leading strings
Americanplural noun
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strings for leading and supporting a child learning to walk.
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excessively restraining guidance.
His parents tried to keep him in leading strings, but he finally married and moved away.
Etymology
Origin of leading strings
First recorded in 1670–80
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Right or wrong, Britain is not responsible for it, and Mr. Wallace's picture of the United States in leading strings is quite fanciful.
From Time Magazine Archive
I am surrounded, as it were, by barriers; hemmed in, bound up, kept in leading strings.
From The Light of Scarthey by Egerton Castle
But a moment must arrive when the work of education had succeeded, when the leading strings essential to childhood began to be a bondage and a hindrance.
From Outlines of a Philosophy of Religion based on Psychology and History by Auguste Sabatier
"How was your charge; is he walking without leading strings yet?"
From Under the Mendips A Tale by Emma Marshall
Another century elapsed before the muse of the Hebrew drama escaped from leading strings.
From Jewish Literature and Other Essays by Gustav Karpeles
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
