A - Z Database
The affectionate name for Nelson Mandela derives from the name of his Xhosa clan.
Mae West is largely obsolete military slang for an inflatable life jacket of the type worn by air force pilots. It was the RAF who first started calli...
From the late 16th century, a magazine was a general term for a storehouse but very soon thereafter became associated with a storage place for munitio...
A maiden over in cricket is an over in which no runs are scored from the bat. Extras like wides or byes are not counted. The term derives from the att...
see Beeline
Something that is funny enough to make a cat laugh must be very funny indeed because, of course, cats cannot and do not laugh. This hyperbole was coin...
This expression meaning to confess or get something off one’s chest and thereby cleansing one’s conscience dates from the 16th century when the breast...
To win everything, to win all the awards or events in any competitive context, dates from the early 19th century and has always been a figurative expr...
see Collar
This expression can take multiple forms because the word fist is often qualified by an adjective. For example, one can make a good, bad, brave, poor f...
Horlicks is the brand name for a hot, malted, pre-bedtime beverage that has been around in Britain since the 1870s. Since the 1980s, to make a complet...
British informal expression that means to tackle a simple task or action with unnecessary, complicated effort and dates from the late 19th century. Fr...
To initiate a romantic and possibly sexual advance towards another person and dates in this context from the 1920s. It is thought to be of American or...
Rod is an old Anglo-Saxon word for a stick or cane from at least the 11th century and this expression means that a problem of one’s own creation will...
Usually expressed in the negative, one cannot make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear, it is an old proverb, popular since the 1500s, and means that one...