palace and treat him like a caliph.

The joke succeeds. Waking up, Abu-1ksan believes that he is the caliph, enjoys luxury and begins to give orders. In the evening, he again drinks wine with sleeping pills and wakes up at home.

Scapegoat

I'm afraid that you will forever be their scapegoat.

Meaning. Responsible for someone else's fault, for the mistakes of others, because the true culprit cannot be found or wants to evade responsibility.

Origin. The phrase goes back to the text of the Bible, to the description of the ancient Hebrew ritual of transferring the sins of the people (community) onto a living goat. This ritual was performed in the event of desecration of the sanctuary where the Ark of the Ark was located by Jews. To atone for sins, a ram was burned and one goat was slaughtered “as a sin offering.” All the sins and iniquities of the Jewish people were transferred to the second goat: the priest laid his hands on it as a sign that all the sins of the community were transferred to him, after which the goat was expelled into the desert. All those present at the ceremony were considered purified.

sing Lazarus

Stop singing Lazarus, stop being poor.

Meaning. Beg, whine, complain exaggeratedly about fate, trying to evoke the sympathy of others.

Origin. In tsarist Russia, crowds of beggars, cripples, blind men with guides gathered everywhere in crowded places, begging, with all sorts of pitiful lamentations, alms from passers-by. The blind people especially often sang the song “About the Rich Man and Lazarus,” composed based on one gospel story. Lazarus was poor and his brother was rich. Lazarus ate the rich man's leftover food along with the dogs, but after death he went to heaven, while the rich man ended up in hell. This song was supposed to frighten and reassure those from whom beggars begged for money. Since not all beggars were actually so unhappy, their plaintive moans were often feigned.

Get into trouble

You promised to be careful, but you deliberately get into trouble!

Meaning. Undertaking something risky, running into trouble, doing something dangerous, doomed to failure.

Origin. Rozhon is a sharpened stake that was used in bear hunting. When hunting with a goad, daredevils held this sharp stake in front of them. The enraged beast got into trouble and died.

Disservice

Constant praise from your lips is a real disservice.

Meaning. Unsolicited help, a service that brings more harm than good.

Origin. The primary source is I. A. Krylov’s fable “The Hermit and the Bear.” It tells how the Bear, wanting to help his friend the Hermit smack a fly that had landed on his forehead, killed the Hermit himself along with it. But this expression is not in the fable: it developed and entered folklore later.

Cast pearls before swine

In a letter to A. A. Bestuzhev (late January 1825), A. S. Pushkin writes:

"The first sign smart person- know at first glance who you are dealing with,

and don’t throw pearls in front of the Repetilovs and the like.”

Meaning. Wasting words speaking to people who cannot understand you.

Origin. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus Christ says: “Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet and turn and tear you to pieces” (Gospel of Matthew, 7: b). In the Church Slavonic translation, the word “pearl” sounds like “beads”. It is in this version that this biblical expression entered the Russian language.

You can't ride a goat

He looks down on everyone, you can’t even approach him on a crooked goat.

Meaning. He is completely unapproachable, it is not clear how to contact him.

Origin. Amusing their high patrons, using harps and bells for their amusement, dressing up in goat and bear skins, and in the plumage of a crane, these “spinners” were sometimes able to do some pretty good things.

It is possible that their repertoire also included riding goats or pigs. Obviously, it was the buffoons who sometimes encountered such a bad mood from a high-ranking person that “even a goat had no effect on him.”

Unlucky man

Nothing went well with him, and in general he was a bad person.

Meaning. Frivolous, careless, dissolute.

Origin. In the old days in Rus', not only the road was called a path, but also various positions at the prince’s court. The falconer's path is in charge of princely hunting, the hunter's path is in charge of hound hunting, the stablemaster's path is in charge of carriages and horses. The boyars tried by hook or by crook to get a position from the prince. And those who did not succeed were spoken of with disdain: a good-for-nothing person.

Shelve

Now you’ll put it on the back burner, and then you’ll forget it completely.

Meaning. Give the case a long delay, delay its decision for a long time.

Origin. Perhaps this expression originated in Muscovite Rus', three hundred years ago. Tsar Alexei, the father of Peter I, ordered a long box to be installed in the village of Kolomenskoye in front of his palace, where anyone could drop their complaint. Complaints were received, but it was very difficult to wait for a solution: months and years passed. The people renamed this “long” box “long”.

It is possible that the expression, if not born, was fixed in speech later, in “presences” - institutions of the 19th century. The officials of that time, accepting various petitions, complaints and petitions, undoubtedly sorted them, putting them in different boxes. “Long” could be called the one where the most leisurely tasks were postponed. It is clear that the petitioners were afraid of such a box.

Retired goat drummer

I am no longer in office - a retired goat drummer.

Meaning. A person not needed by anyone, respected by anyone.

Origin. In the old days, trained bears were brought to fairs. They were accompanied by a dancing boy dressed as a goat, and a drummer accompanying his dance. This was the “goat drummer”. He was perceived as a worthless, frivolous person. What if the goat is also “retired”?

Bring it under the monastery

What have you done, what should I do now, you brought me under the monastery, and that’s all.

Meaning. To put someone in a difficult, unpleasant position, to bring them under punishment.

Origin. There are several versions of the origin of the turnover. Perhaps the turnover arose because people who had big troubles in life usually went to the monastery. According to another version, the expression is related to the fact that Russian guides led enemies under the walls of monasteries, which during the war turned into fortresses (bring a blind man under a monastery). Some believe that the expression is associated with the difficult life of women in Tsarist Russia. Only strong relatives could protect a woman from her husband’s beatings, having achieved protection from the patriarch and the authorities. In this case, the wife “brought her husband to the monastery” - he was sent to the monastery “in humility” for six months or a year.

Plant the pig

Well, he has a nasty character: he planted the pig and is satisfied!

