Put your shoulder to the wheel

Origin of: Put your shoulder to the wheel

Put your shoulder to the wheel

This expression meaning to make an effort derives from Aesop’s Fables c.550 BC in the fable of Hercules and the Wagoner where after his wagon gets stuck, the wagoner prays to Hercules to come help him. Instead, Hercules urges the wagoner to put his own shoulder to the wheel and start up his horses, because the gods help them who help themselves. Put your shoulder to the wheel is thought to have entered the language during the late Middle Ages after William Caxton’s publication of the fables in 1484.