Today we’ll look at the French expression “Dormir sur ses deux oreilles”, which translates literally to “to sleep on his/her two ears” and means “to sleep like a baby” or simply “to sleep well”.
Dormir sur ses deux oreilles
To sleep like a baby
Expression origin
The origins of this expression are unknown. A French-to-French definition is: Dormir profondément ; dormir en toute sécurité (to sleep deeply; to sleep in fully security).
Example sentences
This first sentence uses the form après avoir + past participle, which can translate to “after having”. This is called the past infintive or infinitif passé.
Après avoir passé toute la journée sur l’autoroute, j’ai dormi sur mes deux oreilles.
After spending the entire day on the highway, I slept like a baby.
Avec ses deux chiens de garde la famille peut dormir sur ses deux oreilles.
With their two guard dogs, the family can sleep without worry.
The French language has has several more expressions with dormir (to sleep) including:
- Dormir comme un loir to sleep like a dormouse
- Dormir comme une souche to sleep like a stump
- Dormir comme une marmotte to sleep like a groundhog
- Dormir comme une masse to sleep like a mass
Related lessons:
Reference
French expressions | Lessons by David Issokson
