Where do saying come from.

[Jew Boy]

I remember one of my ex-colleagues saying that she had been "jewed" out of something - she was horrified when she realised what she was saying, never realised that it was related to the religion/race.

 

On welsh/welch, I heard it comes from welsh rarebit, changed to welsh rabbit, and rabbits disappear fast when confronted, so i think it more related to rabbits than the welsh. Possibly.

 

I still get that a lot.

It makes me laugh and i play along with the stereotype to a certain degree. It makes for an amusing break from the hard graft of work.

[mickw]

**** up is from Archery

An arrow has 3 fletches (flights) these when aligned properly by putting the **** or index fletch outwords it misses the side of the bow.If the **** feather is at the top or up it will strike the bow on release and cause the arrow to miss its target.

 

Keep it under your hat is also from archery

A spare bow string was kept under an archers hat to keep it safe and dry.

[DiDoDoDatDoe]

Hi, this is a real interesting topic and the first one that has caught my interest enough to post,

 

I was on a training course not long back when one of the Tutors was talking informally about his family life and in particular some funny anecdote about his mother, anyhow he mentioned the phrase 'dirty Arab' and then immediately had a look of embarrassment as a fellow from Iran was in the class with us.

 

I have not heard the phrase for years now but it was common place back when I was a nipper and I wondered if anyone on here knew the origins of it ?

[Chris_Sleeps]

he mentioned the phrase 'dirty Arab' and then immediately had a look of embarrassment

 

[...] I wondered if anyone on here knew the origins of it ?

I don't think it's a "saying" like the others are. It isn't a verb. It's just a noun and pejorative adjective. Like mucky pup, or dirty sod. There isn't much to explain.

[norman bates]

someone said cheerio to me the other day and just thought people dont seem to say it much these days,just wondered if anyone new where it originated

[HeadingNorth]

...the phrase 'dirty Arab'

 

I have not heard the phrase for years now but it was common place back when I was a nipper and I wondered if anyone on here knew the origins of it ?

 

Probably it goes all the way back to the Crusades. Arab, Saracen and the like were all pejorative terms, and once they get into the vocabulary it's very hard to get them out again.

 

Arab cooking involves a lot of spices which were at that time entirely alien to the Europeans (and even today they still tend to use more spices than would we), which meant that their villages, food, and even themselves and their bodily odours were significantly different from anything the Europeans had smelt before, and it's easy to identify those smells as "dirty" ones when they come from the chaps who are fighting you to the death over the Holy Land.

[DiDoDoDatDoe]

It stuck alright because I don't remember any Arabs as such when I was a lad and yet if you came in with a bit of sludge or anything on you as a kid you were apparently a dirty one.

 

Another, similar I suppose, term I heard at the same training center (although I don't think it was realized what was being said in this instance either), was when one of the tutors said to a Chinese fellow 'its alrieght mi old'. Now Im sure that the end part to that sentence is 'China' although its rarely added and a good job as that could have took some explaining as well. I wonder if when people say 'alrieght mi old' they consider putting on or missing out the China bit ?

[Plain Talker]

It stuck alright because I don't remember any Arabs as such when I was a lad and yet if you came in with a bit of sludge or anything on you as a kid you were apparently a dirty one.

 

Another, similar I suppose, term I heard at the same training center (although I don't think it was realized what was being said in this instance either), was when one of the tutors said to a Chinese fellow 'its alrieght mi old'. Now Im sure that the end part to that sentence is 'China' although its rarely added and a good job as that could have took some explaining as well. I wonder if when people say 'alrieght mi old' they consider putting on or missing out the China bit ?

 

"Mi owd china" is cockney rhyming slang..

 

"Mi owd China plate" = "My old mate"

[Rupert_Baehr]

'Berk' - Abbreviated form of Berkeley Hunt. Rhyming slang. (Not polite )

 

'Son of a gun' - Ships <REMOVED>. There were females on His Majesty's ships (the sailors were often not allowed ashore) and when one of them became pregnant and gave birth, it was usually difficult to identify the father, so the Captain would log the birth using something along the lines of: To Jane, a boy child weighing 8 lb, a 'Son of a Gun'

 

'Two-Six, heave!' Numbers 2 and 6 on a gun crew were the peple who hauled on ropes to run out a cannon after it had been cleaned (by the man with the wooly-headed <REMOVED>) and re-loaded.

 

'Cold enough to freeze the balls of a brass monkey'. Powder was stowed below the waterline (for obvious reasons) and carried to the gun crews by boys known as 'powder monkeys'. Cannonballs were stowed near the guns (for equally obvious reasons) on wooden racks known as 'ball monkeys'. One Admiral (Collingwood, I think) decided it would look smarter if the balls were stowed on shiny brass racks, so he had the wooden ball monkeys replaced with brass ball monkeys. When the ship sailed into very cold regions, the brass contracted more than did the iron of the cannonballs, and eventually, it got 'cold enough to freeze the [cannon]balls off a brass [ball]monkey'.