Meaning. Secretly set up some nasty thing, do some mischief.

Origin. In all likelihood, this expression is due to the fact that some peoples do not eat pork for religious reasons. And if such a person was quietly put pork in his food, then his faith was desecrated.

Get into trouble

The guy got into such trouble that even the guard screamed.

Meaning. Find yourself in a difficult, dangerous or unpleasant situation.

Origin. In dialects, BINDING is a fish trap woven from branches. And, as in any trap, being in it is not a pleasant thing.

Professor of sour cabbage soup

He is always teaching everyone. Me too, professor of sour cabbage soup!

Meaning. Unlucky, bad master.

Origin. Sour cabbage soup - simple peasant food: water yes sauerkraut. Preparing them was not particularly difficult. And if someone was called a master of sour cabbage soup, it meant that he was not fit for anything worthwhile.

Beluga roar

For three days in a row she roared like a beluga.

Meaning. Scream or cry loudly.

Origin. “As dumb as a fish” - this has been known for a long time. And suddenly “beluga roar”? It turns out that we are not talking about the beluga, but about the beluga whale, which is the name of the polar dolphin. He really roars very loudly.

Breeding antimonies

That's it, the conversation is over. I have no time to create antimonies with you here.

Meaning. Chat, lead empty talk. Observe unnecessary ceremony in relationships.

Origin. From Latin name antimony (antimonium), which was used as a medicinal and cosmetic product, having first ground it and then dissolved it. Antimony does not dissolve well, so the process was very long and laborious. And while it was dissolving, the pharmacists carried on endless conversations.

On the side of the bake

Why should I go to them? Nobody called me. It's called coming - on the side of the heat!

Meaning. Everything is random, extraneous, attached to something from the outside; superfluous, unnecessary

Origin. This expression is often distorted by saying “on the side.” In fact, it could be expressed with the words: “side bake.” For bakers, baked, or baked, are burnt pieces of dough that stick to the outside of bread products, that is, something unnecessary, superfluous.

Orphan Kazan

Why are you standing, rooted to the threshold like an orphan from Kazan.

Meaning. This is what they say about a person who pretends to be unhappy, offended, helpless in order to pity someone.

Origin. This phraseological unit arose after the conquest of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible. The Mirzas (Tatar princes), finding themselves subjects of the Russian Tsar, tried to beg all sorts of concessions from him, complaining about their orphanhood and bitter fate.

Grated kalach

Like a grated kalach, I can give you practical advice.

Meaning. This is what they call an experienced person who is difficult to deceive.

Origin. There used to be such a type of bread - “grated kalach”. The dough for it was crumpled, kneaded, “grated” for a very long time, which is why the kalach turned out to be unusually fluffy. And there was also a proverb - “do not grate, do not crush, there will be no kalach.” That is, trials and tribulations teach a person. The expression comes from a proverb, and not from the name of the bread.

Tip on your tongue

What are you saying? Thump your tongue!

Meaning. An expression of dissatisfaction with what was said, an unkind wish to someone who says something that is not meant to be said.

Origin. It is clear that this is a wish, and not a very friendly one. But what is its significance? Pip is a small horny tubercle on the tip of a bird's tongue that helps them peck food. The growth of such a tubercle may be a sign of illness. Hard pimples on the human tongue are called pimples by analogy with these bird bumps. According to superstitious beliefs, pip usually appears in deceitful people. Hence the bad wish, designed to punish liars and deceivers. From these observations and superstitions, an incantatory formula was born: “Tip on your tongue!” Its main meaning was: “You are a liar: let there be a pip on your tongue!” Now the meaning of this spell has changed somewhat. “Tip your tongue!” - an ironic wish to the one who expressed an unkind thought, predicted something unpleasant.

Sharpen the laces

Why are you sitting idle and sharpening your swords?

Meaning. Talking idle talk, engaging in useless chatter, gossiping.

Origin. Lyasy (balusters) are turned figured posts of the railing at the porch; Only a true master could make such beauty. Probably, at first, “sharpening balusters” meant conducting an elegant, fancy, ornate (like balusters) conversation. And by our time, there were fewer and fewer people who could conduct such a conversation. So this expression came to mean empty chatter. Another version elevates the expression to the meaning of the Russian word balyasy - tales, Ukrainian balyas - noise, which go back directly to the common Slavic “tell”.

Pull the gimp

Now they’re gone, he’ll keep dragging his feet until we give up on this idea ourselves.

Meaning. To procrastinate, to delay something, to speak monotonously and tediously.

Origin. Gimp is the finest gold, silver or copper thread, which was used to embroider braids, aiguillettes and other decorations of officer uniforms, as well as priests' vestments and simply rich costumes. It was made in a handicraft way, by heating the metal and carefully pulling out a thin wire with pliers. This process was extremely long, slow and painstaking, so that over time the expression “pull the gimp” began to refer to any protracted and monotonous business or conversation.

Hit face in the dirt

Don't let us down, don't lose face in front of the guests.

Meaning. To make a mistake, to disgrace oneself.

Origin. To hit the dirt with your face originally meant “to fall on the dirty ground.” Such a fall was considered especially shameful by the people in fist fights - wrestling competitions, when a weak opponent was thrown prone to the ground.

In the middle of nowhere

What, should we go see him? Yes, this is in the middle of nowhere.

Meaning. Very far away, somewhere in the wilderness.

Origin. Kulichiki is a distorted Finnish word “kuligi”, “kulizhki”, which has long been included in Russian speech. This is what forest clearings, meadows, and swamps were called in the north. Here, in the wooded part of the country, settlers of the distant past constantly cut down “kulizhki” in the forest - areas for plowing and mowing. In old charters the following formula is constantly found: “And all that land, as long as the ax walked and the scythe walked.” The farmer often had to go to his field in the wilderness, to the farthest “kulizhki”, worse developed than those close to him, where, according to the ideas of that time, goblins, devils, and all sorts of forest evil spirits lived in the swamps and windfalls. This is how ordinary words received their second, figurative meaning: very far away, at the edge of the world.

