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Where did all those common saying come from..Here are a few to start

Started by Ernie, December 01, 2009, 02:20:47 PM

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Ernie

Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May and were still smelling pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the 'B.O.'. Baths equalled a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children. Last of all the babies. By then the water
was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it.

Hence the saying, "Don't throw the baby out with the bath water".

Houses had thatched roofs. Thick straw, piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the pets... dogs, cats and other small animals, mice, rats, bugs lived in the roof. When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would  slip and fall off the roof.
Hence the saying, "It's raining cats and dogs,"

There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could really mess up your nice clean bed. So, they found if they made beds with big posts and hung a sheet over the top, it addressed that problem.

Hence those beautiful big 4 poster beds with canopies.

The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt.
Hence the saying "dirt poor".

The wealthy had slate floors which would get slippery in the winter when wet. So they spread thresh on the floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on they kept adding more thresh until when you opened the door it would all start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed at the entry way.

Hence a "thresh hold".

They cooked in the kitchen in a big kettle that always hung over the fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They mostly ate vegetables as they never had much meat. They would eat the stew for dinner leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes the stew had food in it that had been in there for a month.

Hence the rhyme: peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old."

Sometimes they could obtain pork and would feel really special when that happened. When company came over, they would bring out some bacon and hang it to show it off. It was a sign of wealth and that a man "could really bring home the bacon."

They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around
and "chew the fat."




Those with money had plates made of pewter. Food with a high acid content caused some of the lead to leach onto the food. This happened most often with tomatoes, so they stopped eating tomatoes... for 400 years.

Most people didn't have pewter plates, but had trenchers - a piece of wood with the middle scooped out like a bowl. Trenchers were never washed and a lot of times worms got into the wood. After eating off wormy trenchers, they
would get "trench mouth."

Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the "Upper Crust".

Lead cups were used to drink ale or whiskey. The combination would sometimes knock them out for a couple of days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them for burial. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would wake up.

Hence the custom of holding a "wake".

England is old and small and they started running out of places to bury people. So, they would dig up coffins and would take their bones to a house and re-use the grave. In reopening these coffins, one out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive. So they thought they would tie a string on their wrist and lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night to listen for the bell.

Hence on the "graveyard shift" they would know that someone was
"saved by the bell" or he was a "dead ringer".
A very wise man once told me . Grand children are great, we should have had them first

Tom

World War I started Trenchmouth and Trenchfoot too. :-\

Chew the fat.
Yep, that's were chewing on pig lips, pork snouts, ears and feet came from.  See!  Even the English did it :D



Quote...they didn't have much meat.
And we considered ouselves civilized and prosperous when we Europeans discovered America, and the other worlds unknown to us at the time.

The po-o-or Indian.  We have great big piles of refuse all along the coast where those poor starving fools had to eat things like Oysters, clams, big fish and deer. Then lay back in the sun with their woman or man (or somebody elses) and snooze, wiggle their toes and expose themselves to skin cancer.  It's a good thing we civilized folks came along and saved their dumb Axxes.






Texas Ranger

There is a joke circulating to that effect, where the punch line is: "And the white man thought he could improve on that?"
The Ranger, home of Texas Forestry

moonhill

"coming out of the woodwork"  I know all about that one.   Worms the size of my little finger with their shavings forming mounds on the clients floor.   

"Thresh hold" comes from the threshing floor in barns it is the board placed across the door openings to keep the threshing in, usually it was the center bay.  At least that is what I was told, so it must be a dead ringer.

Tim
This is a test, please stand by...

Jeff

Well Some think that the term sawing logs comes from the sound of snoring, but I beg to differ.

I had many long days in the mill where after which I went home, dead to the world, and all night long in my sleep I would still be seeing the carriage going back and forth, back and forth.   I would saw all day, then go home and saw all night and wake up more tired then I went to bed.
Just call me the midget doctor.
Forestry Forum Founder and Chief Cook and Bottle Washer.

Commercial circle sawmill sawyer in a past life for 25yrs.
Ezekiel 22:30

isawlogs

A man does not always grow wise as he grows old , but he always grows old as he grows wise .

   Marcel

LeeB

'98 LT40HDD/Lombardini, Case 580L, Cat D4C, JD 3032 tractor, JD 5410 tractor, Husky 346, 372 and 562XP's. Stihl MS180 and MS361, 1998 and 2006 3/4 Ton 5.9 Cummins 4x4's, 1989 Dodge D100 w/ 318, and a 1966 Chevy C60 w/ dump bed.

Banjo picker

I have heard that the bullets for the machine guns were 27 ft. long...hence you give them the whole nine yards...Tim
Never explain, your friends don't need it, and your enemies won't believe you any way.

Carpenter

(A Flash in the pan).  Now of course means an idea that never really takes off.  Is when the powder in the pan of a flintlock ignites but fails to ignite the main powder charge. 

(Going off half cocked).  The way the tumbler was notched for the sear of old guns prevented a gun from going off half cocked and flinter and caplock guns both were often carried and stored loaded on half cock.  However as the halfcock notch got worn it could develope a ghost notch which may feel to the user that the gun is on half cock but a bump could set it off. 
(Lock, Stock, and Barrel).  The key components of a gun. or the whole kit and caboodle.
(Bucks) for dollar bills.  In the days of the North American fur trade deer skins (and other skins of course) were used as currency.  I have heard that the price of a trade gun was sometimes determined by its overall length and that it was worth its length in piled deer hides. 
(Cold enough to freeze the ears off a brass monkey).  And the original saying was ears.  I am repeating this from memory so my facts might not be entirely accurate.  From what I have read the saying was first recorded in the written form in the diary of a sailor on a voyage of discovery to the artic in the mid 19th century.  His diary mentioned that the change in temperature had been so extreme thea t the ears on the monkey gun had cracked or he fealt that they could be in danger of cracking.  The monkey gun by the way was a small cannon which was the personal property of the captain which could be swiveled 360 degrees and were largely used as a display of force and to possibly dispell a mutiny.  They were made both of brass and of Iron and the ears would have been handles to aim the thing with.  The ears were often round thus balls could be interchanged with ears. 

