1. Being sick as a dog

When you're bedridden, with a dull fever and nasty pains that prevent you from getting up or doing anything, you say you're sick as a dog.

This expression is even more common to designate a specific ailment, that of indigestion: we will use this formulation to modestly say that we have had our stomach upset while eating something or suffering from motion sickness.

The origin of this phrase is unclear.

What we know for certain is that the word “dog” had a very pejorative connotation in the past, even being used as an insult or a degrading term.

This is probably sufficient to explain the origin of the formulation, which is similar to that of the expressions “un mal de chien” or “un character de chien”.


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2. Looking at each other like earthenware dogs

To look at each other like earthenware dogs is to gaze at each other, to look at each other for a long time and fixedly, without saying a word, without moving.

There is in this expression an impression of mistrust, or defiance, between the two animals or the people to whom they refer.

And yet, the earthenware dogs from which this expression originates have no particular animosity for each other.

In fact, they are decorative objects with which we adorned libraries or fireplaces.

Two representations of seated earthenware dogs were often placed there, in profile, for the sake of symmetry.

The two dogs seemed to face each other and look into each other's eyes, which after a while could evoke the behavior of distrust and defiance that is referred to today with this expression.

3. The weather is bad

When it's a wind to dehorn the oxen, a cold of duck and that it rains cats and dogs, one says that it is a dog's weather.

And come to think of it, it may seem strange to associate this animal with such bad climatic conditions, because it does not derive any particular benefit from it, unlike snails for example.

So why the hell link the dog to bad weather?

As with other expressions of the same type, this could simply be because adding “of dog” to a word immediately gives it a negative qualification, because of the poor image that the dog once suffered from.

We can also imagine that domestic dogs, who were condemned to live outside whatever the weather, were the only creatures left outside during the worst weather episodes.


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