See cry wolf on Wiktionary
Download JSON data for cry wolf meaning in All languages combined (4.4kB)
{
"etymology_text": "From the fable The Boy Who Cried Wolf, where a little boy amuses himself by repeatedly crying \"wolf\" to see the panic he causes in the community, but is consequently ignored when he tries to alert them to a real wolf.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "cries wolf",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "crying wolf",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "cried wolf",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "cried wolf",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "*"
},
"expansion": "cry wolf (third-person singular simple present cries wolf, present participle crying wolf, simple past and past participle cried wolf)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [
"Entries with incorrect language header",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "Mandarin terms with non-redundant manual transliterations",
"parents": [
"Terms with non-redundant manual transliterations",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w"
}
],
"examples": [
{
"text": "The politicians would cry wolf at the slightest provocation so when the real threat appeared no one believed them.",
"type": "example"
},
{
"ref": "1983, Ronald Reagan, Presidential Radio Address - 15 October, 1983",
"text": "[…]those who created the worst economic mess in postwar history should be the last people crying wolf 1,000 days into this administration[…]",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2021 July 17, Somini Sengupta, quoting Ulka Kelkar, “‘No One Is Safe’: Extreme Weather Batters the Wealthy World”, in The New York Times, →ISSN",
"text": "These intensifying disasters now striking richer countries, she said, show that developing countries seeking the world’s help to fight climate change “have not been crying wolf.”",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To raise a false alarm; to constantly warn others about an imagined threat, thereby failing to get assistance when a real threat appears."
],
"id": "en-cry_wolf-en-verb-UTxX6vcK",
"links": [
[
"alarm",
"alarm"
],
[
"imagined",
"imagined"
],
[
"threat",
"threat"
],
[
"assistance",
"assistance"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(idiomatic) To raise a false alarm; to constantly warn others about an imagined threat, thereby failing to get assistance when a real threat appears."
],
"related": [
{
"word": "Chicken Little"
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"english": "wolf",
"word": "cry"
}
],
"tags": [
"idiomatic"
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "cmn",
"lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "狼來了"
},
{
"code": "cmn",
"lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "狼来了"
},
{
"code": "cs",
"lang": "Czech",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"tags": [
"imperfective"
],
"word": "malovat čerta na zeď"
},
{
"code": "da",
"lang": "Danish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "råbe ulven kommer"
},
{
"code": "nl",
"lang": "Dutch",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "loos alarm slaan"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "antaa väärä hälytys"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "nostaa meteli tyhjästä"
},
{
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "crier au loup"
},
{
"code": "it",
"lang": "Italian",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "gridare al lupo"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"tags": [
"imperfective"
],
"word": "podnosić fałszywy alarm"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"tags": [
"perfective"
],
"word": "podnieść fałszywy alarm"
},
{
"code": "ro",
"lang": "Romanian",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "striga lupul"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "gritar ¡al lobo!"
},
{
"code": "sv",
"lang": "Swedish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "ropa varg"
},
{
"code": "te",
"lang": "Telugu",
"roman": "nānnā puli",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "నాన్నా పులి"
}
],
"wikipedia": [
"The Boy Who Cried Wolf"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-cry wolf.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/a/af/En-au-cry_wolf.ogg/En-au-cry_wolf.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/En-au-cry_wolf.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"word": "cry wolf"
}
{
"etymology_text": "From the fable The Boy Who Cried Wolf, where a little boy amuses himself by repeatedly crying \"wolf\" to see the panic he causes in the community, but is consequently ignored when he tries to alert them to a real wolf.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "cries wolf",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "crying wolf",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "cried wolf",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "cried wolf",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "*"
},
"expansion": "cry wolf (third-person singular simple present cries wolf, present participle crying wolf, simple past and past participle cried wolf)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"related": [
{
"word": "Chicken Little"
}
],
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English idioms",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English terms with audio links",
"English terms with quotations",
"English terms with usage examples",
"English verbs",
"Mandarin terms with non-redundant manual transliterations",
"Quotation templates to be cleaned",
"Requests for review of Mandarin translations"
],
"examples": [
{
"text": "The politicians would cry wolf at the slightest provocation so when the real threat appeared no one believed them.",
"type": "example"
},
{
"ref": "1983, Ronald Reagan, Presidential Radio Address - 15 October, 1983",
"text": "[…]those who created the worst economic mess in postwar history should be the last people crying wolf 1,000 days into this administration[…]",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2021 July 17, Somini Sengupta, quoting Ulka Kelkar, “‘No One Is Safe’: Extreme Weather Batters the Wealthy World”, in The New York Times, →ISSN",
"text": "These intensifying disasters now striking richer countries, she said, show that developing countries seeking the world’s help to fight climate change “have not been crying wolf.”",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To raise a false alarm; to constantly warn others about an imagined threat, thereby failing to get assistance when a real threat appears."
],
"links": [
[
"alarm",
"alarm"
],
[
"imagined",
"imagined"
],
[
"threat",
"threat"
],
[
"assistance",
"assistance"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(idiomatic) To raise a false alarm; to constantly warn others about an imagined threat, thereby failing to get assistance when a real threat appears."
],
"tags": [
"idiomatic"
],
"wikipedia": [
"The Boy Who Cried Wolf"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-cry wolf.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/a/af/En-au-cry_wolf.ogg/En-au-cry_wolf.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/En-au-cry_wolf.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"english": "wolf",
"word": "cry"
}
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "cmn",
"lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "狼來了"
},
{
"code": "cmn",
"lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "狼来了"
},
{
"code": "cs",
"lang": "Czech",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"tags": [
"imperfective"
],
"word": "malovat čerta na zeď"
},
{
"code": "da",
"lang": "Danish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "råbe ulven kommer"
},
{
"code": "nl",
"lang": "Dutch",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "loos alarm slaan"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "antaa väärä hälytys"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "nostaa meteli tyhjästä"
},
{
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "crier au loup"
},
{
"code": "it",
"lang": "Italian",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "gridare al lupo"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"tags": [
"imperfective"
],
"word": "podnosić fałszywy alarm"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"tags": [
"perfective"
],
"word": "podnieść fałszywy alarm"
},
{
"code": "ro",
"lang": "Romanian",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "striga lupul"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "gritar ¡al lobo!"
},
{
"code": "sv",
"lang": "Swedish",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "ropa varg"
},
{
"code": "te",
"lang": "Telugu",
"roman": "nānnā puli",
"sense": "raise a false alarm",
"word": "నాన్నా పులి"
}
],
"word": "cry wolf"
}
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-01 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-04-21 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
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