“ad fontes!”
UK, 1851, as ‘haw-doovers’—humorous and colloquial alteration of ‘hors d’oeuvres’, plural of the noun ‘hors d’oeuvre’ (i.e.: an extra dish served as a relish to whet the appetite usually before the main meal)
Read MoreUK, 1945—upper-class slang for ‘champagne’—from the first syllable of ‘champagne’ and the suffix ‘-ers’, used to make jocular formations on nouns by clipping them
Read Morea drink made from black coffee and brandy, cognac or other liquor—‘royale’ means: first-rate—‘café royale’ (USA, 1882): probably a Frenchification of earlier ‘coffee royal’
Read MoreUSA, 1974, as ‘royale kir’—a drink made from champagne, or sparkling white wine, and crème de cassis—from ‘kir’ (a drink made from dry white wine and crème de cassis) and ‘royale’ (first-rate)
Read MoreUSA, 1981—adverb meaning: at one’s desk—especially used with reference to eating lunch or other meals there—humorous alteration of ‘al fresco’
Read MoreUK, 1917—‘what an idiot!’—a borrowing from French
Read MoreUK, 1884—‘what a surprise!’—a borrowing from French—chiefly used ironically, to imply that a situation or event is unsurprising, typical or predictable
Read MoreFrench, 1848; English, 1861—a small, oblong cake made of choux pastry, filled with cream, and typically topped with chocolate icing—literally ‘lightning’—origin unknown
Read MoreUSA, 1890—a participle, often found at the beginning of a sentence, that appears from its position to modify an element of the sentence other than the one it was intended to modify
Read MoreAustralia, 1965—the Strine equivalent of ‘glorious home’—‘Strine’: the English language as spoken by Australians
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word histories 