Where the phrases actually came from.

On the whole; generally speaking.

Origin A 17th-century sailing phrase — a ship that sailed well "by" (close to the wind) and "large" (with the wind behind it) was seaworthy in every condition. Compressed into general use by 1700.

Open, honest, with nothing concealed.

Origin Card-sharps hid cards under the table ("board"). Keeping hands *above board* meant no cheating. 17th-century, but the maritime "board" (the deck) gives it a second life in sailing contexts.

Very drunk.

Origin On a ship, a "sheet" is a rope controlling a sail. If three sheets are loose, the sails flap uncontrollably and the vessel staggers. The metaphor transferred to drunkenness by the 1820s.

Startled; caught unexpectedly.

Origin When a sudden wind shift pinned a square-rigged ship's sails flat against the mast, it was "taken aback" — briefly halted. 18th-century sailor slang; figurative by the 1840s.

Learning how a new job or system works.

Origin A sailing ship had dozens of ropes — each with a specific function. A new sailor had to *learn the ropes* before being useful. The figurative use spread to office life in the 20th century.

Stranded; left without help.

Origin A ship left on a beach by the receding tide — too high on the sand and too dry to move — is stuck until the tide returns. The figurative "abandoned" sense dates to the 1820s.

Rapidly; in large quantities.

Origin Sailors climbed rigging by hauling one hand over the other ("hand over hand") — a continuous, fast motion. "Fist" replaced "hand" in the 19th century. The money sense (earning rapidly) is American, 1820s.

An unpredictable person who causes damage to their own side.

Origin Ship's guns weighed tons and were secured with ropes — a gun that broke loose in a storm careened around the deck, wrecking everything. Figurative by the 1890s after Victor Hugo's *Ninety-Three* (1874).

Sustain you until something better arrives.

Origin When a ship was becalmed, sailors would let the tide carry it along until the wind returned. "Tide" as a verb meaning "carry" is now obsolete outside this phrase. 1820s.

Ease the initial awkwardness of a social encounter.

Origin Shakespeare used it in *The Taming of the Shrew* (c. 1590) — "and if you break the ice, and do this feat" — building on an earlier image of ice-breaker ships clearing a way for those behind.

A hopeless, pointless pursuit.

Origin Coined in *Romeo and Juliet* (c. 1595) — originally a type of horse race that followed an erratic lead rider, the way wild geese follow a leader. The "pointless pursuit" sense is later.

Scant consolation; reassurance that barely helps.

Origin Appears in *King John* (c. 1596) and *The Taming of the Shrew*. Shakespeare didn't invent "cold" as "unwelcome," but he popularised the pairing.

Show your emotions openly.

Origin From Iago in *Othello* (c. 1604) — "I will wear my heart upon my sleeve / For daws to peck at." Possibly refers to knights tying a lady's token to their sleeve in a joust.

A result that is obvious in advance.

Origin Othello (c. 1604): "But this denoted a foregone conclusion." Shakespeare used it more ambiguously — "a thing already done" — than the modern "obvious outcome," which is 18th-century.

Unambiguously, decisively dead.

Origin Pre-dates Shakespeare (Langland used it in 1350s *Piers Plowman*), but Shakespeare normalised it in *Henry IV, Part 2*. A "doornail" was a large-headed nail on a door — driven flat and clinched on the other side, so it couldn't be reused.

In a difficult situation.

Origin Shakespeare, *The Tempest* (1611): "How camest thou in this pickle?" Dutch "in de pekel zitten" (sit in brine) may be the older source; either way, Shakespeare pinned it down in English.

An unmistakable sign of coming disaster.

Origin Daniel 5 — a hand appears and writes on the palace wall during Belshazzar's feast; the message foretells the fall of Babylon that same night. The phrase entered English by 1720.

Barely; with almost no margin.

Origin Job 19:20 — "I am escaped with the skin of my teeth." Literally nonsensical (teeth have no skin), which is the point: an impossibly thin margin.

A negligible amount relative to what's needed.

Origin Isaiah 40:15 — "Behold, the nations are as a drop of a bucket." Carried into English by the King James Version (1611) and widespread by the 18th century.

Make more effort than is required.

Origin Matthew 5:41 — "whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain." Roman soldiers could legally make civilians carry their kit one mile; the Sermon on the Mount counsels volunteering a second.

A fundamentally decent, honest person.

Origin Matthew 5:13 — "Ye are the salt of the earth." The original image is that salt preserves and gives flavour; the "decent working person" connotation is a 19th-century English gloss.

Retributive justice; proportional retaliation.

Origin Exodus 21:24 — "eye for eye, tooth for tooth." The Code of Hammurabi (c. 1750 BCE) contains an earlier version; scholars agree the Mosaic code was actually a *limit* on retaliation, not a mandate.

A minor flaw that spoils something otherwise excellent.

Origin Ecclesiastes 10:1 — "Dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savour." Shortened in English by 1700.

Give up; concede defeat.

Origin A boxer's corner throws a towel into the ring to signal surrender. Replaces the earlier "throw up the sponge" (same idea, different cloth). Standardised by the early 1900s.

Unfair; hitting where it shouldn't hurt.

