A-Z Database
Mayday, repeated three times, has become the official international radio signal for distress. It was coined in 1923 by Frederick Mockford (1897-1962)...
During the 13th century, maim and mayhem were interchangeable words deriving from the same Anglo-Norman roots maime or mayhem meaning to inflict cripp...
Historians still argue over whether mayonnaise is a Spanish or French invention. What is indisputable is that this emulsion of egg yolks, olive oil an...
American slang for money dates from the late 19th/early 20th century from the Yiddish mezumman medieval Hebrew for cash.
This well-known catchphrase, supposedly drawn from the Tarzan movies, was actually never used in any of the Tarzan movies, nor was it ever used in any...
A Latin phrase extracted from the liturgy of the Mass that means my fault. It dates from the 14th century, extracted from the Mass, in the general sen...
An American metaphor for a benefactor who provides a livelihood for others and dates from the late 19th century, from the allusion to providing food a...
Obsequious, afraid or reticent to speak one’s mind as if one, literally, had a mouthful of meal, the powdery, flour-like substance made from ground, e...
To mean business is to be serious or earnest in intent or determined to take positive action about something or other and dates from the mid-19th cent...
When someone says that something is ‘meat and drink to me’ they mean one of two things - either something that gives them intense pleasure or somethin...
Australian/NewZealand rhyming slang for a try (in rugby), meat pie/try, dates from the late 20th/early 21st century.
An ungainly, oafish, loud, obnoxious person, an Americanism first cited from the mid-19th century.
The medium is the message has become a 20th century aphorism that describes the way that both the content of modern electronic media and the consumpti...
Mega- as a prefix (meg- before a vowel) derives from the Ancient Greek mega meaning great or large. As a prefix measuring large units its usage dates...
Melting pots have literally been around from time immemorial, but in the sense of a metaphor for a place where a variety of races, cultures, or indivi...