tanière

See also: taniere

French

Etymology

Inherited from Middle French taisnere, tesniere, derived from Old French taisson (“badger”), from Late Latin taxōnem, itself of Germanic origin, from Proto-Germanic *þahsuz (compare German Dachs (“badger”)).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ta.njɛʁ/

• Audio

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Noun

tanière f (plural tanières)

1. lair, den (of an animal)
   • 1994, Yasmina Reza, ‘Art’:

     Yvan. […] Que veux-tu que je fasse ? J’ai fait le con jusqu’à quarante ans, ah bien sûr je t’amusais, j’amusais beaucoup mes amis avec mes conneries, mais le soir qui est seul comme un rat ? Qui rentre tout seul dans sa tanière le soir ?

     Yvan. […] What do you want me to do? I messed around till I was forty; oh, I made you laugh, of course, I made my friends laugh a lot with the stupid things I did, but at the end of the day, who winds up alone like a rat? Who goes back to his lair alone at night?

2. hideout, den, lair (of an outlaw)

Further reading

• “tanière”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Anagrams

• arétine, enterai, trainée, traînée