See bell the cat in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
Download JSON data for bell the cat meaning in English (4.2kB)
{
"etymology_text": "From a medieval fable in which mice agree that a bell should be put round a cat's neck so they will always be warned of its arrival, but cannot agree who should undertake the dangerous task.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "bells the cat",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "belling the cat",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "belled the cat",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "belled the cat",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "*"
},
"expansion": "bell the cat (third-person singular simple present bells the cat, present participle belling the cat, simple past and past participle belled the cat)",
"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": "English entries with language name categories using raw markup",
"parents": [
"Entries with language name categories using raw markup",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English predicates",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
"parents": [
"Terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "Persian terms with redundant script codes",
"parents": [
"Terms with redundant script codes",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group."
],
"id": "en-bell_the_cat-en-verb-JNvg9cdn",
"links": [
[
"undertake",
"undertake"
],
[
"dangerous",
"dangerous"
],
[
"service",
"service"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(idiomatic) To undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group."
],
"related": [
{
"word": "take one for the team"
},
{
"word": "step into the breach"
},
{
"word": "fall on a grenade"
}
],
"tags": [
"idiomatic"
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "nl",
"lang": "Dutch",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "de kat de bel aanbinden"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "panna kello kissan kaulaan"
},
{
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "attacher le grelot"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "der Katze die Schelle umhängen"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "der Katze die Schelle anhängen"
},
{
"code": "nb",
"lang": "Norwegian Bokmål",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "henge bjella på katten"
},
{
"code": "nn",
"lang": "Norwegian Nynorsk",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "hengje bjølla på katten"
},
{
"code": "nn",
"lang": "Norwegian Nynorsk",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "henge bjølla på katten"
},
{
"code": "fa",
"lang": "Persian",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "پیش مرگ شدن، در انجام کار مشکلی پیش قدم شدن"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "narazić się (dla dobra grupy)"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "ponerle el cascabel al gato"
},
{
"code": "vi",
"lang": "Vietnamese",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "đeo lục lạc cho mèo"
},
{
"code": "vi",
"lang": "Vietnamese",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "treo chuông cổ mèo"
}
],
"wikipedia": [
"Belling the cat"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-bell the cat.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/3/39/En-au-bell_the_cat.ogg/En-au-bell_the_cat.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/En-au-bell_the_cat.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"word": "bell the cat"
}
{
"etymology_text": "From a medieval fable in which mice agree that a bell should be put round a cat's neck so they will always be warned of its arrival, but cannot agree who should undertake the dangerous task.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "bells the cat",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "belling the cat",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "belled the cat",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "belled the cat",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "*"
},
"expansion": "bell the cat (third-person singular simple present bells the cat, present participle belling the cat, simple past and past participle belled the cat)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"related": [
{
"word": "take one for the team"
},
{
"word": "step into the breach"
},
{
"word": "fall on a grenade"
}
],
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English entries with language name categories using raw markup",
"English idioms",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English predicates",
"English terms with audio links",
"English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
"English verbs",
"Persian terms with redundant script codes"
],
"glosses": [
"To undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group."
],
"links": [
[
"undertake",
"undertake"
],
[
"dangerous",
"dangerous"
],
[
"service",
"service"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(idiomatic) To undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group."
],
"tags": [
"idiomatic"
],
"wikipedia": [
"Belling the cat"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-bell the cat.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/3/39/En-au-bell_the_cat.ogg/En-au-bell_the_cat.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/En-au-bell_the_cat.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "nl",
"lang": "Dutch",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "de kat de bel aanbinden"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "panna kello kissan kaulaan"
},
{
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "attacher le grelot"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "der Katze die Schelle umhängen"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "der Katze die Schelle anhängen"
},
{
"code": "nb",
"lang": "Norwegian Bokmål",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "henge bjella på katten"
},
{
"code": "nn",
"lang": "Norwegian Nynorsk",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "hengje bjølla på katten"
},
{
"code": "nn",
"lang": "Norwegian Nynorsk",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "henge bjølla på katten"
},
{
"code": "fa",
"lang": "Persian",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "پیش مرگ شدن، در انجام کار مشکلی پیش قدم شدن"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "narazić się (dla dobra grupy)"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "ponerle el cascabel al gato"
},
{
"code": "vi",
"lang": "Vietnamese",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "đeo lục lạc cho mèo"
},
{
"code": "vi",
"lang": "Vietnamese",
"sense": "to undertake a dangerous action in the service of a group",
"word": "treo chuông cổ mèo"
}
],
"word": "bell the cat"
}
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-03 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 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.
If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.