No strings attached

[haukehaien]

(language geek mode on)

It seems unlikely that the origin of "no strings attached" comes from the world of tailors; the meaning they attach to the phrase ("No flaws") is not the same as it's common meaning ("No obligation"). The American Dialect Society's discussion list found usage of the phrase in the 1890s, referring to politicians who were not controlled by outside interests. (http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi...l&D=0&P=12219). The usage appears to come from the idea of a marionette or puppet being controlled by its strings. This seems more likely than the meaning tailors have for it.

Golf certainly does not come from "Gentlemen only, ladies forbidden" - there are no examples of acronymic origins for words that predate the 20th Century. Golf can be dated to at least 1547, when James II forbade "gouf" playing as causing his subjects to neglect their archery practice. (It should be noted that early manuscripts spell it in a number of ways - gouf, golf, gowf, gowff, and so on - which should make it obvious that the word is not an acronym.) (http://www.scottishgolfhistory.net/o...golf_sites.htm)

"Sleep tight" could possibly have something to do with mattresses, but there's no evidence for it. "Tight" is well-attested as meaning "well" or "soundly" in English at least since the 1800s; it seems a bit much to go looking for another meaning. Eric Partridge traced it back to the late 19th or early 20th Centuries, but thought that it might have been older. (http://www.word-detective.com/back-b2.html#tight)

The OED gives a date of mid-16th century for "Honeymoon", in Richard Huloet's Abecedarium Anglico-Latinum, a Latin-English dictionary published in ~1546. (This would seem to negate Babylonian origins of the word.) Huloet says that it refers to the sweetness of new love, which wanes away, just like the moon. "Hony mone, a term proverbially applied to such as be newly married, which will not fall out at the first, but thone loveth the other at the beginning excedingly, the likelyhood of their exceadinge love appearing to aswage, ye which time the vulgar people call the hony mone." (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/honeymoon)

"Mind your P's and Q's" may very well have come from pub tabs. Other etymologies include pupils being told to mind p's and q's as they learn to write, since the lower-case versions of these letters are (somewhat) similar. Either one makes sense, and without evidence, there's probably no way to tell. (http://www.takeourword.com/Issue053.html)

"Wet your whistle" doesn't come from whistling mugs; the term "whistle" has been used since at least the 1600s to mean "throat". ("Let’s have no pitty, for if you do, here’s that shall cut your whistle." from The Coxcomb, a play written by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher in 1612.) (http://books.google.com/books?vid=OC...&lpg=RA7-PA282)
The term seems to have existed even earlier; in the Towneley Mysteries manuscript, dating from 1386, we see "Had She oones Wett Hyr Whystyll She couth Syng full clere Hyr pater noster." (http://www.archive.org/details/towne...erie03surtuoft)

In general, beware of any etymology that doesn't cite sources, especially if it's being passed by email; it's almost certainly wrong.

(language geek mode off)

[Beertigger]

(language geek mode on)


"Mind your P's and Q's" may very well have come from pub tabs. Other etymologies include pupils being told to mind p's and q's as they learn to write, since the lower-case versions of these letters are (somewhat) similar. Either one makes sense, and without evidence, there's probably no way to tell. (http://www.takeourword.com/Issue053.html)


In general, beware of any etymology that doesn't cite sources, especially if it's being passed by email; it's almost certainly wrong.

(language geek mode off)

This language geek would concur with most of your cites; excepting the p's and q's.

The phrase comes from a typesetter's admonition to not make mistakes. When handsetting lead type, it's quite easy to mix up similar-looking letterforms, since you're looking a the letter in reverse. P's and Q's, in lowercase (p and q) are hard to tell apart (q and p in reverse...).

Crossing my t's,

[macwilkin]

I've always heard that "sleep tight" refers to rope beds, and having to tighten the ropes so one will not "sag" to the floor.

Regards,

Todd

[haukehaien]

This language geek would concur with most of your cites; excepting the p's and q's.

The phrase comes from a typesetter's admonition to not make mistakes. When handsetting lead type, it's quite easy to mix up similar-looking letterforms, since you're looking a the letter in reverse. P's and Q's, in lowercase (p and q) are hard to tell apart (q and p in reverse...).

That one is also quite possible, and makes a certain amount of sense. The major problem with determining any origin for the phrase is that we don't have any contemporary references for its origin; it just starts cropping up in the mid 1700s, as though it sprang fully-formed from Zeus' head (as good an explanation as any.) Unless someone comes across some usage that shows more clearly the original source of the phrase, I suspect that all we'll be able to do is guess at probabilities.

Todd: the trouble with that idea of the origin is that there are no references to it; early usages of the term postdate the general use of rope mattresses. The claim that the phrase originates with those appears to have originated with guides at places like Colonial Williamsburg; the researchers I've read on the topic mention that museum guides are the only places they've run across the rope mattress claim. At the same time, the usage of "tight" to mean "soundly" or "fully" is well-attested from the time that we first begin to see the phrase, which (to my mind) makes it less likely that it comes from anything else. It's a good story, though.