A-Z Database
This expression was originally American and described the black horse drawn vehicles that the New York police used for transporting criminals. It date...
A black mark against one’s name is a mark of censure, more often figuratively than literally, and dates from the early 19th century. See also Black.
A black sheep is a person who causes shame or embarrassment within his or her family or peer group because of beliefs, behaviour etc that vary from ac...
To blackball someone means to ostracise or exclude them and derived this meaning from the late 18th century when it was common practice, typically at...
To blacken someone’s name is to denigrate their character or reputation and the phrase itself dates from the mid-1400s. See also Black.
This word for a scoundrel or villain is pronounced ‘blaggard’ and dates from the early 18th century. It is frequently misspelled as ‘blaggard’ which t...
Its first meaning is a tar-coated leather bottle for beer dating from the late 16th century. Thereafter, in the late 19th century, it became known as...
Blackleg has become a derogatory term for a strike breaker i.e. a worker willing to work for an employer whose other workers are on strike and this us...
A blacklist as a written record of censure is first recorded from the late 1500s. As a verb, to blacklist someone is first recorded from the early 18t...
At first glance, one would think that this word must have something to do with threatening letters of extortion but this would be far from the truth....
Means persuasive flattery and derives from the Blarney Stone at Blarney Castle in Ireland. Legend has it that kissing the Blarney Stone endows one wit...
Blast and blasted are expressions of annoyance or frustration that date from the 1500s and are synonyms for damn, damned or spoiled. Blast as in ‘a go...
This expression was coined by American disc jockeys in the 1960s to describe replays of erstwhile hit records. It is not known who actually coined the...
To blaze a trail is to be a pioneer or the first to do something and set an example or standard for others to follow. The expression dates in this fig...
As in expressions like, “Where the blazes did I put my book?” Blazes is simply a euphemism for hell dating from the late 18th/early 19th century. Thus...