Fig leaf

She is a terrible pretender and a lazy person, hiding behind her imaginary illness,

like a fig leaf.

Meaning. A plausible cover for unseemly deeds.

Origin. The expression goes back to the Old Testament myth about Adam and Eve, who, after the Fall, experienced shame and girded themselves with fig leaves (fig tree): “And their eyes were opened, and they knew that they were naked, and they sewed together fig leaves and made girdles for themselves "(Genesis 3:7). From the 16th to the end of the 18th century, European artists and sculptors had to cover the most revealing parts of the human body with a fig leaf in their works. This convention was a concession christian church, who considered the image of naked flesh sinful and obscene.

Filka's certificate

What kind of filthy letter is this, can’t you really express your thoughts?

Meaning. An ignorant, illiterate document.

Origin. The author of the expression was Ivan the Terrible. To strengthen his power, which was impossible without weakening the princes, boyars and clergy, Ivan the Terrible introduced oprichnina, which terrified everyone.

Metropolitan Philip could not come to terms with the revelry of the guardsmen. In his numerous messages to the tsar - letters - he sought to convince Grozny to abandon his policy of terror and dissolve the oprichnina. Tsyuzny contemptuously called the disobedient Metropolitan Filka, and his letters - Filka letters.

For his bold denunciations of Ivan the Terrible and his guardsmen, Metropolitan Philip was imprisoned in the Tverskoy Monastery, where he was strangled by Malyuta Skuratov.

Grab the stars from the sky

He is a man not without abilities, but there are not enough stars from heaven.

Meaning. Do not be distinguished by talents and outstanding abilities.

Origin. A phraseological expression associated, apparently, by association with the award stars of military and officials as insignia.

That's enough of a prickle

He was in great health, and suddenly he got sick.

Meaning. Someone died suddenly or was suddenly paralyzed.

Origin. According to the historian S. M. Solovyov, the expression is associated with the name of the leader of the Bulavin uprising on the Don in 1707, Ataman Kondraty Afanasyevich Bulavin (Kondrashka), who in a sudden raid destroyed the entire royal detachment led by the governor Prince Dolgoruky.

Apple of discord

This ride is a real bone of contention, can’t you give in, let him go.

Meaning. What gives rise to conflict, serious contradictions.

Origin. Peleus and Thetis, the parents of the Trojan War hero Achilles, forgot to invite the goddess of discord Eris to their wedding. Eris was very offended and secretly threw it onto the table at which gods and mortals were feasting. Golden Apple; on it was written: “To the most beautiful.” A dispute arose between three goddesses: Zeus's wife Hera, Athena the maiden, goddess of wisdom, and the beautiful goddess of love and beauty Aphrodite.

The young man Paris, the son of the Trojan king Priam, was chosen as a judge between them. Paris gave the apple to Aphrodite who bribed him; Aphrodite forced the wife of King Menelaus for this, beautiful Elena, to fall in love with a young man. Leaving her husband, Helen left for Troy, and in order to avenge such an insult, the Greeks began a long-term war with the Trojans. As you can see, the apple of Eris actually led to discord.

Pandora's Box

Well, now hold on, Pandora's box has opened.

Meaning. Everything that can serve as a source of disaster if you are careless.

Origin. When the great titan Prometheus stole the fire of the gods from Olympus and gave it to people, Zeus terribly punished the daredevil, but it was too late. Possessing the divine flame, people stopped obeying the celestials, learned various sciences, and came out of their pitiful state. A little more - and they would have won complete happiness.

Then Zeus decided to send punishment on them. The blacksmith god Hephaestus sculpted the beautiful woman Pandora from earth and water. The rest of the gods gave her: some cunning, some courage, some extraordinary beauty. Then, handing her a mysterious box, Zeus sent her to earth, forbidding her to open the box. Curious Pandora, as soon as she came into the world, opened the lid. Immediately all human disasters flew out of there and scattered throughout the universe. Pandora, in fear, tried to slam the lid again, but in the box of all the misfortunes, only deceptive hope remained. published . If you have any questions about this topic, ask them to the experts and readers of our project .

Hello, dear readers of the blog site. It is not for nothing that the Russian language is considered “great and powerful”.

It contains not only words with which you can describe the reality of what is happening, but also words whose meaning does not correspond to the words used in them.

Such phrases (these are phraseological units) cannot be understood “head-on” (literally), because the words used in them sometimes create a completely ridiculous picture. For example, “making a molehill out of a molehill,” “sit in a puddle,” “lead by the nose,” “like water off a duck’s back,” etc. They are used only in a figurative sense and by this.

What is it (with examples)

Phraseologisms are set expressions(everyday used in this form), one of the features of which is that they are almost impossible to translate into other languages. And if you do it verbatim, you get real gobbledygook.

For example, how do you translate the phrases to a foreigner:

With a gulkin nose
Where the eyes look.
Shot sparrow.

At the same time, we, as native speakers of Russian, will immediately understand what we are talking about.

“With a gulkin’s nose” - not enough, just a little bit.
“Where the eyes look” - directly, without a specific goal.
“Shooted Sparrow” is experienced in some matters.

These are some examples of phraseological units. Here is the definition of this concept in textbooks:

“Phraseological unit is an expression that is well-established in structure and composition, which used figuratively and consists of two or more words."

Signs of phraseological units

Phraseologism is quite easy to recognize. These phrases have their own distinctive features:

1. They contain two or more words;
2. Have stable compound;
3. Have portable meaning;
4. Have historical roots;
5. Are united member of the proposal.

Now let’s take a closer look at each of these distinctive criteria of phraseological units.

