meaning and origin of ‘the icing’, or ‘the frosting’, ‘on the cake’
something extra that makes a good thing even better—USA 1889 with ‘frosting’, 1896 with ‘icing’—refers to a sugar preparation for coating and decorating cakes
Read MoreCategory: literature
the various figurative meanings of ‘dirty spoon’
UK, 1849: cheap dingy eatery, as a translation from German—USA, from 1862 onwards: brothel, squalid lodging-house, bar; 1897: cheap dingy eatery
Read Moremeaning and origin of ‘somebody is walking over my grave’
early 18th century, in Jonathan Swift’s ‘Polite Conversation’—from the folk belief that one shudders when somebody walks over the site of one’s future grave
Read Moreearly instances of the phrase ‘tin god’
1875 in The Evening News (Indianapolis, USA)—in reference to tin as a base metal, ‘tin’ is used in the senses ‘petty’, ‘worthless’, ‘counterfeit’
Read Moremeanings and origin of the term ‘God’s acre’
churchyard—from German ‘Gottesacker’, literally ‘God’s field’—image of the bodies of the dead sown like seeds in order to bear fruit at the time of resurrection
Read Morehistory of the phrase ‘tin Jesus’
USA, 1874, as ‘a little tin Jesus on wheels’—in reference to tin as a base metal, ‘tin’ is used figuratively in the senses ‘petty’, ‘worthless’, ‘counterfeit’
Read Moremeanings and origin of the British phrase ‘to come the (old) acid’
to behave in an unpleasant, aggressive or overbearing manner; to speak in a sarcastic or caustic way—British Army slang, World War I
Read Moremeanings and origin of the British-English phrase ‘to go west’
to die; to be lost or destroyed; to meet with disaster—1914, Army slang—probably from the notion of the setting sun symbolising disappearance or finality
Read Morethe sexual meanings of ‘crumpet’ in British English
women regarded collectively as objects of sexual desire; sexual intercourse—first recorded in ‘The Gilt Kid’ (1936), by James Curtis (Geoffrey Basil Maiden)
Read Morethe cultural background to the phrase ‘to shop till one drops’
USA, 1904—from the image of shopping until one is physically exhausted and unable to continue—alludes to the consumerist avidity prompted by department stores
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