January 24, 2025 • 7 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, Andrew Thompson shares another slice of his guide to understanding the baffling mini-mysteries of the English language. The book is Hair of the Dog to Paint the Town Red: The Wonderful Origins of Everyday Expressions and Fun Phrases.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
and we tell stories about everything here on this show,
including your story. Send them to our American Stories dot com.
There are some of our favorites. Hair of the Dog,
To Paint the Town Red. The Curious Origins of Everyday
Sayings and Funphrases is a book that reveals the surprising, captivating,
(00:30):
and even hilarious origins behind four hundred of these sayings,
including read between the lines, cat Got Your Tongue, Raining
cats and dogs. Here with the recurring series is Hair
of the Dog author Andrew Thompson as he shares another
slice from his Ultimate Guide to Understanding these baffling mini
(00:50):
mysteries of the English language.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
The first expression I'd like to tell you about is
above board, which means honest and open or legal. If
something's above board, everything's okay. It reminds me years ago
is to have a weekly game of blackjack with a
group of guys and people would often cheat. It was
all a bit joking, but people that have their hands
under the table and everyone is say to get your
(01:13):
hands on the table, you've got to be above board.
And that's where that expression comes from. It's a gaming expression.
In card playing, the board was the table as in
a sideboard, and if a player dropped his hands below
the table, he could be accused of cheating by swapping
his cards or pulling a card out that he had
stashed under there. So to stop any sort of suspicion,
(01:34):
people had to keep their hands above the table. So
if the player's hands are above board, nobody could suggest
anything was wrong. A saying that comes from ancient times
is achilles heel, which everyone's heard of. It means a
weakness or vulnerability. He might say he's a great runner,
but that's his achilles heel when he can't do long distances,
(01:56):
for example. It has its origins in ancient Greek legend.
Chillies was dipped into a river by his mother in
order to give him a skin of armor and make
him invulnerable to his enemies. But she held him by
the heel, which didn't get covered by the water and
became a weak point for him. He became this great warrior,
but his arch enemy, a guy called Paris, discovered his
(02:18):
weakness and killed him by shooting an arrow through his heel.
And Homer wrote about this Aeliad, and the phrase became
popular in the nineteenth century. The expression across the board
means it applies to everyone. For example, the government might
impose tax cuts across the board. This phrase is from
the sporting arena. It was coined in America in the
(02:41):
early nineteen hundreds from horse racing at the time. At
race meets, a large board would display the odds of horses,
and the odds were listed for a horse to win
place or show which was to make third, and if
a punter placed a bed across the board, he put
an equal amount of money on a horse to finish firs, second,
or third, So it was an across the board bet
(03:02):
that applied to everything every option. To add another string
to your bow is another spawling expression which comes from
the sport of archery, and it started in medy evil
times when in competitions often men who were the best
shot became widely popular when archery was very popular for
fighting and exhibition sports. So never to be caught short,
(03:25):
the best archers would add another string to their bow.
They'd attach a second string at the top of the
bow that was wound around the handle. If the first
string snapped or was damaged, the archer had a backup
string to get him out of trouble, and that's also
how the expressions second string came about. To add. Insult
to injury is an expression that comes from the literary world.
(03:46):
It dates way back to twenty five BC and was
from a writer from ancient Rome, and it was from
the story of the bald Man and the Fly. In
that story, a fly stings a bald man on the
top of his head, and the man swats at the fly,
trying to kill it, but the fly moves away so
that the man hits himself on the head as well,
and the fly then remarks, all you've done is added
(04:07):
insult of injury, which is where the expression comes from,
to mean making an already bad situation even worse. The
phrase began in twenty five PC didn't pass into English
until about the mid seventeen hundreds. The saying against the
grain comes from tradesman. It means against the natural flow,
(04:28):
or opposed to one's normal inclination. It has its origins
in woodwork and carpentry. When wood is planed, sword or
sanded along the grain, it results in a smooth finish,
but when it's done across the grain, it tends to splinter.
Or be rough, so working against the grain is also
far more difficult, and that's where the expression came from.
(04:49):
It was first used by Shakespeare in sixteen oh seven.