These are several words that are one part of a sentence

There are no one-word phraseological units at all. Most often they consist of just two words, but there are many examples of longer phrases.

Here examples of such phrases with an explanation of their meaning:

“He ate the dog” - experienced, has done something more than once.
“You can’t spill water” - very friendly.
“Wait for the weather by the sea” - do nothing and hope that everything will be resolved by itself.
“Seven Fridays a week” - constantly change your plans or decisions.
“Struggle like a fish against ice” - you do something, but it doesn’t give results.
“Well, you’ve made a mess” - you did something that provoked a whole chain of events.

When parsing a sentence, phraseological units are not divided into parts. For example, the phrase “worked until we sweated” is a single predicate. Just like “counting crows” or “washing your hands.”

Phraseologisms are stable phrases in a figurative sense

Such phrases cannot be distorted, adding or removing individual words from them. AND cannot be replaced one word to another. In this way, they resemble a “house of cards” that will fall apart if one card is pulled out of it.

By the way, "House of cards" also an example of a phraseological unit, it is used when they want to say that “something broke very easily or is about to break”.

For example:

“Between heaven and earth” means being in limbo, not knowing what to do.

And in this phrase it is impossible to replace “sky” with, for example, “clouds”, or “earth” with “field”. The result will be a completely different expression than others people won't understand.

More examples of stable phraseological units with an explanation of their meaning:

“To muddy the waters” means to come up with something strange; it is not good to influence others.
“Sloppy” - doing something poorly.
“Roll up your sleeves” - work well and quickly.
“Counting crows” means being distracted, inattentive.
“Staying with your nose” means being deceived.
“Come to your senses” - change your behavior or attitude towards something.

These phrases always have a figurative meaning

As you may have already noticed, all phraseological units have a figurative meaning. That is why they simply cannot be translated into another language.

For example, try translating the phrase into English "disservice". It will sound like “bear service,” and any foreigner will literally understand that “a specific bear provides some kind of service,” and will most likely decide that we are talking about a trained bear.

But we understand perfectly well this phraseological unit, which means “to help in such a way that it became even worse”.

The same can be said about other expressions:

“Grated Kalach” is a man with experience and who cannot be deceived.
“On the topic of the day” - something relevant that this moment attracts a lot of attention.
“I got into a galosh” - I did something absurd, I made a mistake.
“Losing your head” means doing unreasonable things.
“Wash the bones” - discuss someone behind his back.

History of the origin of phraseological units

Some philologists argue that all phraseological units have some historical roots. It’s just that not everything managed to survive before us. But there are phrases about which we know exactly where they came from.

For example, the expression "beat the buck", which means "To do nothing". In the old days, small wooden blocks were called baklushi, from which spoons were most often made. It was very easy to make blanks; this was trusted to the most inept apprentices. And everyone around believed that they weren’t really working.

Or phraseological unit "like water off a duck's back", meaning that “everything is forgiven to a person.” This phrase was created by nature itself. Not only a goose, but also any bird, loses water really quickly, since their feathers have a thin layer of fat.

And here is the expression "Trishkin caftan" is not as widely known, although it means “an unsuccessful attempt to solve some problem that only leads to more problems.” The phrase appeared thanks to Krylov's fable:

Trishka’s caftan was torn at the elbows.
Why take so long to think here? He took up the needle:
I cut off the sleeves by a quarter -
And he paid in elbow grease. The caftan is ready again;
My arms became only a quarter bare.
But what about this sadness?

And here is the phraseological unit "Monomakh's hat", which means "too much responsibility", gave us Pushkin in his drama "Boris Godunov".

Examples of phraseological units and their meaning

And this is not the only example when common expressions appear in the Russian language thanks to literature. For example, a lot came to us from ancient myths and epics, and even from the Bible.

Brief summary

In conclusion, I will say that phraseological units are found in any language in the world. But so many catchphrases, as in Russian, nowhere else.

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The Russian language is one of the most beautiful and rich languages ​​in the world. Over the long history of its formation, it has undergone many transformations, changes and has been imbued with various vocabulary expressions that help make the conversation clearer and understandable, or figurative and tortuous, and sentences more elegant.

One of these vocabulary phrases in sentences of the Russian language is rightfully considered to be considered in the article. These are proverbs and sayings, carefully collected over the centuries by our ancestors. They make the dialogue between people more rich, beautiful, similar to literary language.

It is incredibly interesting to find the meanings of certain types of phraseological units. You can spend your whole life studying this direction in the Russian language. Let's try to answer the question of how and when it is appropriate to use phraseological units in a conversation.

What is a phraseological unit

A phraseological unit is a stable phrase, which in most cases has its own meaning in a sentence only in an established, generally accepted form, and nothing more. For example, “to run away with your heels sparkling” cannot be pronounced as “to run away with your heels sparkling”, or you can’t say “to take care of it like the pupil of your eye” instead of “to take care of it like the apple of your eye.”

But there are exceptions, when changing the order of words in some types of phraseological units is often considered normal. That is, a number of phrases do not change their meaning when words are rearranged. Thus, “beat the thumbs” and “beat the thumbs” or “carry water in a sieve” and “carry water in a sieve” are phraseological units that do not change due to the rearrangement of words in them.

The history of the birth of proverbs

Many words in the Russian language have long been outdated and have lost their true meaning, but they are still present in stable expressions.

Consider an example like "Nick down"(remember something very well). If you think about the meaning of this phrase, it seems quite cruel, but in fact the history of this expression is hidden in the centuries. Many centuries ago, illiterate people carried tablets with them, on which they made notches in order to remember upcoming events or necessary facts. That is, notching on the nose used to be literally a synonym for the word “write down.”

Or phraseological unit "lead by the nose"(deception is very skillful, so that the victim does not notice it at all). Why did they start talking like that? It's simple. Haven't you noticed how huge camels obediently wander behind their owner without even trying to run away or somehow lean on them? The reason for this is far from animal obedience, but a ring threaded through the nose, to which a rope is attached, which is in the hands of the animal’s owner. Therefore, the expression “being led by the nose” acquired its meaning.

