A-Z Database
Wood or timber as an inanimate object has long been used as a simile for lack of intelligence or stupidity in humans e.g. blockhead or wooden-headed....
This use of thick means intimate, conspiratorially close, in the manner of plotting thieves, dates from the early 19th century.
As in to give someone a thick ear i.e. to give someone a blow to the ear so as to make it swollen, dates from the late 19th century.
see Like a thief in the night
see Into thin air
see As thin as a rake
By definition, the thin or pointed end of a wedge is the smallest part, hence the meaning of this expression as being hard-done-by, getting the worst...
see Skating/treading/walking on thin ice
An ancient proverb from Roman times, non semper es sunt quae videntur. It first appears in the writings of Phaedrus c. 8 AD.
Unexplained and unnerving sounds heard at night derives from an anonymous Scottish prayer c. 1800, “From ghoulies and ghosties and long leggety beasti...
Nonsense words used when one cannot recall the exact name of a thing or person. They derive from the word ‘thing’. According to the OED, it all starte...
To think outside the box is to think creatively or innovatively outside of accepted norms, and has become something of a cliché these days, especially...
Put on one’s thinking cap is a metaphor for giving something or other due thought or consideration. In this form, it dates from the early 19th century...
To give someone the third degree is to subject them to intense interrogation and the expression is American from the late 19th century. Since The Midd...
Third man is a fielding position in cricket behind the slips and on the boundary. It was so-called because usually a slip was pushed back to this posi...