Origin The Marquess of Queensberry Rules (1867) banned punches below the belt. The figurative use — unethical attacks in argument — appeared within a decade.

Rescued at the last possible moment.

Origin The bell ending a boxing round saves a fighter about to be knocked out. A persistent folk etymology links it to graveyard "safety coffin" bells — charming, but not the real source.

Hold back; avoid full force.

Origin A boxer "pulling" a punch strikes softer than their full power — useful in sparring, suspicious in a real bout. The figurative "be overly cautious in criticism" sense dates to the 1930s.

Close to defeat; in serious trouble.

Origin A boxer backed against the ring ropes has nowhere to retreat and is absorbing full punches. Figurative by the 1960s, especially in US political writing.

Dazed, disoriented.

Origin Dr Harrison Martland's 1928 paper *Punch Drunk* in JAMA described the neurological damage of repeated blows — the clinical term that's now replaced by CTE. The general "dazed" sense entered English immediately.

Impatient, eager to start.

Origin A racehorse chews ("champs") the bit in its mouth when keyed up before a race. "Chomping at the bit" — the common modern form — is an eggcorn that most dictionaries now accept.

An unexpected contender.

Origin English racing slang from the 1830s — a horse whose form was kept "dark" (unknown) to betting markets, used to manipulate odds. The political sense (unexpected candidate) arose in US politics by 1844.

Old; past one's prime.

Origin Horses' gums recede with age, making the teeth look longer. The phrase began as a practical way to check a horse's age at sale — which is also why you "don't look a gift horse in the mouth."

From an authoritative primary source.

Origin Racing tipsters claimed inside info "from the horse's mouth" — meaning they'd heard directly from the stable, not via secondhand rumour. 1920s English racing slang.

Retired from active service.

Origin Working horses whose useful days were over were grazed in a pasture rather than worked. Figurative use — for retiring executives — dates to the 1920s American business press.

Caught in the act, with evidence visible.

Origin Scots law from the 1400s — a poacher caught with blood still on his hands could be convicted on the spot, without further evidence. Sir Walter Scott popularised it in *Ivanhoe* (1819).

A decision has been made; the outcome is now out of your hands.

Origin Julius Caesar, crossing the Rubicon in 49 BCE — "alea iacta est." He quoted the Greek playwright Menander. The original image is of a thrown die rolling — the roll has started and cannot be stopped.

Fixed, unchangeable.

Origin From the practice of inscribing laws on stone — the Mosaic tablets, Hammurabi's code, grave markers. Unlike ink or wax, stone engraving can't be amended. Figurative use from the 1890s.

Shift responsibility to someone else.

Origin From poker — a marker (originally a buckhorn knife) placed in front of the dealer passed around the table with the deal. President Truman's desk sign — "The buck stops here" — made the idiom famous.

Make peace.

Origin Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) peace ceremonies involved literally burying weapons as a sign of reconciliation. Recorded by English colonists in the 1680s; figurative by the 1750s.

Good luck — said to performers before a show.

Origin Theatre superstition: wishing good luck directly is thought to invite the opposite. The phrase is early 20th-century American; its folk etymologies (John Wilkes Booth, the "leg line" of curtains) are retrofits.

Outshine the main performers.

Origin American vaudeville slang from the 1920s — a supporting act who drew more applause than the headliner was said to "steal" the show. Quickly figurative.

Capital / small letters.

Origin Printing presses stored capital letters in the upper drawer ("case") and small letters in the lower one. The compositor reached up for caps and down for minuscules. The drawers are gone; the names stayed.

A fixed, oversimplified image of a group.

Origin From Greek *stereos* (solid) + *typos* (mould) — originally an 18th-century printing plate used to print the same text over and over. The figurative use — a rigid mental template — comes from journalist Walter Lippmann in 1922.

A contrived plot resolution.

Origin Greek theatre: an actor playing a god was lowered onto stage by a crane (*mēkhanē*) to resolve the plot. Aristotle already disapproved in the *Poetics* (c. 335 BCE).

Perform with exaggerated, attention-seeking emotion.

Origin From "ham actor" — American theatre slang from the 1880s, possibly from "hamfatter" (a clumsy minstrel who used ham fat to remove makeup). The overacting sense stabilised by 1920.

A brief, promising start that leads to nothing.

Origin From flintlock muskets — the priming powder in the firing pan could ignite ("flash") without setting off the main charge in the barrel, wasting the shot. The kitchen-pan folk etymology is wrong.

Something very easy.

Origin American slang from the 1930s; the RAF picked it up during WWII to describe an easy mission. Possibly linked to "cakewalk" — a competitive plantation dance where the winner received a cake.

Treat with scepticism.

Origin Pliny the Elder, first century CE — describing an antidote said to be effective when swallowed *cum grano salis* (with a grain of salt) to make it palatable. The scepticism sense dates to 17th-century English translation.

Earn a living for the family.

Origin Probably from English village fairs where men wrestled for prize pigs; reinforced by the Dunmow Flitch (a tradition of awarding bacon to faithful married couples, attested since 1104). Modern use: US, early 1900s.

The very best of a group.

Origin Dairy metaphor — cream rises to the top of unhomogenised milk. The rhyming form "cream of the crop" is 19th-century American; earlier forms just said "the cream."