A - Z Database
Dates originally from the mid-19th century in America, meaning an important poker game or business transaction and it can still mean the latter in som...
see Whole enchilada
This British working class expression for a weakling or an ineffectual male is thought to have originated in the North of England around the mid-20th...
Its figurative meaning for pre-eminent, important persons or heavyweights dates from the mid-19th century. Charles Dickens used the metaphor in a lett...
A self-opinionated, conceited person, originally an Americanism that dates from the late 19th century.
see See the big/bigger picture
More modern version of big gun and dates from c. 1930.
This American expression as in to hit the big time means to ascend the upper echelons of a pursuit or profession e.g. Hollywood stardom, fame etc and...
An important, influential person, an Americanism that dates from the mid-20th century from the analogy of wheels turning, going forward, and making th...
American campus slang for the toilet bowl, more specifically, to be on the big white telephone is to be drunkenly sick in the toilet, dates from the 1...
This expression means that one has better, more important things to do and first appears in English as “other fish to fry” in Peter Motteux’s c. 1700-...
Important, influential person often used contemptuously dates from the 18th century when important people, aristocracy etc wore powdered wigs. The exp...
Biltong is South African dried/cured meat, similar to American jerky, and was once a staple food for early Dutch pioneers but now considered a treat o...
The bikini as a two-piece bathing costume for women only came into existence after the Second World War. The word dates from c.1946. Bikini was origin...
see Old Bill