‘(as) mad as a (cut) snake’: meaning and origin
out of one’s mind, extremely annoyed—Australia, 1900; New Zealand, 1907—originally as ‘(as) mad as a snake’, ‘(as) mad as snakes’ and variants—later as ‘(as) mad as a cut snake’
Read MoreTag: Australia
‘(as) [adjective] as a meat-ax(e)’: meaning and origin
USA, 1825—the phrases that are built on the pattern ‘(as) [adjective] as a meat-ax(e)’ intensify the meaning of the adjective—this adjective can be ‘savage’, ‘wicked’, or ‘mad’
Read MoreAustralian terms referring to left-handedness
left-handed: ‘molly-handed’, ‘mauldy’, ‘molly-dooked’—a left-handed person: ‘molly-hander’, ‘mauldy’, ‘molly-dook’—‘molly’ and ‘mauldy’ may derive from ‘mauley’, denoting the hand or fist; ‘dook’ is ‘duke’, denoting the hand or fist
Read More‘he must have killed a Chinaman’: meaning and origin
Australia, 1885; New Zealand, 1894—indicates that a person is suffering from bad luck—the implication is that this bad luck is punishment for a crime committed by the person
Read More‘Bugs Bunny’ (i.e., an eagle)
Australia, 1954—derogatory nickname for the metal eagle at the top of the Australian-American Memorial in Canberra—alludes to the fact that, from a distance, the eagle’s upswept wings look like a rabbit’s ears
Read More‘dinnyhayser’: meanings (and origin?)
Australia, 1878—a knockout blow; anything of exceptional size or force—allegedly alludes to a boxer called Dinny Hayes—but no evidence supports this allegation
Read More‘not worth a crumpet’: meaning and early occurrences
Australia, 1944—utterly worthless—one of the phrases built on the pattern ‘not worth a —’, such as ‘not worth a tinker’s curse’
Read More‘Christmas hold’: meaning and origin
also ‘Christmas grip’—Australia, prison slang, 1953—a grabbing of another’s testicles—the image is of a handful of nuts
Read More‘within a bull’s roar of’: a measure of distance
Australia, 1930—when used negatively, means ‘far away from’; when used affirmatively, means ‘not too far away from’—refers to the fact that a roaring bull can be heard over a great distance
Read More‘boudoir bandicoot’: meaning and origin
Australia—a promiscuous male—coined in 1983, during a parliamentary debate, by Michael Hodgman, then Member of the Australian House of Representatives, to describe Bob Hawke, then Prime Minister of Australia
Read More
