lie through one's teeth
Deceive with confidence
To lie through one's teeth is to tell blatant, shameless falsehoods—lies so obvious or brazen that the liar barely bothers to make them convincing.
The phrase suggests bold-faced deception rather than subtle misdirection: He looked me in the eye and lied through his teeth.
The teeth may evoke the image of words passing through a smiling, insincere mouth.
- misleadCause false belief
- distrustAbsence of confidence
- falsifyDistort the truth
- bold-faced lieShameless, obvious untruth
- falsehoodDeliberate untrue statement
honesty · cross my heart · straight-faced · fabricate · untruth · feign · betrayal · hypocrisy · deceit · con artist · scam · whopper · bluff · pull the wool · bald-faced · pretense · distort · conceal
lie through one's teethtell the truth
Communicate facts honestly
speak the truth · be honest · tell it like it is · come clean · speak plainly
lie through one's teethfib
Trivial, harmless falsehood
stretch the truth · bend the truth · exaggerate · embellish · sugarcoat