#french phrase

French phrase

[ too-zhoor per-dree]

1. too much of a good thing.

Origin:
Toujours perdrix “too much of a good thing” is a direct borrowing of two French words: toujours “always” and perdrix“partridge.”Toujours derives from an Old French phrase meaning “all days” and is equivalent to Modern French tous jours.Tous (masculine singular tout) comes from Latin tōtus “whole, entire,” which is also the source of total and the Italian flavor tutti frutti “all fruits,” while jours(singularjour) comes from Latin diurnus “daily, of the day,” derivatives of which include diurnalandjournal. The phrase toujours perdrix is allegedly connected to King Henri IV of France, whose spiritual adviser loved to eat partridge but, upon being served partridge for every meal, grew tired, frustrated, and spiteful of the dish. Toujours perdrix was first recorded in English in the early 1800s.

“His new landlady’s ideas on the subject of cooking were of the most limited character. She gave him weak tea and bacon for breakfast without any apparent consciousness of the fact that such luxuries pall upon the taste by constant repetition, and that a diet of toujours perdrix wearies the meekest soul.”
- MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON, THE THREE BROTHERS, 1870