blanc-bec

From blanc +‎ bec. Literally, “white mouth”, where bec (“beak”) informally means “mouth” (likewise in English slang, which see beak), referring to the area around the mouth of a White, beardless, young man, which has the white skin visible, not yet covered by a beard and mustache.

• IPA^(key): /blɑ̃.bɛk/

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blanc-bec m (plural blancs-becs)

1. (colloquial, derogatory) greenhorn
   • 1976, Serge Gainsbourg, “L’homme à tête de chou [The cabbage-headed man]”, in L’homme à tête de chou:

     J'étais fini, foutu, échec / Et mat aux yeux d’Marilou / Qui m’traitait comme un blanc-bec

     I was finished, screwed, checkmated / In the eyes of Marilou / Who treated me like a greenhorn

   • 1992, Amélie Nothomb, Hygiène de l'assassin [Hygiene of the assassin]:

     Et moi, j'aurai été un écrivain de génie, universellement admiré, j'aurai reçu le prix Nobel de littérature, tout ça pour qu'un blanc-bec vienne me lanciner de questions quasi tautologiques, auxquelles le dernier des imbéciles fournirait une réponse identique à la mienne !

     And I would have been a genius writer, universally admired, I would have received the Nobel Prize for Literature, all that for a greenhorn to come and poke me with almost tautological questions, to which the last of the imbeciles would provide an answer identical to mine!

• béjaune

• “blanc-bec”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.