throw one's cap over the windmill

Widely reported as deriving from a passage in the novel Don Quixote in which the titular character throws his cap over a windmill that he has mistaken for a giant, as a challenge - but no such passage exists in the book.

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throw one's cap over the windmill (third-person singular simple present throws one's cap over the windmill, present participle throwing one's cap over the windmill, simple past threw one's cap over the windmill, past participle thrown one's cap over the windmill)

1. (idiomatic) To act in a bizarre or eccentric manner.

• cap over the windmill

• tilt at windmills