And also an interesting story with phraseology "hang your nose". Nowadays the full version of the proverb is rarely used, which sounds like “hang your nose on a fifth.” Strange as it may be, this phrase originates from musical professionalism, or rather, from violinists. When a person plays the violin, he clamps his head on the instrument so that his nose almost touches the top string, which is called the fifth.

General meaning of set phrases

Most groups of phraseological units in the Russian language have something in common with each other. Therefore, if you look closely, you can notice a pattern in the use, for example, of one or another part of the human body in phraseological usage. Let's try to understand this issue in more detail and understand the meaning of some proverbs. So.

Nose in phraseological units

On the human face, the nose serves as the organ of smell, that is, the perception of smells. In stable phrases called phraseological units, this part of the body is a symbol of something nearby, located at a very short distance from a person. Here are some variations use of nose meanings in proverbs:

Interesting fact . The nose is considered a symbol of something very close, not only in proverbs. Let's take, for example, the fairy tale about Kolobok. How did the cunning fox force her prey to come dangerously close? That's right, she asked Kolobok to come closer and sit on her nose.

Perhaps such meanings are due to the fact that on the human face the nose comes forward most of all, but at the same time it is still close to the rest of the face.

Mouth and lips

Mostly mouth in proverbs has the same functions as on the human face - talking and eating. Lips, in turn, often express emotions and desires, which is quite natural, because, from the point of view of psychology, it is this part human face is the most involved in human facial expressions. By the way, there are not so many groups of stable expressions in which lips are used.

• Take water into your mouth and suddenly shut up;
• To pout your lips is to be offended;
• Lip is not a fool - a person knows how to choose the best or has inflated desires;
• There is porridge in the mouth - the person speaks indistinctly;
• Do not take it into your mouth - very tasteless, unpleasant food;
• There was no poppy dew in the mouth - the person was hungry;
• The mouth is full of trouble - there is a lot to do, the person is very busy;
• To open your mouth is to be very surprised.

Ears

Ears appear in proverbs as organs of hearing, but also they have one feature- they are quite difficult to see without using foreign objects with a mirror surface, and, naturally, this meaning of the symbol could not be ignored.

Teeth in proverbs

Teeth are mostly used in set phrases as protection against something. And also in proverbs, teeth symbolize smile and laughter.

• Armed to the teeth - a dangerous opponent, who is very difficult to defeat due to his good preparation;
• To give a tooth - to laugh or mock someone;
• To bare your teeth means it is unpleasant to laugh, to mock;
• Give it a try - get to know it better, study it well;
• Show teeth - show readiness for hostility and hostility;
• To sharpen/to have a tooth - to dislike, to have hostility towards someone.

Thus, we can conclude that phraseological units are phrases that make conversation more rich and varied. They decorate our speech and help to express and define the emotions that flow like a waterfall within us. So do we have the right, having such linguistic wealth, to use slang words What makes our speech less pleasant and our soul more callous? One can only hope that everyone can find the answer to this question for themselves.

You've probably heard more than once that some phrases are called phraseological units. And, we bet, we have used such phrases ourselves many times. Let's check what you know about them. We guarantee we know more. And we will be happy to share information.

What is a phraseological unit?

Phraseologism- a turnover that is freely reproduced in speech, has a holistic, stable and, often, figurative meaning. From the point of view of structure, it is constructed as a coordinating or subordinating phrase (it is non-predicative or predicative in nature).

In what case does a certain phrase turn into a phraseological unit? When each of its component parts loses its independence as a semantic unit. And together they form a phrase with a new, allegorical meaning and imagery.

Signs of phraseological units:

• sustainability;
• reproducibility;
• integrity of meaning;
• dismemberment of the composition;
• belonging to the nominative dictionary of the language.

Some of these signs characterize the internal content phraseological turn, part – form.

How do phraseological units differ from words?

First of all, with its pronounced stylistic coloring. Most commonly used words in the average person's vocabulary are neutral vocabulary. Phraseologisms are characterized by evaluative meaning, emotional and expressive coloring, without which the realization of the meaning of phraseological units is impossible.

From the point of view of language stylistics, phraseological units can be divided into:

• neutral ( from time to time, little by little and so on.);
• high style ( cornerstone, rest in God and etc.);
• colloquial and vernacular ( good riddance, catch crows etc.).

How do phraseological units differ from phraseological combinations, proverbs and sayings, and popular expressions?

Phraseologisms are capable (and actively do this) in composition to be combined with words of free use (that is, all other words of the language, “non-phraseologisms”).

How phraseological units are divided by origin:

• originally Russian– some free phrases were rethought in speech as metaphors and turned into phraseological units ( reel in fishing rods, fish in muddy water, knead the dirt, spread your wings, grated roll and so on.);
• borrowings from Old Church Slavonic (hesitating nothing, like the apple of his eye, not of this world, a proverb, in its time, the holy of holies and etc.);
• stable phrases-terms that have turned into metaphors (bring to a common denominator= call, specific gravity= value, exaggerate= to greatly exaggerate, squaring the circle and etc.);
• accepted in everyday life stable names, which do not belong to any terminological system ( Indian summer, goat leg and so on.);
• catch words and expressions who came to us from Greek and Roman mythology (Achilles' heel, sword of Damocles, tantalum torment, wash your hands etc.);
• popular words and expressions from the Bible and other religious texts ( manna from heaven, abomination of desolation etc.);
• catchphrases originating from literature, which have lost connection with the original source and entered speech as phraseological units ( magician and wizard– comedy by A.V. Sukhovo-Kobylin “Krechinsky’s Wedding” (1855), between a rock and a hard place– F. Spielhagen’s novel “Between a Hammer and a Hard Place” (1868), between Scylla and Charybdis– Homer, “Odyssey” (8th century BC);
• tracing phraseological units, that is, a literal translation of set expressions from other languages ​​( smash on your head– German aufs Haupt Schlagen, out of place– fr. ne pas etre dans son assiette, time of the dog and the wolf– fr. l'heure entre chien et loup, literally: the time after sunset when it is difficult to distinguish a dog from a wolf).

