the Welsh origin of the phrase ‘to let the dog see the rabbit’

26th November 2018.Reading time 5 minutes.

1893—to allow someone to get on with their task—originated in Wales with reference to fair-mindedness in sports

meaning and origin of ‘to see which way the cat jumps’

14th December 2016.Reading time 8 minutes.

Tip-Cat in A Little Pretty Pocket-Book, Intended for the Instruction and Amusement of Little Master Tommy, and Pretty Miss Polly (1787 edition) The phrase to see which way the cat jumps means to see what direction events are taking before committing oneself. One of its earliest instances is from The Berkshire Chronicle […]

origin of ‘to miss the bus’ (to miss an opportunity)

15th September 2016.Reading time 5 minutes.

The phrase to miss the bus, or the boat, etc., means to be too slow to take advantage of an opportunity. In A Concise Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1993), B. A. Phythian explained: This expression is said to originate in an Oxford story of the 1840s about John Henry Newman, fellow of Oriel […]

origin and history of the names ‘Wales’ and ‘Cymru’

28th July 2016.Reading time 10 minutes.

Briton settlements in the 6th century – settlements of the Angles, Saxons and Jutes in Britain, circa 600 In the following, Briton will refer to the Celtic Brittonic-speaking peoples who inhabited Britain south of the Firth of Forth, and who, following the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons in the 5th century, gradually retreated until the […]