“ad fontes!”
chiefly UK politics—a culture characterised by influential networks of close friends—from ‘chum’ (a close friend) and ‘‑ocracy’ (forming nouns designating forms of government or groups who exercise political or social power)
Read MoreBritish, colloquial: a period during which an employee who is about to leave a company continues to receive a salary and in return agrees not to work for anyone else—origin, British Army: a paid leave between the end of one posting and the beginning of another
Read Moreto abandon or betray someone in order to protect or advance one’s own interests—originally (British politics, 1971) ‘to push someone under a bus’—derived from ‘to walk under a bus’ (British politics, 1966)
Read MoreUK, 2022— translates French ‘girouette de fer’—a derisive nickname for Liz Truss, in reference both to ‘Iron Lady’ (a nickname for Margaret Thatcher) and to Liz Truss’s changing views on a variety of subjects
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UK, 1899—derogatory—a foreigner; a personification of foreign people—‘Johnny’ is used with modifying word to designate a person of the type, group, profession, etc., specified
Read MoreUK, 1978—(soccer players) a confrontation that does not lead to serious fighting—based on the cliché ‘pistols at ten paces’—the substitution of ‘pistols’ with ‘handbags’, which evokes women fighting with their handbags, expresses the histrionic character of the confrontation
Read MoreUK, 1821—‘we’ used in place of ‘I’ by a monarch or other person in power, also (frequently humorously) by any individual—originated as a loan translation from French ‘nous royal’, as used of Napoléon Bonaparte by Madame de Staël in her memoirs published in 1821
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‘The Daily Telegraph’: nicknamed ‘Torygraph’ for its adherence to Conservative Party—the ‘Daily Mail’: nicknamed ‘Daily Heil’ for its support for Fascists in the 1930s
Read More(of an action or decision) hopelessly self-defeating—UK, 1979, with reference to the Scottish National Party’s decision to vote with the Tories
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‘handbag’: to bully or coerce by subjecting to a forthright verbal assault or criticism—originally used with reference to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in The Economist (7 August 1982)—from literal meaning ‘to batter or assault with a handbag’
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word histories 