taste of one's own medicine

English

Alternative forms

• dose of one's own medicine

Pronunciation

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Noun

taste of one's own medicine

1. (idiomatic, usually preceded by a) Harsh treatment inflicted on one who previously inflicted similar or equivalent treatment on others.

   Synonym: taste of one's own poison

   • 1916, Rex Ellingwood Beach, chapter 27, in Rainbow's End:

     "The man's spirit is evil enough to frighten people away and we will drop stones upon him, so that he can learn the taste of his own medicine."

   • 1919, Joseph A. Altsheler, chapter 5, in The Sun Of Quebec:

     The Long Tom in the stern of the schooner opened fire . . . and two men were seen to go down. The captain laughed. "That's a taste of their own medicine," he said.

   • 2001 June 24, Richard Zoglin, “Hey, Wanna Buy Some Pix?”, in Time:

     Some stars reportedly even want to investigate the private lives of tabloid editors, to give them a taste of their own medicine.

Translations

harsh treatment

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: no equivalent term in Mandarin, but see 以其人之道，還治其人之身／以其人之道，还治其人之身 (zh) (yǐ qí rén zhī dào, huán zhì qí rén zhī shēn)

• Danish: please add this translation if you can
• Dutch: koekje van eigen deeg n
• Finnish: no equivalent term in Finnish, but see maistaa omaa lääkettään
• French: no equivalent term in French, but see rendre la pareille (fr), rendre la monnaie de sa pièce (fr), récolter ce que l’on a semé (fr)
• German: no equivalent term in German, but see mit gleicher Münze, am eigenen Leib spüren, am eigenen Leib erfahren
• Hungarian: no equivalent term in Hungarian, but see egye meg, amit főzött
• Icelandic: no equivalent term in Icelandic, but see í sömu mynt
• Irish: tomhas a láimhe féin
• Italian: pan per focaccia
• Spanish: dosis de su propia medicina, cucharada de su propia medicina

See also

• turnabout is fair play
• turn the tables