"smell like a tart's handbag" meaning in English

See smell like a tart's handbag in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Forms: smells like a tart's handbag [present, singular, third-person], smelling like a tart's handbag [participle, present], smelt like a tart's handbag [participle, past], smelt like a tart's handbag [past], smelled like a tart's handbag [participle, past], smelled like a tart's handbag [past]
Head templates: {{en-verb|smell<,,smelt:> like a tart's handbag}} smell like a tart's handbag (third-person singular simple present smells like a tart's handbag, present participle smelling like a tart's handbag, simple past and past participle smelt like a tart's handbag or smelled like a tart's handbag)
  1. (UK, idiomatic, slang, derogatory, simile) To smell strongly of perfume. Tags: UK, derogatory, idiomatic, slang Synonyms: smell like a tart's boudoir, smell like a tart's bedroom, smell like a tart's handkerchief
    Sense id: en-smell_like_a_tart's_handbag-en-verb-mEJ1qkTe Categories (other): British English, English entries with incorrect language header, English similes

Inflected forms

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for smell like a tart's handbag meaning in English (1.8kB)

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "smells like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "smelling like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "smelt like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "smelt like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "smelled like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "smelled like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "smell<,,smelt:> like a tart's handbag"
      },
      "expansion": "smell like a tart's handbag (third-person singular simple present smells like a tart's handbag, present participle smelling like a tart's handbag, simple past and past participle smelt like a tart's handbag or smelled like a tart's handbag)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "British English",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
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          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
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            "Entry maintenance"
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      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "I dropped a perfume bottle on the floor and now the house smells like a tart's handbag.",
          "type": "example"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To smell strongly of perfume."
      ],
      "id": "en-smell_like_a_tart's_handbag-en-verb-mEJ1qkTe",
      "links": [
        [
          "derogatory",
          "derogatory"
        ],
        [
          "perfume",
          "perfume"
        ]
      ],
      "qualifier": "simile",
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(UK, idiomatic, slang, derogatory, simile) To smell strongly of perfume."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "smell like a tart's boudoir"
        },
        {
          "word": "smell like a tart's bedroom"
        },
        {
          "word": "smell like a tart's handkerchief"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "UK",
        "derogatory",
        "idiomatic",
        "slang"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "smell like a tart's handbag"
}
{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "smells like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "smelling like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "smelt like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "smelt like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "smelled like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "smelled like a tart's handbag",
      "tags": [
        "past"
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  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "smell<,,smelt:> like a tart's handbag"
      },
      "expansion": "smell like a tart's handbag (third-person singular simple present smells like a tart's handbag, present participle smelling like a tart's handbag, simple past and past participle smelt like a tart's handbag or smelled like a tart's handbag)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "British English",
        "English derogatory terms",
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English idioms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English similes",
        "English slang",
        "English terms with usage examples",
        "English verbs"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "I dropped a perfume bottle on the floor and now the house smells like a tart's handbag.",
          "type": "example"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To smell strongly of perfume."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "derogatory",
          "derogatory"
        ],
        [
          "perfume",
          "perfume"
        ]
      ],
      "qualifier": "simile",
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(UK, idiomatic, slang, derogatory, simile) To smell strongly of perfume."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "UK",
        "derogatory",
        "idiomatic",
        "slang"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "smell like a tart's boudoir"
    },
    {
      "word": "smell like a tart's bedroom"
    },
    {
      "word": "smell like a tart's handkerchief"
    }
  ],
  "word": "smell like a tart's handbag"
}

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.