Do not apply to phraseological units:

• phraseological combinations like to scorn, to pay attention, to win, to make a decision; voracious appetite, girlish memory, bosom friend, sworn enemy, dog cold and the like. The words that make up these phrases retain the ability to be meaningfully and grammatically connected to another word. Phraseological combinations are classified as specific phrases. But phraseological units themselves are not phrases in the common understanding of this definition (*in fact, this is a rather controversial point of classification and in the future we will look at some of these expressions);
• stable phrases-terms ( exclamation point, brain, chest, spinal column, progressive paralysis) and compound names (such as red corner, wall newspaper);
• designs such as: in the form of, for the sake of appearance, under power, if they cannot be compared with a literal prepositional-case combination of words (compare: On the nose= very soon and On the nose mole);
• catchphrases, proverbs and sayings ( Happy hours are not observed; Love for all ages; Whoever comes to us with a sword will die by the sword; Do not renounce money and prison etc.) - they differ from phraseological units in that in speech they are combined not with words, but with whole sentences (parts of sentences).

Lexico-grammatical classification

Phraseologisms can also be classified from a lexico-grammatical point of view:

• verbal- used in speech in the imperfect and perfect form: take/take the bull by the horns, hang/hang the nose, stroke/pat against the grain etc. A significant number of verbal phraseological units have nevertheless become entrenched in the language in the form of only one type: perfect ( wave your hand, tuck it into your belt, kill two birds with one stone) or imperfect ( lead by the nose, smoke the sky, stand like a mountain(for someone)).
• personalized– are realized in noun phrases ( Indian summer, dark forest, Filkina's diploma). In a sentence they can play the role of a nominal predicate - they are used in I.p. or sometimes in the like.
• adverbial– are realized in adverbial combinations ( in all the shoulder blades, in all the eyes, in one word, in a black body, so-so).
• adjectival – are characterized by the fact that their interpretation requires attributive (adjective) phrases ( skin and bones= very thin wet behind the ears= too young).
• verbal-nominal predicative - built on the model of a sentence and implemented in verbal-nominal phrases (in fact, sentences where the role of the subject (grammatical or logical) is an indefinite pronoun): my eyes are rolling out of my head who, and a flag in your hands to whom.

Phraseologisms and idioms - is there a difference?

Is it necessary to distinguish between phraseological units and idioms? Idioms- This figures of speech, which cannot be divided into component parts without losing the original meaning and general meaning which cannot be deduced from the meanings of the individual words included in their composition. We can say that phraseological units and idioms are related as genus and species. That is, a phraseological unit is a broader concept, a special case of which is an idiom.

Idioms are curious because when translated literally into another language, their meaning is lost. An idiom gives a description of phenomena that is logical for speakers of a language, but is based on definitions and metaphors that cannot be understood outside of this language without additional interpretation. For example, in Russian we talk about heavy rain it's raining cats and dogs. In the same case, the British say It’s raining cats and dogs). And, for example, Estonians will say about a heavy downpour that it is pouring like from a beanstalk.

We'll talk about something incomprehensible Chinese letter, but for the Danes it’s “ sounds like the name of a Russian city". The German will say: “I only understood “station”, Pole – “Thank you, everyone is healthy at home.”, the Englishman will use “It’s all Greek to me”.

Or let’s take the famous Russian phraseological unit kick your ass(= to idle, to do nonsense) – it cannot be translated into another language word for word. Because the origin of the expression is associated with phenomena of the past that have no analogues in modern times. “Beating the bucks” means splitting logs into logs for turning spoons and wooden utensils.

Phraseologisms, speech stamps and cliches

Do not confuse phraseological units with speech cliches and cliches. Phraseologisms are a product of metaphorization of language. They enrich speech, make it more expressive and varied, and give figurativeness to the statement. On the contrary, clichés and cliches impoverish speech and reduce it to some hackneyed formulas. Although phraseological units have a stable structure and are reproduced, as a rule, in their entirety, without changes or additions, they liberate thinking and give free rein to the imagination. But clichés and cliches make thinking and speech stereotyped, deprive them of individuality and indicate the poverty of the speaker’s imagination.

For example, expressions black gold(= oil), people in white coats(= doctors), light of the soul– are no longer metaphors, but real cliches.

Common mistakes in using phraseological units

Incorrect use of phraseological units leads to speech errors, sometimes simply annoying, and sometimes even comical.

1. Using phraseological units with the wrong meaning. For example, with a literal understanding or distortion of the meaning of a phraseological unit - In the forest, I always use repellents, so a mosquito won't hurt your nose. The meaning of this phraseological unit is “you can’t find fault with anything”; in this case, the phrase was taken too literally and therefore used incorrectly.
2. Distortion of the form of phraseological units.

• Grammatical Distortion - It Works later ive sleeves(Right later I sleeves). His stories for me imposed on teeth(Right imposed V teeth). It is also incorrect to replace short forms of adjectives with full forms in phraseological units.
• Lexical distortion – Shut up mine someone's belt(it is impossible to freely introduce new units into a phraseological unit). Live wide(Right live large leg – you cannot throw out words from a phraseological unit).

Violation of lexical compatibility. He never had his own opinion - he always repeated after everyone and sang to someone else's tune(in fact, there are phraseological units dance to someone else's tune And sing from someone else's voice).

Modern phraseological units

Like any lexical units, phraseological units are born, exist for some time, and some of them sooner or later go out of active use. If we talk about the relevance of phraseological units, they can be divided into:

• common;
• obsolete;
• outdated.

