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Where Does It Come From? Origins Of Phrases & Expressions

Rule of thumb - purportedly from the language of millers who would gauge the fineness of flour by rubbing it between the first two fingers and thumb, and adjust the grindstones if necessary to become closer if necessary.

I got that one from Victorian Farm (BBC)!
 
escargot said:
Do you remember The Fivepenny Piece? They performed songs in broad Lanky. Your Grandma would've understood every word.
Saw them back in the day. Hilarious and evocative.

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Yep. Introduced the kids to them when they were younger. It brought back loads of memories. Could remember loads of the words as well.
 
AnonyJ said:
Rule of thumb - purportedly from the language of millers who would gauge the fineness of flour by rubbing it between the first two fingers and thumb, and adjust the grindstones if necessary to become closer if necessary.

I got that one from Victorian Farm (BBC)!
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I've also read that it's the approximate length of the last joint of an adult thumb, which works for me.

In the '70s men would gleefully tell women that it was historically the greatest width of a stick that a man could beat his wife with under English law. :chuckle:
 
Mr. Banooka said:
Yep. Introduced the kids to them when they were younger. It brought back loads of memories. Could remember loads of the words as well.
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Seems all the original band members have now died, some long since. If the band is still touring in some form I'll go and see them again! :)

@Stormkhan - they did a song about parkin.
 
Parky and nesh are common parlance in North Yorkshire too.

As we'd come under the Danelaw, I wonder if there's anything Norse about it? We still have words like 'greet' (meaning to cry) which are apparently from Danish, so perhaps these words were imported too.
 
Dunno if it's an origin or a different usage, but as you sharpen a blade on a whetstone, if you rest your thumb between the blunt edge and the stone, the blade is at about the right angle - i.e. 15-17degrees.
I always thought that the 'rule of thumb' is a person's thumbnail is approximately one inch. Like a cubit being the distance between elbow and extended fingers.
 
Frideswide said:
I know the song as keep your hand on your hankie! I wonder if I misheard it, or if it's a real vatient.
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Where did you learn that? :chuckle:
The song was written by Alex Glasgow in 1970. Definitely ha'penny.
 
Are you a safe distance from a nuclear detonation?

94C51E8C-BC2C-4673-A01B-021F639AA2C3.jpeg
 
Stormkhan said:
Dunno if it's an origin or a different usage, but as you sharpen a blade on a whetstone, if you rest your thumb between the blunt edge and the stone, the blade is at about the right angle - i.e. 15-17degrees.
I always thought that the 'rule of thumb' is a person's thumbnail is approximately one inch. Like a cubit being the distance between elbow and extended fingers.
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I've always taken it to mean a measure (1" approx.) for beating ones wife no less!
https://www.historyextra.com/period/modern/rule-thumb-idiom-origins-meaning-phrase-why-do-we-say/
How things have changed eh!:rcard:
 
Mr. Banooka said:
Yep - where I am from (Leigh, Lancashire) 'parky' means cold. For example "Bloody hell, it's a bit parky out".

A term I hadn't heard until I met my wife, who is from just 10 miles down the road in Warrington, is 'Nesh'. Meaning someone who is always cold. As in "Make sure you turn the heating up before Aunty June arrives, you know she's nesh".

I got introduced to a lot of old Lancashire slang through my Grandma who spoke a lot of broad Lancashire dialect. Hypocritically, if us grandkids uttered any of those words she'd clips us round the ear and tell us off for "Talking Broad".

Some examples of words she used.

Steers - Stairs
Wayter - Water
Essole - The space under the coal fire where the ash dropped. We think this meant "Ash Hole".

We used to listen to the album Deep Lancashire which had songs by the likes of the Oldham Tinkers, Mike Harding and Bernard Wrigley.
https://www.mikeharding.co.uk/recordings/deep-lancashire/
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Essole. That's what we call Swifty.
 
Mr. Banooka said:
A term I hadn't heard until I met my wife, who is from just 10 miles down the road in Warrington, is 'Nesh'. Meaning someone who is always cold. As in "Make sure you turn the heating up before Aunty June arrives, you know she's nesh".
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When the word was deployed against me, as a kid, I took it to mean wimpish but it was always in the context of feeling the cold, so maybe this more precise definition is better.

