A-Z Database
Slang term for a stupid person, usually only applied to men, dates from the 1960s, but the practice of using the word ‘head’ as a suffix is originally...
Dicky is a British colloquialism that means not functioning properly, as in ‘a dicky heart’, or it can mean unwell as in ‘feeling a bit dicky’. Both t...
Children’s talk for a small bird dates from the late 18th century but the origin is obscure, perhaps echoic of the sounds that small birds make and oc...
Another name for a bow tie dates from the mid-19th century, probably derives from its association with dicky as in a detachable shirtfront.
Sometimes called a rumble seat was the foldout seat at the rear of some early automobiles dates from the early 20th century but why dicky remains obsc...
see Turn a hair
Diddle in the sense of to cheat or swindle dates from the early 19th century and derives from Jimmy Diddler, a fictional swindler in the popular farce...
see Squat
As in 'the die is cast', meaning that a crucial and probably irreversible decision has been taken. The most obvious derivation is from the throw or ca...
This catchphrase is usually in the negative form of not to die wondering or the injunction don’t die wondering, which of course means to get on with w...
A die-hard is a person or attitude that resists stubbornly to the last, from the literal sense of resisting until death. Thus, people had been dying h...
see Straight as a die
Some sources attribute the coining of this phrase to Muhammad Ali in 1966 when describing his repertoire of punches, as was quoted in a US newspaper a...
Dig as in to like or understand something is Black American slang from the 1930s.
To work doggedly and intensively, the expression dates from the 19th century. It can also to eat heartily, a colloquial usage from the late 19th/early...