“ad fontes!”
‘to have a fancy for’—UK, 1900—loan translation from French ‘avoir un béguin pour’—French ‘béguin’ is from ‘s’embéguiner de’, meaning ‘to put on a bonnet’, hence ‘to put a sudden capricious idea into one’s head’
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1990—a street in which many satellite dishes are attached to the front of the buildings—‘satellite dish’: a bowl-shaped antenna used to view satellite television
Read MoreUK, 1933—cursive handwriting as learnt in elementary school as a stage beyond printing individual letters separately—from the adjective ‘joined-up’, meaning ‘conjoined’
Read More1673—a person who aggravates distress under the guise of administering comfort—alludes to Job’s reply to his friends in the Book of Job, 16:2
Read More‘extremely poor’—USA, 1810—humorous variant of ‘(as) poor as Job’, from the name of the eponymous protagonist of a book of the Old Testament, taken as the type of extreme poverty
Read More‘extremely poor’—USA, 1817—humorous variant of ‘(as) poor as Job’, from the name of the eponymous protagonist of a book of the Old Testament, taken as the type of extreme poverty
Read MoreUK, 1950, as ‘old boy net’—a system of favouritism and preferment operating among people of a similar social, usually privileged, background, especially among former pupils of public schools
Read Morea person whose career is believed to have been advanced by having a famous or successful relative—‘nepotism baby’ (USA, 1915)—‘nepo baby’ (USA, 2022)
Read MoreIreland, 1989—treatment given to hospital patients in overcrowded and inappropriate spaces such as corridors and waiting rooms—had been used earlier (UK, 1980) of treatment given to schoolchildren
Read Morea dish consisting of deep-fried battered fish fillets served with potato chips—Lancashire, England, 1886 (1879, as ‘fried fish and chipped potatoes’)
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word histories 