English · Idiom Attested

cut and thrust

In real, traceable use. Part of the curated seed collection; community review is coming.

Both English Tiếng Việt

Meaning · English

Competitive atmosphere.

Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt

Không khí cạnh tranh

Machine-translated — suggest a fix

Where it’s used: Used Widespread English

Examples

This in no way limited the cut - and - thrust of political disagreement.

The man on the right had been reading while the scintillating cut and thrust of Alf and Bert had dominated the ward: Amiss thought that a good sign.

British National Corpus sentence via the MAGPIE corpus (CC BY 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-30)

Sources & notes

Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Figurative class: Metaphor (PIE-English corpus, CC BY 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-31).

Common questions

What does “cut and thrust” mean?

Competitive atmosphere.

Is “cut and thrust” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.

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