The system of phraseological units of the Russian language is not once and for all frozen and unchangeable. New phraseological units inevitably arise in response to the phenomena of modern life. Borrowed as cripples from other languages. And enrich modern speech new, relevant metaphors.

Here, for example, are several relatively “fresh” phraseological units that relatively recently (mainly in the twentieth century) took root in the Russian language:

On a live thread- to do something not too carefully, temporarily, with the expectation of redoing the work properly in the future, to do it without extra effort. The origin of the phraseology is quite clear: when seamstresses sew pieces of a product together, they first baste them with large stitches so that they just hold together. And then the parts are sewn together carefully and firmly.

Cloudless character– a characteristic for a calm and calm person with a friendly and balanced character, a person without any special flaws and not subject to mood swings. It can also be used not only to describe a person, but also to characterize abstract phenomena (relationships between people, for example).

How to send two bytes- a characteristic for any action that is completely easy to perform.

Speak different languages– not finding mutual understanding.

Make lemonade out of lemons- be able to even the most unfavourable conditions and apply circumstances to your advantage and achieve success in this.

Why are synonymous phraseological units needed?

By the way, phraseological units can be both synonyms and antonyms. Having understood what connections exist between phraseological units that are different at first glance, you can better understand their meanings. And also diversify the use of these phrases in speech. Sometimes synonymous phraseological units describe different degrees of manifestation of a phenomenon or its different but similar aspects. Look at these examples of phraseological units:

• They also say about a person who means nothing to society and represents nothing of himself small fry, And the last spoke in the chariot, And low flying bird, And lump out of the blue.
• Antonyms for these phraseological units are the following phrases: important bird, high flying bird, big shot.

Interpretation of phraseological units

We bring to your attention the interpretation and even the history of the origin of some phraseological units. They are part of the active stock of the modern Russian language. And, despite the fact that some are not just tens, but even a couple of hundred years old, they remain popular and are widely used in everyday speech and literature.

Augean stables- this is how they burn about a very dirty place, a neglected and untidy room, things scattered in disarray. It also applies to affairs that have become disordered, unorganized and neglected.

Phraseologism comes from ancient Greek myths. One of the labors of Hercules was cleaning the stables of King Augeas of Elis, which had not been cleaned for 30 years.

Ariadne's thread- a wonderful way to find a way out of a difficult situation.

This phrase also came to us from ancient Greek myths. According to legend, the daughter of the Cretan king Minos, Ariadne, helped the Athenian hero Theseus get out of the Minotaur’s labyrinth, giving him a ball of thread so that he could use a thread fixed at the entrance to the labyrinth to return from the tangled corridors. By the way, if you one day become interested in ancient literature, you will find out that later Ariadne probably regretted that she undertook to help Theseus.

Achilles' heel– the weakest and most vulnerable place, secret weakness.

According to ancient greek mythology, the hero Achilles was miraculously hardened from any danger. And only one heel remained humanly vulnerable. Achilles subsequently died from a wound inflicted by an arrow in the heel.

lamb in a piece of paper- bribe.

It is believed that phraseological units originated in the 18th century. At that time, there was a magazine called “All sorts of things”, the editor of which was Empress Catherine II. The monarch sharply criticized bribery, widespread among officials. And she claimed that the officials, hinting at a bribe, demanded that they bring them “a lamb in a piece of paper.” The turn of phrase was popular with the Russian writer M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, who, as you know, often ridiculed the vices of his contemporary society.

without a hitch, without a hitch- flawlessly, without complications or problems, good and smooth.

A snag used to be called roughness, an unevenness on the surface of a smoothly planed board.

sound the alarm- to attract general attention to something of great public or personal meaning, to something dangerous and disturbing.

Alarm - in the Middle Ages and earlier periods of history, to notify people of trouble (fire, invasion of enemies, etc.), an alarm signal was given by ringing bells, less often by beating drums.

swear words(shout) – scream very loudly, at the top of your lungs.

Phraseologism has nothing to do with modern swear words, i.e. mat. From Old Russian, good can be translated as strong, and mat as voice. Those. The expression should be taken literally only if you know what each of its parts means separately.

big boss– an important, respected and significant person in society.

In the old days, heavy loads were floated on rivers using the draft power of people (barge haulers). In the strap, the most experienced, physically strong and hardy man walked in front of everyone, who in the jargon accepted in this environment was called a big shot.

shave forehead– send to military service, into soldiers.

Before the new regulations on conscription were adopted in 1874, recruits were recruited into the army (usually under duress) for a period of 25 years. While the recruitment process lasted, everyone fit for duty military service the front half of the head was shaved bald.

Babel- confusion and crowding, disorder.

Biblical legends describe the construction of a grandiose tower reaching to the sky (“pillar of creation”), which was started by the inhabitants of Ancient Babylon and in which many people from different lands took part. As punishment for this insolence, God created many different languages, so that the builders ceased to understand each other and, in the end, were unable to complete the construction.

St. Bartholomew's night– massacre, genocide and extermination.

On the night of August 24, 1572 in Paris, on the eve of St. Bartholomew's Day, Catholics carried out a massacre of Protestant Huguenots. As a result, several thousand people were physically destroyed and injured (according to some estimates, up to 30 thousand).

Versta Kolomenskaya– a characteristic for a very tall person.

In the past, mileposts marked distances on roads. This particular expression was born from a comparison tall people with milestones on the way between Moscow and the village of Kolomenskoye (the summer residence of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich was located there).

hang dogs- to accuse someone, to condemn and blame, to slander and to blame someone else.

By “dog” we do not mean an animal, but an outdated name for thorns and thorns.

to the fullest extent- very fast.

This phrase was born to denote the very fast running of a horse when it gallops “with all its front legs.”

free Cossack– definition for a free and independent person.

