A - Z Database
Originally, a contemptuous American term for a toady or sycophant dates from the mid-19th century. Later, it evolved into a general term of contempt.
The only thing known about this word, in the sense of an exotic, alcoholic drink, is that it is of American origin from the early 19th century. Despit...
Meaning impudent and arrogant is from the 18th century and derives from the behaviour of the rooster or cock in the henhouse.
Disparaging term for a person who is black/coloured on the outside and white on the inside, implying non-adherence to original racial background and c...
Cod is British slang for mock or sham, as in cod Latin or cod philosophy and dates from the late 19th century. It supposedly derives from codger meani...
Usually in the form of old codger and describes, irreverently or perhaps whimsically, any old and slightly foolish fellow, and dates in this sense fro...
The flap or bag that covered the crotch area in medieval male fashion as doublets grew shorter. It derives from cod an old English word, now obsolete,...
The origin of this British colloquial word for rubbish or nonsense is unclear but there are several theories. The most popular one is that it derives...
see Put a nail in someone’s coffin
The use of the word coin as in the coining of words and phrases dates from the 16th century. It means to create a new word or phrase just as to coin m...
Despite bogus attempts to attribute this saying to witch-hunts from centuries ago, where witch-hunters would look for tell-tale marks on witches’ brea...
This simile for expressing coldness, whether literally or figuratively, was used by Shakespeare in Henry V (1598) Act II, Scene III, “and all was as c...
see In cold blood
This oxymoronic phrase means hardly any comfort at all and first appears in early English alliterative poems during the 14th century, as “cold was his...
There have been many unproven attempts to attribute a naval origin to this expression. There is rather more evidence that the expression is a literal...