oude koeien uit de sloot halen

Dutch

Etymology

Literally means "to get old cows out of the ditch". This originally referred to the removal of cadavers of drowned cows.[1]

Verb

oude koeien uit de sloot halen

  1. (intransitive) to bring up long forgotten unpleasant subjects

Usage notes

Usually preceded by geen to use the verb as a negative. In that case it is similar in meaning to let bygones be bygones.

Inflection
Conjugation of oude koeien uit de sloot halen: see halen.

References
  1. “Oude koeien uit de sloot halen”, in onzetaal.nl‎, Genootschap OnzeTaal, 2011-05-02, archived from the original on 2020-10-25
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