“Ad fontes!”
the affected dandyism of the writers, artists, etc., associated with the aesthetic movement, which advocated a doctrine of ‘art for art’s sake’—UK, 1879—coined by George Du Maurier in cartoons published in Punch
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slang—(used especially of women) lustful; sexually aroused or arousing—first recorded in The Confession of the New Married Couple (London, 1683)
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Read MoreAustralia, 1907—very spirited or brave—refers to the Australian outlaw Ned Kelly (1855-1880), leader of a band of horse and cattle thieves and bank raiders operating in Victoria, who was eventually hanged in Melbourne
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‘impressionist’ (1875) from French ‘impressionniste’ (1874)—a painter who was an exponent of ‘impressionism’ (1877), a movement in painting developed in France in the last third of the 19th century—French ‘impressionnisme’ may have been coined in 1858
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UK—2008 ‘fatberg’, after ‘iceberg’: a large mass of fat and waste material in a sewerage system—originally a large lump of congealed cooking fat washed up on a beach—2019 ‘concreteberg’, after ‘fatberg’: a large mass of concrete in a sewerage system, consisting of cement that has been poured down a drain
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USA, 1898—a view as seen from below or from a humble position—refers to a view taken as from the standpoint of a worm, i.e. from ground-level—coined after ‘bird’s-eye view’ (1782), denoting a view of a landscape from above, such as is presented to the eye of a bird
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refers to “All right, have it your own way—you heard a seal bark”, the caption to a drawing by James Thurber, originally published in The New Yorker of 30th January 1932
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used of images suggestive of real or imaginary events—UK and USA early 1900s: popularised by its use as an advertising slogan for Doan’s Backache Kidney Pills
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USA, 1902—jocularly used to justify the necessity of taking another alcoholic drink—Irish variant (1947): ‘a bird never flew on one wing’
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word histories 