In the Moscow state of the 15th-17th centuries, this was the name given to free people from the central regions of the country who fled to the periphery to escape enslavement (i.e., becoming serfs).

newspaper duck– unverified, distorted or completely false information in the media.

There are several versions of the origin of this phraseological unit. This is a popular one among journalists: in the past, newspapers used to put the letters NT next to dubious and unverified reports ( non testatum= "not verified" in Latin). But the fact is that the German word for "duck" ( ente) is consonant with this abbreviation. This is how this expression was born.

highlight of the program- the most important part of the performance, the best and most important number, something very important and significant.

The famous Eiffel Tower was built in Paris specifically for the World Exhibition (1889). To contemporaries of those events, the tower resembled a nail. By the way, it was assumed that 20 years after the exhibition the tower would be dismantled. And only the development of radio broadcasting saved it from destruction - the tower began to be used as a tower for placing radio transmitters. And the expression has since taken root to denote something unusual, noticeable and significant.

pillars of Hercules(pillars) – the highest, extreme degree of something.

It was originally used to describe something very distant, almost “on the edge of the world.” This is what in ancient times they called two rocks located on the shores of the Strait of Gibraltar. In those days, people believed that the pillar rocks were installed there by the ancient Greek hero Hercules.

goal like a falcon- a characteristic for a very poor person.

Falcon was the name of an ancient battering gun used during the siege. It looked like an absolutely smooth cast iron block attached to chains.

sword of Damocles– constant threat, danger.

In ancient Greek myths there was a story about the tyrant from Syracuse Dionysius the Elder. He taught one of his close associates, Damocles, a lesson for envy of his position. At the feast, Damocles was seated in a place above which a sharp sword was suspended from a horsehair. The sword symbolized the many dangers that constantly haunt a man of such high position as Dionysius.

the case burned out– i.e. something completed successfully, satisfactorily.

The origin of this phraseological unit is associated with the peculiarities of judicial records management in the past. No charges could be brought against a defendant if his court file was destroyed, for example, by fire. Wooden courts, along with all archives, often burned in the past. And there were also frequent cases when court cases were destroyed deliberately, for a bribe to court officials.

reach the handle- to reach the extreme degree of humiliation, extreme need, to completely descend and lose self-respect.

When ancient Russian bakers baked kalachi, they gave them the shape of a padlock with a round shackle. This form had a purely utilitarian purpose. It was convenient to hold the roll by the handle while eating. About illnesses dirty hands, apparently, they guessed even then, so they disdained to eat the handle of the roll. But it could be given to the poor or thrown to a hungry dog. It was possible to go so far as to eat the handle of a roll of bread only in the most extreme cases, in extreme need, or simply without caring at all about one’s health and image in the eyes of others.

bosom friend– the closest and most reliable friend, soul mate.

Before the arrival of Christianity in Rus', it was believed that the human soul was in the throat, “behind the Adam’s apple.” After the adoption of Christianity, they began to believe that the soul is located in the chest. But the designation of the most trusted person, to whom you can even entrust your own life and for whom you will regret it, remained as a “sidekick”, i.e. "soul" friend.

for lentil soup- betray your ideals or supporters for selfish reasons.

According to biblical legend, Esau gave up his birthright to his brother Jacob for just a bowl of lentil soup.

golden mean– an intermediate position, behavior aimed at avoiding extremes and making risky decisions.

This is a tracing paper from the Latin saying of the ancient Roman poet Horace “ aurea mediocritas".

history with geography- a state when things took an unexpected turn that no one expected.

The phraseological unit was born from the outdated name of the school discipline - “history with geography.”

and it's a no brainer– something that should be understandable even to the most incomprehensible, self-evident.

There are two versions of the origin of this phraseological unit. It is also possible that they are both valid and one follows from the other. One by one, a turn of phrase went to the people after a poem by V. Mayakovsky, in which there were the following lines: “It’s clear even to a no brainer / This Petya was a bourgeois.” According to another, the expression took root in boarding schools for gifted children that existed during Soviet times. The letters E, Zh and I denoted classes with students of the same year of study. And the students themselves were called “hedgehogs.” In terms of their knowledge, they lagged behind students from classes A, B, C, D, D. Therefore, what was understandable to a “no brainer” should have been even more understandable to more “advanced” students.

don't wash, just ride– to achieve the desired result in more than one way.

This phraseological unit describes the ancient method of washing adopted in villages. The laundry was rinsed by hand, and then, due to the lack of such benefits of civilization as an iron at that time, they were “rolled out” with a special wooden rolling pin. After this, things became wrung out, especially clean and even practically ironed.

latest Chinese warning– empty threats that do not entail any decisive action.

This phraseological unit was born relatively recently. In the 50s and 60s, US Air Force reconnaissance aircraft often violated Chinese airspace. The Chinese authorities responded to any such border violation (and there were several hundred of them) with an official warning to the US leadership. But no decisive action was taken to stop the reconnaissance flights of American pilots.

quietly- do something secretly and gradually, act on the sly.

Sapa (from it. zappa= “hoe”) - a ditch or tunnel, imperceptibly dug towards the enemy’s fortifications in order to take him by surprise. In the past, in this way they often undermined the walls of enemy fortresses, placing charges of gunpowder in the trenches. Exploding, the bombs destroyed the external walls and opened up the opportunity for the attackers to break through. By the way, the word “sapper” is of the same origin - this is the name given to people who left gunpowder charges in saps.

Conclusion

We hope that we were able to reveal for you at least a little the diverse and interesting world phraseological units. If you continue this journey on your own, many more interesting discoveries await you.

Phraseological units change over time, new phenomena in life lead to the emergence of new phraseological units. If you know any interesting new phraseological units, tell us about it in the comments. We will definitely supplement this article with them and will not forget to thank those who send us new phraseological units.

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