Do You Know These Expressions Your Ancestors Used? (Part 8)

Introduction: In this article (Part 8), Jessica Edwards continues her discussion of the meanings and origins of idioms (figurative phrases) that our ancestors used, focusing on more idioms from the 1800s. Jessica has had a lifelong interest in her family’s history – especially on her father’s side, which goes back to the first settlers in Pennsylvania, Jamestown and New England – and has documented and added more than 21,000 people to her family tree!

Idioms (figurative phrases) have been used throughout the centuries and may appear in what was said or written by our ancestors. Understanding these expressions will help you better understand what your ancestors were saying – and finding out the history of these sayings can be quite entertaining!

I hope you enjoy this series, and perhaps it will allow you to better understand what your ancestors may have meant in their letters and diaries, or in newspaper articles written about them – as well as increase your knowledge and vocabulary.

Today I’m going to discuss some more idioms from the 1800s, as I did in Part 7.

• Being on the fence: means you are undecided about something, as if you’re sitting on a fence and cannot decide which side to jump off of – which property to land on – which decision to make. This idiom came about in the 1820s.

• Elephant in the room: referring to a major problem or controversial issue that is present but avoided as a subject. This idiom originated in 1814 when Ivan Andreevich Krylov (1769-1844), a poet and fabulist, wrote a fable entitled The Inquisitive Man which tells of a man who goes to a museum and notices all sorts of tiny things, but fails to notice an elephant.

• Heard it on (or through) the grapevine: many people associate this idiom with the song “Heard It through the Grapevine,” released by Motown (recorded by Gladys Knight & the Pips in 1967 and by Marvin Gaye in 1968). However, it was first used to describe the telegraph (the grapevine telegraph) in a U.S. dictionary in 1852, which alluded to interactions among people who could be expected to be found among grapevines (the rural poor).

• Mad as a hatter: many people think this idiom originated from Lewis Carroll’s novel Alice in Wonderland, because there was a character named Hatter who was described as mad (crazy). But actually, this phrase has been found to emanate from Denton and Stockport, Greater Manchester, England, where men in the area worked predominantly in the hattery business – which used mercury in the hat-making process. The accumulation of mercury in the body causes symptoms similar to madness. The earliest known appearance of the phrase in print is in an 1829 issue of Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine.

• Makes my blood boil: something that makes you very angry. This idiom didn’t appear in print until 1848, but the phrase “blood boils” is mentioned clear back to the 1600s.

• Mind your Ps and Qs: this idiom can mean any of the following: “Mind your manners”; “Mind your language”; “Be on your best behavior”; or “Watch what you’re doing.” Attempts at explaining the origin of “Mind your Ps and Qs” go back to the mid-19th century. One explanation is a letter to the editors of Notes and Queries, dated 1851, which was a literal interpretation of the saying, regarding the lowercase letters p and q in the context of the schoolroom or typesetting in the printing office.

• Not my cup of tea: used to describe something you don’t like. This idiom can be traced to the late 1800s when the British started using the phrase “my cup of tea” to indicate something that they enjoyed. In the 1920s they added the phrase “not my cup of tea” to mean the opposite.

• Once in a blue moon: used to describe something that doesn’t happen often This idiom dates back to 1821 when it first appeared in print. It got its meaning from what is termed “a blue moon,” or second full moon in the same calendar month, which occurs only once in every 32 months.

• Skeleton in the closet: means someone has a secret that (if known) would embarrass them. This idiom is said to have come from before the United Kingdom passed its 1832 Anatomy Act, which addressed the problem of grave robbers supplying corpses for dissection in medical schools by requiring licenses to obtain and dissect the bodies. Before the act, when a raid occurred, teachers tended to hide the skeletons in the closet so as not to have them confiscated.

• Straight from the horse’s mouth: means reading or hearing something straight from the source. This idiom came from the London newspaper Reynolds Newspaper in a June 1896 article that compared horse racing to politics.

• Take the plunge: means you are committing to someone in marriage or making some other big decision. This exact phrase might owe its popularity to its appearance in Oliver Goldsmith’s novel The Vicar of Wakefield.

• We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it: means not doing something until it is time. The earliest recorded use of this idiom is in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s 1851 poem The Golden Legend: “Don’t cross the bridge till you come to it, is a proverb old and of excellent wit.”

More to come!

Note on the header image: “Genealogy” logo designed and copyrighted by Mary Harrell-Sesniak.

Related Articles:

• ‘Curiosity Killed the Cat’ or What Your Ancestor Really Meant
• Genealogy Tip: Idioms through the Ages
• Do You Know These Expressions Your Ancestors Used? (Part 1)
• Do You Know These Expressions Your Ancestors Used? (Part 2)
• Do You Know These Expressions Your Ancestors Used? (Part 3)
• Do You Know These Expressions Your Ancestors Used? (Part 4)
• Do You Know These Expressions Your Ancestors Used? (Part 5)
• Do You Know These Expressions Your Ancestors Used? (Part 6)
• Do You Know These Expressions Your Ancestors Used? (Part 7)