“ad fontes!”
Australia, 1937—very scarce—‘rocking horse’: a toy horse mounted on rockers or springs for a child to sit on and rock to and fro—this phrase has come to be also used in British English and American English
Read More1809—a transient light preceding the true dawn by about an hour, a phenomenon common in Eastern countries—translates Arabic ‘ṣubḥ kāḏib’—figuratively: a hopeful sign that can prove either illusory or authentic
Read MoreUK, 1990—a British-Army euphemism for a severe reprimand by a senior officer—also, by extension, any ‘dressing-down’
Read MoreAustralia, 1843—used as a type of the isolated, deprived or exposed—refers to a shag (i.e., a cormorant) perched alone on a rock
Read MoreAustralia, 1935—meaning: ‘to deliberately ignore someone’s presence, request, etc.’—has erroneously been said to have originated in army slang during the Second World War
Read MoreUSA, 1876—‘extremely cold’—cf. ‘as hard as Pharaoh’s heart’ (USA, 1829), meaning ‘extremely hard’—both phrases refer to the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart in the Book of Exodus, 7:13-22
Read MoreUSA, 1896—one-word form representing a colloquial pronunciation of the phrase ‘hell’s a poppin’’ (1875)—meaning: ‘events are unfolding in a chaotic manner’; ‘a state of confusion and disarray is taking hold’—the verb ‘pop’ means ‘to suddenly break open’
Read MoreAustralia, 1941—‘apples’ is used in phrases such as ‘everything’s apples’, meaning ‘everything is all right’—perhaps from ‘apple-pie order’—may have originated in the Australian armed forces’ slang during World War II
Read MoreUSA—‘a cold day in July’ 1881—‘a cold day in hell’ 1906—those phrases refer to an impossibly distant time or to an extremely unlikely scenario
Read More1906—a familiar name jocularly given to a fanciful deity reputed to be in command of the weather—especially occurs in the phrase ‘send it down, Hughie!’, used to ask that deity to send the rain down from the heavens—also, in the surfers’ lingo: the god of the waves
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