hurt your knife
- idiom
- Informal
:
¿te dolió el cuchillo?
- When he found out his friend had lied, he said, 'Did my back hurt your knife?' in a bitter tone.
Examples
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I can't believe you did that! Did it hurt your knife?
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Did it hurt your knife when you betrayed me?
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After hearing about the gossip, I asked, 'Did my back hurt your knife?'
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She messaged, 'Did my back hurt your knife?' after learning of the betrayal.
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After learning about her betrayal, I sarcastically asked, 'Did my back hurt your knife?'
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Feeling hurt by his actions, I texted, 'Did my back hurt your knife?'
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Upon hearing the news of his disloyalty, I replied, 'Did my back hurt your knife?'
Surface Forms
Morphology
A learner who knows 'hurt', 'your' and 'knife' will most likely interpret this literally (the knife being hurt) and will not infer the sarcastic, ironic meaning about betrayal. The intended sense depends on pragmatic/idiomatic inference (mocking the perpetrator) and a metaphorical use of 'knife' as instrument of betrayal, so the overall meaning is not derivable from the constituents.
Etymology
Hurt your knife comes from the picture of someone being 'stabbed in the back' with a knife. By asking 'Did my back hurt your knife?' the speaker flips that image and, in a bitter way, mocks the person who betrayed them. So, it is used as a sarcastic reply after a 'betrayal'.
