A - Z Database
An unsung hero is a person who makes a substantive but unrecognised contribution to an enterprise and it dates in this sense dates from the mid-19th c...
An arduous task involving prolonged effort, dates from the 1600s, although to give someone uphill, meaning to give them a hard time, is much newer fro...
The exact quotation from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar Act III, Scene II is “This was the most unkindest cut of all” which Marc Anthony uses to describe...
To explain, analyse or break down into constituent parts is first attested in the language of computers and automation in the mid-1950s, but its usage...
see Blue in the face
People can talk, wait, or engage in virtually any number of pastimes until the cows come home, which means a very long but indefinite time. The expres...
Untoward means improper or unseemly and has enjoyed this meaning since the early 1600s. From this same time, its antonym, toward, enjoyed the opposite...
To be 'up a gum tree' or to be 'stuck up a gum tree' means to be in trouble or in some sort of predicament and dates in this sense from the mid-19th c...
This American expression from the late 19th century denotes the rise of a potential talent yet to come to fruition.
This expression describes an in-your-face encounter and, depending on the context, it can be either intimate or threatening. It’s originally Ame...
Since the late 16th century, this expression has acquired its figurative meaning of being excessively agitated or incensed about something. Its origin...
The highest seats in a theatre have been known as the gods or gallery gods since the latter half of the 18th century. The OED maintains that the origi...
The notion of keeping something up one’s sleeve as a fallback safeguard or a surprise alternative dates back to the 1500s at least, and all such expre...
see Up the creek
Increase the intensity or competitiveness of any situation, an Americanism from c.1830 that originally derives from the game of poker where the ante,...