“ad fontes!”
UK, 1983—a large, rectangular dustbin with a hinged lid and wheels on two of the corners—bins on wheels were introduced into the United Kingdom in 1980 on the model of what was done in the Federal Republic of Germany
Read MoreUSA, 1792—to say to a person the things that they want to hear—allegedly from the story of a white man and an Indian who went hunting together, and killed a turkey and a buzzard
Read Moreirresponsible or unfounded optimism—1857, apparently coined by Charles Dickens—refers to Wilkins Micawber, a character in Dickens’s novel David Copperfield (1850)
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USA, 2003—a group of people organised by means of the internet, mobile phones or other wireless devices, who assemble in public to perform a prearranged action together and then quickly disperse
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to put someone in a difficult, vulnerable or compromising situation, especially by exposing them to blame—USA, 1945, sports—the image is of suspending wet washing in the open so that it can dry
Read MoreUK, 2019—an older, white, working-class, Brexiteer, Northern-English man—coined by thinktank Onward to designate the Conservative Party’s target voter in the 2019 general election—refers to Workington, in Cumbria
Read MoreUK, 1954—the economic policy of Rab Butler, Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer (1951-5), regarded as largely indistinguishable from that of Hugh Gaitskell, Labour Chancellor of the Exchequer (1950-1)—blend of ‘Butler’ and ‘Gaitskell’ plus suffix ‘-ism’
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 Morealso ‘to drop one’s h’s’—not to pronounce the letter h at the beginning of words in which it is pronounced in standard English—1855—1847 as ‘not to sound one’s h’s’
Read Morea gesture (made by a French person to deny responsibility, knowledge or agreement) consisting typically in shrugging one’s shoulders while upturning one’s hands
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word histories 