Rooster

For many years, simple wooden doors on cabins, houses and barns were assembled with nails,... as the vertical boards were nailed to the cross pieces, the nails would stick through the other side.  To ensure that the nail would not loosen or pull out over time, the nail tips were cleated over, this is called "deadening".  Hence, "dead as a door nail".  Eh?

Rooster
"We talk about creating millions of "shovel ready" jobs, for a society that doesn't really encourage anybody to pick up a shovel." 
Mike Rowe

"Old barns are a reminder of when I was young,
       and new barns are a reminder that I am not so young."
                          Rooster

Ernie

I heard that "cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey" referred to the monkey,(brass ring) on deck upon which the cannon balls were stacked.  The cold would contract the ring and the cannon balls would fall off
A very wise man once told me . Grand children are great, we should have had them first

ford62783

scrapeing the bottom of the barrell
i heard that years ago when they made flower and put it in wood barrells they didnt want to waste any so they would scrape it all off the bottom
timberjack 240e

Tom


maple flats

Ernie's right on the balls and the brass monkey. The brass ring on the deck of a ship that held the cannon balls was called a monkey. Extreme cold temperatures would contract it enough to cause the balls to roll of.
logging small time for years but just learning how,  2012 36 HP Mahindra tractor, 3point log arch, 8000# class excavator, lifts 2500# and sets logs on mill precisely where needed, Woodland Mills HM130Max , maple syrup a hobby that consumes my time. looking to learn blacksmithing.

Carpenter

The brass ring to hold the cannon balls on the deck of a gunship is a common misconception.  I have heard that theory as well, and believed it for years untill I did a little internet research on the subject and thought you guys would want to hear a more realistic version.  Accurate or not, it is at least interesting. 

This was copied from the wikopedia encyclopedia. 
 
Cannonballs
One theory, of sufficient popularity as to be an example of so-called folk etymology, is that a brass monkey is a brass tray used in naval ships during the Napoleonic Wars, for the storage of cannonballs, piled up in a pyramid. The theory goes that the tray would contract in cold weather, causing the balls to fall off. [9] This theory is discredited by the US. Department of the Navy[10] and the etymologist Michael Quinion and the OED's AskOxford website[11] for five main reasons:

1.The Oxford English Dictionary does not record the term "monkey" or "brass monkey" being used in this way.
2.The purported method of storage of cannonballs ("round shot") is simply false. Shot was not stored on deck continuously on the off-chance that the ship might go into battle. Indeed, decks were kept as clear as possible.
3.Furthermore, such a method of storage would result in shot rolling around on deck and causing a hazard in high seas. Shot was stored on the gun or spar decks, in shot racks—longitudinal wooden planks with holes bored into them, known as shot garlands in the Royal Navy, into which round shot were inserted for ready use by the gun crew.
4.Shot was not left exposed to the elements where it could rust. Such rust could lead to the ball not flying true or jamming in the barrel and exploding the gun. Indeed, gunners would attempt to remove as many imperfections as possible from the surfaces of balls.
5.The physics do not stand up to scrutiny. All of the balls would contract equally, and the contraction of both balls and plate over the range of temperatures involved would not be particularly large. The effect claimed possibly could be reproduced under laboratory conditions with objects engineered to a high precision for this purpose, but it is unlikely it would ever have occurred in real life aboard a warship.
[edit] Brass cannons
A similar theory states that the expression refers to a cannon.[citation needed] Quinion notes that there was a cannon nicknamed this in the mid-17th century (much too early).

To get a line from one ship to another, it was necessary to take a small piece of shot, and using knot tying skills, encase it with sturdy light rope, resulting in the weight attached to the end of a heaving line. That would be referred to as a monkey fist and a seaman would throw the line to a ship alongside, which would haul it over, thus getting a heavier line or some item. Again, with the distances involved, often the monkey fist and line would be fired from a signaling gun.

In those days, a ship was captained from the raised aft quarter deck, and the small cannon there was used for firing lines, signaling and combat against persons (either on another ship or mutineers), often fired by the captain himself. It was a small cannon, usually about 2-3' in length and less than 2" in bore, and mounted on a swivel, able to be swung 360 degrees. This swivel gun was often referred to as a monkey gun.

To assist in aiming the gun, aft of the mounting there usually would be either loops or knobs cast onto the barrel on each side, aft of the swivel mounting or on the end of the gun. As might be expected, these were referred to as ears or balls and grasped by the person doing the aiming. The guns were usually the property of the ship's master and a matter of personal pride, like his personal charts, navigation instruments, clock, etc. Common guns would be cast iron, but a well-off captain would have a fine brass monkey gun.

So, with the monkey gun located in an exposed position aboard ship, and the rapid changes of temperature, especially in arctic latitudes, the difference in mass of the parts of the cast cannon, either brass or iron, was reputed to create cracking when temperature changed rapidly.

Thus, "Cold enough to freeze the balls (or ears) off a brass (or cast iron) monke

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