proverbial
/pɹəˈvɜɹb.iː.əl/ adjective C2- Of, resembling, or expressed as a proverb, cliché, fable, or fairy tale. · The busyness of a beaver is proverbial.· The beaver in this instance upheld the reputation of the proverbial one: her output was prodigious.
- Optionally placed before an element of a well-known proverb or metaphor to emphasize that the element is not being used in a literal sense (see Usage notes below) · the proverbial smoking gun· the proverbial spilled milk
- Widely known; famous; stereotypical. · I grew up in a prefab house on Main Street in 1950s suburbia, the second and last child of a proverbial nuclear family.
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One could have eaten a meal off the ground without overbrimming the proverbial peck of dirt.
Born in the neighborhood of Arles, she had shared in the beauty for which its women are proverbial; but that beauty had gradually withered beneath the devastating influence of the slow fever so prevalent among dwellers by the ponds of Aiguemortes and the marshes of Camargue.
“Shall we make a positive appointment for a particular day and hour?” inquired the count; “only let me warn you that I am proverbial for my punctilious exactitude in keeping my engagements.”
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