1. Home
2. Idioms
3. breed

breed

---

---

Familiarity breeds contempt.

Prov. People do not respect someone they know well enough to know his or her faults. The movie star doesn't let anyone get to know him, because he knows that familiarity breeds contempt.

See also: breed, contempt

Like breeds like.

Prov. People tend to raise children who are like them; something tends to give rise to things that resemble it. Jill: I think Fred's little boy is going to be just as disagreeable as Fred. Jane: That's no surprise. Like breeds like.

See also: breed, like

breed like rabbits

  (informal)

if people breed like rabbits, they produce too many babies very quickly It's like I was saying to Derek, they all intermarry and they breed like rabbits.

See also: breed, like, rabbit

Familiarity breeds contempt.

something that you say which means if you know someone very well or experience something a lot, you stop respecting them You two are going to find it difficult living and working together. Familiarity breeds contempt, you know.

See also: breed, contempt

familiarity breeds contempt

Long experience of someone or something can make one so aware of the faults as to be scornful. For example, Ten years at the same job and now he hates it-familiarity breeds contempt. The idea is much older, but the first recorded use of this expression was in Chaucer's Tale of Melibee (c. 1386).

See also: breed, contempt

breed

a scab/scabs on (one's) nose Regional

To stir up trouble for oneself.

breed up a storm

New England

To become cloudy.

See also: breed, storm, up