the supposed origin of ‘to have one’s work cut out’: tailoring
supposedly an allusion to the preparation of fabric to be worked on: once the shapes have been cut out, the tailor still has a lot of sewing to do
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the probable origin of ‘one over the eight’ (‘one drink too many’)
UK, 1919—possibly a mere euphemism for having too much to drink, regardless of the actual number of drinks that have been consumed (‘eight’ probably arbitrary)
Read Morethe Christian-Latin origin of ‘Noël’
French—from the noun use of the Latin adjective ‘natalis’ (from Christian-Latin ‘natalis dies’, ‘day of birth’), denoting the festival of the nativity of Christ
Read MoreThe phrase ‘to pull one’s weight’ originated in rowing.
origin: a rower who does not pull the oar with a force appropriate to his or her weight fails to make the contribution expected by the rest of the crew
Read Morethe mistaken origin of ‘white elephant’ in the Oxford English Dictionary
refers to the rarity of white elephants and to the story that the king of Pegu waged war on the king of Siam, who had refused to sell him one
Read Morethe theatrical origin of ‘claptrap’
first half of the 18th century—‘clap trap’: a use of language designed to capture (i.e. trap) a theatrical audience’s applause (i.e. clapping)
Read Moremistaken etymology of ‘not to give a XXXX’ in the Oxford English Dictionary
UK, 1972—‘XXXX’: a euphemistic substitute for a four-letter swear word, usually ‘fuck’—it did not originally refer to the Australian lager Castlemaine XXXX
Read Moreorigin of ‘vamoose’
from Spanish ‘vamos’, ‘let us go’—first recorded as ‘vamos’ in ‘Every Night Book; or, Life after Dark’ (London, 1827), by the English author William Clarke
Read Morethe Cantabrigian origin of ‘wooden spoon’
originally, at Cambridge University: oversized wooden spoon given to the candidate coming last in the mathematical tripos (BA-degree final honours examination)
Read Morethe Shakespearean origin of ‘sea change’
from ‘Full Fathom Five’, Ariel’s song to Ferdinand in ‘The Tempest’, by Shakespeare, where ‘sea change’ denotes a change brought about by the action of the sea
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word histories 