flic
Americannoun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of flic
1895–1900; < French (slang), perhaps < German; Cf. flick boy, in early modern German thieves' argot (of obscure origin)
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.
See Examples For:
"The best-dressed flic in France," as his colleagues called him, Tonnot made no secret of his own close connections with the underworld.
From Time Magazine Archive
It was rheumy old Georges Clemenceau who first called dapper, baldish Jean Chiappe "le flic le plus habile de France," "the smartest cop in France."
From Time Magazine Archive
They dispersed only after a judge reversed a lower-court ruling and freed 19-year-old Gilles Guiot, who had been jailed on flimsy charges of striking a flic during an earlier demonstration.
From Time Magazine Archive
Flic flac, flic flac, the tramping of the feet!
From Punch or the London Charivari, September 9, 1914 by Seaman, Owen, Sir
They trained them for the Frontier upon an August day; Flic flac, flic flac, all on an August day!
From Punch or the London Charivari, September 9, 1914 by Seaman, Owen, Sir
Cara Black has studied Buddhism in India, taught English in Japan, and visits Paris at least twice a year with notebook in hand, to explore and to interview les flics about crime and procedure.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 16, 2022
Publishers are scouring the world for the next crime wave: a few summers hence we may all have forgotten about Oslo and Ystad, and be reading about les flics in Paris and Lyon instead.
From Economist ● Aug. 30, 2012
There has, alas, been no word on whether a half-smoked Gauloise and small glass of Ricard were left at the scene to taunt les flics.
From The Guardian ● May 20, 2010
Last week the harried flics finally struck back.
From Time Magazine Archive
And back on the Riviera, the flics, using his description, picked up a suspect who, it seemed, had visited the Von Karajans after unsuccessfully trying to break into Brigitte Bardot's home earlier.
From Time Magazine Archive
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.
