"chercher la petite bête" meaning in French

See chercher la petite bête in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

IPA: /ʃɛʁ.ʃe la p(ə).tit bɛt/ Audio: LL-Q150 (fra)-LoquaxFR-chercher la petite bête.wav
Head templates: {{fr-verb}} chercher la petite bête
  1. (informal) to nitpick, to split hairs Tags: informal Synonyms: pinailler, ergoter, ratiociner Related terms: chercher midi à quatorze heures, couper les cheveux en quatre, chercher des poux
    Sense id: en-chercher_la_petite_bête-fr-verb-qPw56vhb Categories (other): French entries with incorrect language header

Download JSON data for chercher la petite bête meaning in French (1.8kB)

{
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "chercher la petite bête",
      "name": "fr-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "French",
  "lang_code": "fr",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "French entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "english": "(please add an English translation of this quotation)",
          "roman": "Le caissier pour sûr devait se douter de quelque chose en voyant arriver à la banque tous ces pécuniaux qu’Amalia ne pouvait pas gagner en vendant de la salade et des œufs, mais il préférait ne pas chercher la petite bête.",
          "text": "2015, Andrea Camilleri, Dominique Vittoz transl., La reine de Poméranie, Fayard, Trois",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "to nitpick, to split hairs"
      ],
      "id": "en-chercher_la_petite_bête-fr-verb-qPw56vhb",
      "links": [
        [
          "nitpick",
          "nitpick"
        ],
        [
          "split hairs",
          "split hairs"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(informal) to nitpick, to split hairs"
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "chercher midi à quatorze heures"
        },
        {
          "word": "couper les cheveux en quatre"
        },
        {
          "word": "chercher des poux"
        }
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "pinailler"
        },
        {
          "word": "ergoter"
        },
        {
          "word": "ratiociner"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "informal"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ʃɛʁ.ʃe la p(ə).tit bɛt/"
    },
    {
      "audio": "LL-Q150 (fra)-LoquaxFR-chercher la petite bête.wav",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/6/65/LL-Q150_%28fra%29-LoquaxFR-chercher_la_petite_b%C3%AAte.wav/LL-Q150_%28fra%29-LoquaxFR-chercher_la_petite_b%C3%AAte.wav.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/6/65/LL-Q150_%28fra%29-LoquaxFR-chercher_la_petite_b%C3%AAte.wav/LL-Q150_%28fra%29-LoquaxFR-chercher_la_petite_b%C3%AAte.wav.ogg",
      "text": "Audio"
    }
  ],
  "word": "chercher la petite bête"
}
{
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "chercher la petite bête",
      "name": "fr-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "French",
  "lang_code": "fr",
  "pos": "verb",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "chercher midi à quatorze heures"
    },
    {
      "word": "couper les cheveux en quatre"
    },
    {
      "word": "chercher des poux"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "French entries with incorrect language header",
        "French informal terms",
        "French lemmas",
        "French multiword terms",
        "French terms with IPA pronunciation",
        "French terms with audio links",
        "French terms with quotations",
        "French verbs",
        "Requests for translations of French quotations"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "english": "(please add an English translation of this quotation)",
          "roman": "Le caissier pour sûr devait se douter de quelque chose en voyant arriver à la banque tous ces pécuniaux qu’Amalia ne pouvait pas gagner en vendant de la salade et des œufs, mais il préférait ne pas chercher la petite bête.",
          "text": "2015, Andrea Camilleri, Dominique Vittoz transl., La reine de Poméranie, Fayard, Trois",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "to nitpick, to split hairs"
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "nitpick",
          "nitpick"
        ],
        [
          "split hairs",
          "split hairs"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(informal) to nitpick, to split hairs"
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "pinailler"
        },
        {
          "word": "ergoter"
        },
        {
          "word": "ratiociner"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "informal"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ʃɛʁ.ʃe la p(ə).tit bɛt/"
    },
    {
      "audio": "LL-Q150 (fra)-LoquaxFR-chercher la petite bête.wav",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/6/65/LL-Q150_%28fra%29-LoquaxFR-chercher_la_petite_b%C3%AAte.wav/LL-Q150_%28fra%29-LoquaxFR-chercher_la_petite_b%C3%AAte.wav.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/6/65/LL-Q150_%28fra%29-LoquaxFR-chercher_la_petite_b%C3%AAte.wav/LL-Q150_%28fra%29-LoquaxFR-chercher_la_petite_b%C3%AAte.wav.ogg",
      "text": "Audio"
    }
  ],
  "word": "chercher la petite bête"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable French 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.