Anyone ever get called "nesh" for anything else? :thought:
 
Erinaceus said:
I wonder when Inuit-style parka hooded coats first appeared in Britain? Did someone start talking about being a bit parky, meaning it was cold enough to wear their parka?
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No - that’s one of the dismissed explanations as is cockney rhyming slang & anything to do with Michael Parkinson.
 
escargot said:
Where did you learn that? :chuckle:
The song was written by Alex Glasgow in 1970. Definitely ha'penny.
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I have a vague feeling it was on something like the Good Old Days. Sung by someone like Danny la Rue.

But that could be a load of old bobbins!
 
‘Going back to square one’

People have various theories for the origin of this - from here

BBC radio football commentaries - pitch divided into sections to describe where the play was - goal area was square one.
Snakes & Ladders
Hopscotch

But first citation seems to be 1952 from UK publication the Economic Journal:

"He has the problem of maintaining the interest of the reader who is always being sent back to square one in a sort of intellectual game of snakes and ladders."
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So younger than you might think.
 
hunck said:
‘Going back to square one’

People have various theories for the origin of this - from here

BBC radio football commentaries - pitch divided into sections to describe where the play was - goal area was square one.
Snakes & Ladders
Hopscotch

But first citation seems to be 1952 from UK publication the Economic Journal:



So younger than you might think.
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How about this for a theory. . .
Had a thought that maybe it's far older than thought, maybe?
I thought about the phrase 'back to square one,' then had the notion that it may at one time have been a reference to the first squares that are placed on a map?
Found this old map as one of the first, and bingo - it has faint squares placed on it, and thought it could well be something to do with a journey - land, or sea, that the person using the map to direct themselves finds themself wandering, and realises that they are quite literally back to square one? "Seems a logical bit of reasoning to me."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portolan_chart
 
Sid said:
How about this for a theory. . .
Had a thought that maybe it's far older than thought, maybe?
I thought about the phrase 'back to square one,' then had the notion that it may at one time have been a reference to the first squares that are placed on a map?
Found this old map as one of the first, and bingo - it has faint squares placed on it, and thought it could well be something to do with a journey - land, or sea, that the person using the map to direct themselves finds themself wandering, and realises that they are quite literally back to square one? "Seems a logical bit of reasoning to me."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portolan_chart
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It’s another theory but there’s no mention in print before 1952..
 
JamesWhitehead said:
When the word was deployed against me, as a kid, I took it to mean wimpish but it was always in the context of feeling the cold, so maybe this more precise definition is better.

Anyone ever get called "nesh" for anything else? :thought:
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And round here, 'nesh' does mean wimpish or soft. 'A nesh, southern softie' is often levelled against me! But yes, it does tend to be applied when someone complains about feeling the cold - but it doesn't mean you're cold, you're soft for feeling it. Round here the men wear vests and shorts all year round.
 
catseye said:
Parky and nesh are common parlance in North Yorkshire too.

As we'd come under the Danelaw, I wonder if there's anything Norse about it? We still have words like 'greet' (meaning to cry) which are apparently from Danish, so perhaps these words were imported too.
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This reminds me of something I've posted on another thread:

As a Northerner I have a tendency to use ta (for the informal thank you), without even thinking about it. Also, round here, ta is pronounced with a harder A, so it comes out a little more like tap without the P, than it does like tar.

I've worked in Scandinavia a few times - and I've done this in places like Copenhagen and Malmo and Oslo and been told by the person I've unconsciously used ta with - that, no, it's tak (or takk or tack), because that's what they've thought I've been trying to say.

So this makes me wonder if ta is actually connected to the Scandinavian languages via the Viking settlements. It makes some kind of sense, because some of the other derivations I've seen don't look very satisfying (although, admittedly, I haven't done the most thorough of searches); even the usually awesome and thorough Chambers has it down as, [Imit of baby talk] - which, quite frankly, looks a bit ridiculous.
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