Everyone knows the expression to aid in a bet, which
is usually used in relation to criminals with a person
held or inciting someone in the commission of a crime,
So you might be convicted of aiding and a betting
a crime. It's got an interesting origin, this one. It's
(05:09):
from the now outlawed sport, or if you could call
it that, of bear baiting. The word a bet is
from the Norse word meaning to bite, and it was
originally called bear a betting in the fourteenth century in England,
where a hungry bear would be tethered to a pole
in a pit and set upon by trained bulldogs. The
dogs would bite the bear until was killed, and often
(05:31):
in doing so they'd suffer casualties or be very tired,
and the owner would urge the dog to continue to
keep the spectacle going. So it was said that he
was a betting the dog to keep biting. And frase
was coined in the eighteenth century to mean what it
does today to air your dirty laundry in public means
to talk in public about private matters, and this expression
(05:54):
came from Napoleon Bonaparte in eighteen fourteen, when he was
exiled to the island of elba Is forced to addicate
the French throne, and he went there and despite the
island being surrounded by the British navy, he managed to
escape on a boat. After less than a year there
and back in France, he was asked about his experiences
on the island, to which he replied, it is at
(06:16):
home and not in public, that one washes one's dirty linen,
and that eventually got corrupted to air your dirty launder
in public. To come to what it means to all
hell brogue loose has become a common expression to mean
wild and erratic behavior, like if a teacher left the
classroom for ten minutes, all hell brogue loose with the students.
(06:36):
It's got literary origins as well. It's from John Milton's
epic poem Paradise Loss, which was published in sixteen sixty seven,
and it tells the tale of the biblical Garden of Eden.
In one part, just before he cast him out of
the Garden of Eden, the angel Gabriel asked satan why
he traveled alone and hadn't been joined by other inhabitants
of Hell, and Gabriel poses the question as wherefore with
(07:00):
thee came not all hell? Brokelues which is holding wish
obviously mean that's where the expression began.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
And a special thanks to Greg for producing the piece,
and a special thanks also to Andrew Thompson Hair of
the Dog to paint the town. Read is the book?
Go to Amazon dot com and buy it. The story
of our own language and phrases we all know but
don't know the origins of here on our American Story Folks.
(07:29):
If you love the great American stories we tell and
love America like we do, we're asking you to become
a part of the Our American Stories family. If you
agree that America is a good and great country, please
make a donation. A monthly gift of seventeen dollars and
seventy six cents is fast becoming a favorite option for supporters.
Go to Our American Stories dot com now and go
(07:50):
to the donate button and help us keep the great
American stories coming. That's our American Stories dot Com.
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
and we tell stories about everything here on this show,
including your story. Send them to our American Stories dot com.
There are some of our favorites. Hair of the Dog,
To Paint the Town Red. The Curious Origins of Everyday
Sayings and Funphrases is a book that reveals the surprising, captivating,
(00:30):
and even hilarious origins behind four hundred of these sayings,
including read between the lines, cat Got Your Tongue, Raining
cats and dogs. Here with the recurring series is Hair
of the Dog author Andrew Thompson as he shares another
slice from his Ultimate Guide to Understanding these baffling mini
(00:50):
mysteries of the English language.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
The first expression I'd like to tell you about is
above board, which means honest and open or legal. If
something's above board, everything's okay. It reminds me years ago
is to have a weekly game of blackjack with a
group of guys and people would often cheat. It was
all a bit joking, but people that have their hands
under the table and everyone is say to get your
(01:13):
hands on the table, you've got to be above board.
And that's where that expression comes from. It's a gaming expression.
In card playing, the board was the table as in
a sideboard, and if a player dropped his hands below
the table, he could be accused of cheating by swapping
his cards or pulling a card out that he had
stashed under there. So to stop any sort of suspicion,
(01:34):
people had to keep their hands above the table. So
if the player's hands are above board, nobody could suggest
anything was wrong. A saying that comes from ancient times
is achilles heel, which everyone's heard of. It means a
weakness or vulnerability. He might say he's a great runner,
but that's his achilles heel when he can't do long distances,
(01:56):
for example. It has its origins in ancient Greek legend.
Chillies was dipped into a river by his mother in
order to give him a skin of armor and make
him invulnerable to his enemies. But she held him by
the heel, which didn't get covered by the water and
became a weak point for him. He became this great warrior,
but his arch enemy, a guy called Paris, discovered his
(02:18):
weakness and killed him by shooting an arrow through his heel.
