catch a Tartar

catch a Tartar

English

Alternative forms

• get someone for a Tartar

Verb

catch a Tartar (third-person singular simple present catches a Tartar, present participle catching a Tartar, simple past and past participle caught a Tartar)

1. (archaic, colloquial) To discover someone is much stronger, much more dangerous, and/or much more violent than they appeared at first, especially after laying hands on them or (cant, obsolete) in a failed attempt to rob someone who turns out to be a stronger robber.
   • 1674, Samuel Butler, Hudibras, §1.3.175:

     Now thou hast got me for a Tartar,
     To make m 'gainst my will take quarter.

   • 1680, John Dryden, Kind Keeper, §5.1.62:

     What a Tartar have I caught!

   • 1720, Daniel Defoe, Life of Captain Singleton, p. 281:

     Tell him, if he try, he may catch a Tartar.

2. (archaic, colloquial, figuratively) To discover someone who cannot be controlled or disposed of more generally.
   • 1897, Florence Marryat, The Blood of the Vampire, Ch. xiv:

     You must give up flirting, my boy, or if I mistake not, you'll find you've caught a Tartar.

References

• “Tartar | Tatar, n².”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 2022.
• (discover the true personality): 1873, John Camden Hotten, The Slang Dictionary
• Tartar in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913