"put the cat among the pigeons" meaning in English

See put the cat among the pigeons in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Audio: En-au-put the cat among the pigeons.ogg [Australia] Forms: puts the cat among the pigeons [present, singular, third-person], putting the cat among the pigeons [participle, present], put the cat among the pigeons [participle, past], put the cat among the pigeons [past]
Head templates: {{en-verb|put<,,put> the cat among the pigeons}} put the cat among the pigeons (third-person singular simple present puts the cat among the pigeons, present participle putting the cat among the pigeons, simple past and past participle put the cat among the pigeons)
  1. (figuratively) To cause alarm, fuss, or agitation. Tags: figuratively Synonyms: set the cat among the pigeons Related terms: flutter in the dovecote Translations (Translations): de knuppel in het hoenderhok gooien (Dutch), herättää huolta (Finnish), jeter un pavé dans la mare (French), enfermer le loup dans la bergerie (French), wsadzać kij w mrowisko [imperfective] (Polish), wsadzić kij w mrowisko [perfective] (Polish)
    Sense id: en-put_the_cat_among_the_pigeons-en-verb-RHlNodDj Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header

Inflected forms

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for put the cat among the pigeons meaning in English (2.9kB)

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "puts the cat among the pigeons",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "putting the cat among the pigeons",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "put the cat among the pigeons",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "put the cat among the pigeons",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
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      "args": {
        "1": "put<,,put> the cat among the pigeons"
      },
      "expansion": "put the cat among the pigeons (third-person singular simple present puts the cat among the pigeons, present participle putting the cat among the pigeons, simple past and past participle put the cat among the pigeons)",
      "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"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1994 September 19, The Times",
          "text": "Professor Stephen Hawking put the cat among the pigeons last week with his cheery remarks about comet Machholz-2, which some astronomers believe could be heading our way.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2023 September 2, Simon Schama, “The real Rino”, in FT Weekend, Life & Arts, page 2",
          "text": "In any event, this professorial detonation, especially coming as it does from hardline Federalist Society constitutional originalists, has set the cat among the Republican pigeons.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To cause alarm, fuss, or agitation."
      ],
      "id": "en-put_the_cat_among_the_pigeons-en-verb-RHlNodDj",
      "links": [
        [
          "alarm",
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        ],
        [
          "fuss",
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        ],
        [
          "agitation",
          "agitation"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(figuratively) To cause alarm, fuss, or agitation."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "flutter in the dovecote"
        }
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "set the cat among the pigeons"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "figuratively"
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "nl",
          "lang": "Dutch",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "de knuppel in het hoenderhok gooien"
        },
        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "herättää huolta"
        },
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "jeter un pavé dans la mare"
        },
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "enfermer le loup dans la bergerie"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "tags": [
            "imperfective"
          ],
          "word": "wsadzać kij w mrowisko"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "tags": [
            "perfective"
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          "word": "wsadzić kij w mrowisko"
        }
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      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bb/En-au-put_the_cat_among_the_pigeons.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "word": "put the cat among the pigeons"
}

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "puts the cat among the pigeons",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "putting the cat among the pigeons",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "put the cat among the pigeons",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "put the cat among the pigeons",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "put<,,put> the cat among the pigeons"
      },
      "expansion": "put the cat among the pigeons (third-person singular simple present puts the cat among the pigeons, present participle putting the cat among the pigeons, simple past and past participle put the cat among the pigeons)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "flutter in the dovecote"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
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      "categories": [
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        "English idioms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English terms with audio links",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "English verbs",
        "Translation table header lacks gloss"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1994 September 19, The Times",
          "text": "Professor Stephen Hawking put the cat among the pigeons last week with his cheery remarks about comet Machholz-2, which some astronomers believe could be heading our way.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2023 September 2, Simon Schama, “The real Rino”, in FT Weekend, Life & Arts, page 2",
          "text": "In any event, this professorial detonation, especially coming as it does from hardline Federalist Society constitutional originalists, has set the cat among the Republican pigeons.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To cause alarm, fuss, or agitation."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "alarm",
          "alarm"
        ],
        [
          "fuss",
          "fuss"
        ],
        [
          "agitation",
          "agitation"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(figuratively) To cause alarm, fuss, or agitation."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "figuratively"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-put the cat among the pigeons.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/b/bb/En-au-put_the_cat_among_the_pigeons.ogg/En-au-put_the_cat_among_the_pigeons.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bb/En-au-put_the_cat_among_the_pigeons.ogg",
      "tags": [
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      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "set the cat among the pigeons"
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "nl",
      "lang": "Dutch",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "de knuppel in het hoenderhok gooien"
    },
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "herättää huolta"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "jeter un pavé dans la mare"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "enfermer le loup dans la bergerie"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "tags": [
        "imperfective"
      ],
      "word": "wsadzać kij w mrowisko"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "tags": [
        "perfective"
      ],
      "word": "wsadzić kij w mrowisko"
    }
  ],
  "word": "put the cat among the pigeons"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-05 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.