A-Z Database
British informal expression for teeth dates from the late 19th century.
American slang for penis, perhaps from allusion to a cock or rooster that pecks, dates from c.1902. See also Keep one’s pecker up.
Originally, this word meaning urination or to urinate was literally the p-word in that it was just written or said as the letter ‘p’ when to say or wr...
An inquisitive, prying person dates from the late 18th century and derives from the legend of Lady Godiva, a noble woman who rode naked through the st...
To peg it or peg out are British colloquialisms from the mid-19th century meaning to die, together with ‘pegged’ which means dead. The origin is from...
Rhyming slang for stink, pen and ink/stink, dates from the mid-19th century and is still in use.
Verbatim, the quotation is attributed to Edward Bulwer Lytton (1803-1873). The following lines appear in his play Richelieu (1839) Act II, Scene II,...
Originally, a cheap, trashy novel of the Victorian era that literally cost a penny, the British equivalent of the American ‘dime novel’. The expressio...
The penny drops means sudden understanding or realisation of something or other. The expression usually implies a period of non-comprehension before t...
This exhortation to reveal what one is thinking is first recorded in John Heywood Proverbs (1546) therefore it should be much older than this. Penny i...
This aphorism means that concern over small things can lead to missing greater opportunities or pre-occupation with trivial amounts of money can resul...
This old English proverb first appears in George Herbert’s Jacula Prudentum (1640) in the form of “Whose house is of glass, must not throw stones at a...
A peppercorn rent is a nominal or trivial amount of rent that is paid in order to legalise a rental contract. The phrase dates from the late 16th/earl...
A phrase that describes Britain or England as treacherous or untrustworthy, especially in international affairs. It is often wrongly attributed to Nap...
British slang, usually derogatory, applied to a rogue or rascal dates from the late 19th century. The adjective perishing dates from around the same t...