“ad fontes!”
an occasion on which enjoyment or profit is derived from the suffering or discomfiture of others—UK, 1836—alludes to the description of a gladiator dying in a Roman arena in Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1818), by Byron
Read Moreto snore—UK, 1828—this phrase likens a person’s snoring to the sound made by a herd of pigs
Read Moremeaning: if circumstances permit, if all is well—first recorded in 1683—of unknown origin
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Canada, 1970—the people who were born during the ‘baby boom’ of the years immediately following WWII, considered as a demographic bulge—any short-term increase or notably large group
Read Morethe final four months of the calendar year, i.e., September, October, November and December—UK, 1863—from ‘-ember’ in ‘September’, ‘November’ and ‘December’
Read Moresoldiers, especially low-ranking recruits, collectively regarded as expendable in war—UK, 1740—coined by William Shakespeare in Henry IV, Part 1 (1598)
Read Moresoldiers regarded simply as material to be expended in war—‘cannon fodder’ (1847), said to have been coined after German ‘Kanonenfutter’—French ‘chair à canon’ (1814), first used in reference to Napoléon Bonaparte
Read Morea period of warm, springlike weather occurring in the autumn—hence, figuratively, a late period of youthfulness—first used from 1639 onwards by the Anglican clergyman and historian Thomas Fuller (1608-1661)
Read MoreUK, 1895—the use of an imaginary person as a fictitious excuse for visiting a place or avoiding obligations—from ‘Bunbury’, the name of an imaginary character in The Importance of being Earnest (first performed in 1895), by Oscar Wilde
Read Moreused as an interjection to assert truthfulness, honour or sincerity—USA, 1851, as ‘honest Indian’—perhaps alludes to the fact that, in their past interactions with Europeans, Native Americans had to give assurance of their good faith
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word histories 