And Homer wrote about this Aeliad, and the phrase became
popular in the nineteenth century. The expression across the board
means it applies to everyone. For example, the government might
impose tax cuts across the board. This phrase is from
the sporting arena. It was coined in America in the
(02:41):
early nineteen hundreds from horse racing at the time. At
race meets, a large board would display the odds of horses,
and the odds were listed for a horse to win
place or show which was to make third, and if
a punter placed a bed across the board, he put
an equal amount of money on a horse to finish firs, second,
or third, So it was an across the board bet
(03:02):
that applied to everything every option. To add another string
to your bow is another spawling expression which comes from
the sport of archery, and it started in medy evil
times when in competitions often men who were the best
shot became widely popular when archery was very popular for
fighting and exhibition sports. So never to be caught short,
(03:25):
the best archers would add another string to their bow.
They'd attach a second string at the top of the
bow that was wound around the handle. If the first
string snapped or was damaged, the archer had a backup
string to get him out of trouble, and that's also
how the expressions second string came about. To add. Insult
to injury is an expression that comes from the literary world.
(03:46):
It dates way back to twenty five BC and was
from a writer from ancient Rome, and it was from
the story of the bald Man and the Fly. In
that story, a fly stings a bald man on the
top of his head, and the man swats at the fly,
trying to kill it, but the fly moves away so
that the man hits himself on the head as well,
and the fly then remarks, all you've done is added
(04:07):
insult of injury, which is where the expression comes from,
to mean making an already bad situation even worse. The
phrase began in twenty five PC didn't pass into English
until about the mid seventeen hundreds. The saying against the
grain comes from tradesman. It means against the natural flow,
(04:28):
or opposed to one's normal inclination. It has its origins
in woodwork and carpentry. When wood is planed, sword or
sanded along the grain, it results in a smooth finish,
but when it's done across the grain, it tends to splinter.
Or be rough, so working against the grain is also
far more difficult, and that's where the expression came from.
(04:49):
It was first used by Shakespeare in sixteen oh seven.
Everyone knows the expression to aid in a bet, which
is usually used in relation to criminals with a person
held or inciting someone in the commission of a crime,
So you might be convicted of aiding and a betting
a crime. It's got an interesting origin, this one. It's
(05:09):
from the now outlawed sport, or if you could call
it that, of bear baiting. The word a bet is
from the Norse word meaning to bite, and it was
originally called bear a betting in the fourteenth century in England,
where a hungry bear would be tethered to a pole
in a pit and set upon by trained bulldogs. The
dogs would bite the bear until was killed, and often
(05:31):
in doing so they'd suffer casualties or be very tired,
and the owner would urge the dog to continue to
keep the spectacle going. So it was said that he
was a betting the dog to keep biting. And frase
was coined in the eighteenth century to mean what it
does today to air your dirty laundry in public means
to talk in public about private matters, and this expression
(05:54):
came from Napoleon Bonaparte in eighteen fourteen, when he was
exiled to the island of elba Is forced to addicate
the French throne, and he went there and despite the
island being surrounded by the British navy, he managed to
escape on a boat. After less than a year there
and back in France, he was asked about his experiences
on the island, to which he replied, it is at
(06:16):
home and not in public, that one washes one's dirty linen,
and that eventually got corrupted to air your dirty launder
in public. To come to what it means to all
hell brogue loose has become a common expression to mean
wild and erratic behavior, like if a teacher left the
classroom for ten minutes, all hell brogue loose with the students.
(06:36):
It's got literary origins as well. It's from John Milton's
epic poem Paradise Loss, which was published in sixteen sixty seven,
and it tells the tale of the biblical Garden of Eden.
In one part, just before he cast him out of
the Garden of Eden, the angel Gabriel asked satan why
he traveled alone and hadn't been joined by other inhabitants
of Hell, and Gabriel poses the question as wherefore with
(07:00):
thee came not all hell? Brokelues which is holding wish
obviously mean that's where the expression began.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
And a special thanks to Greg for producing the piece,
and a special thanks also to Andrew Thompson Hair of
the Dog to paint the town. Read is the book?
Go to Amazon dot com and buy it. The story
of our own language and phrases we all know but
don't know the origins of here on our American Story Folks.
(07:29):
If you love the great American stories we tell and
love America like we do, we're asking you to become
a part of the Our American Stories family. If you
agree that America is a good and great country, please
make a donation. A monthly gift of seventeen dollars and
seventy six cents is fast becoming a favorite option for supporters.
Go to Our American Stories dot com now and go
(07:50):
to the donate button and help us keep the great
American stories coming. That's our American Stories dot Com.
Host
Lee Habeeb
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