tell its own tale in English

Forms: tells its own tale [present, singular, third-person], telling its own tale [participle, present], told its own tale [participle, past], told its own tale [past] [Show additional information ▼] [Hide additional information ▲]

Head templates: {{en-verb|tell<,,told> its own tale}} tell its own tale (third-person singular simple present tells its own tale, present participle telling its own tale, simple past and past participle told its own tale)

Alternative forms

[Show JSON for post-processed kaikki.org data shown on this page ▼] [Hide JSON for post-processed kaikki.org data shown on this page ▲]

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "tells its own tale",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "telling its own tale",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "told its own tale",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "told its own tale",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "tell<,,told> its own tale"
      },
      "expansion": "tell its own tale (third-person singular simple present tells its own tale, present participle telling its own tale, simple past and past participle told its own tale)",
      "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 terms with placeholder \"it\"",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1868, Frances Mary Oxenham, Edith Sydney, page 19",
          "text": "[…] and looking out she saw Sir William Grant approaching at an easy trot, for he was anxious to avoid giving her any sudden shock; but the poor animal's state told its own tale; and starting up, Lady Sydney herself opened the hall-door […]",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To speak for itself; to require no explanation."
      ],
      "id": "en-tell_its_own_tale-en-verb-joeaLNrx",
      "links": [
        [
          "speak for itself",
          "speak for oneself"
        ],
        [
          "explanation",
          "explanation"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) To speak for itself; to require no explanation."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "tell its own tale"
}

[Show JSON for raw wiktextract data ▼] [Hide JSON for raw wiktextract data ▲]

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "tells its own tale",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "telling its own tale",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "told its own tale",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "told its own tale",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "tell<,,told> its own tale"
      },
      "expansion": "tell its own tale (third-person singular simple present tells its own tale, present participle telling its own tale, simple past and past participle told its own tale)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English idioms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English terms with placeholder \"it\"",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "English verbs",
        "Quotation templates to be cleaned"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1868, Frances Mary Oxenham, Edith Sydney, page 19",
          "text": "[…] and looking out she saw Sir William Grant approaching at an easy trot, for he was anxious to avoid giving her any sudden shock; but the poor animal's state told its own tale; and starting up, Lady Sydney herself opened the hall-door […]",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To speak for itself; to require no explanation."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "speak for itself",
          "speak for oneself"
        ],
        [
          "explanation",
          "explanation"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) To speak for itself; to require no explanation."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "tell its own tale"
}

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.

"tell its own tale" meaning in English

Verb

Alternative forms