A-Z Database
This expression usually appears in its negative form of not being worth one’s salt. It goes back to Roman times when salt was such a valuable commodit...
The British slang phrase ‘wotcha cock’ is actually short for the very dated ‘wotcha cock sparrow/sparrer’. Wotcha is in fact a contraction of the medi...
Almost anything can follow these words because there is a whole universe of situations and things that people find abhorrent and in which they would n...
see Know from a bar of soap
see Know from a bar of soap
see Not say boo to a goose
see Not touch with a barge pole
see Not give someone the time of day
To have complete control or influence over someone so that only one’s finger or little finger is needed as the control mechanism, dates from the mid-1...
see Nothing to write home about
A metaphor for a sign or clear indication of imminent failure or disaster. The original writing on the wall comes from the Bible, Daniel 5:22, and was...
From the 16th century onwards, this expression, the wrong or short end of the stick meant getting the worst end of a deal or bargain and it was not un...
To get up on the wrong side of the bed is wake up in a bad mood and the expression in this form dates from the late 18th/early 19th century. The conce...
This is an American expression from the 1920s for the poorer or lower class part of town. The allusion is to the railroads that eventually ran into ev...
An American slang expression for a weak, ineffectual person dates from the 1960s. Probably derives from earlier slang ‘pussy wussy’ or ‘wussy’ meaning...