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word histories
“AD FONTES!”
Erstellt: 2023-01
word histories
“AD FONTES!”
ALPHABETICAL INDEX
A – B – C – D – E – F – G – H – I – J – K – L – M – N – O – P – Q – R – S – T – U – V – W – X – Y – Z – numerals – miscellany
numeralsmiscellany
- 999
- a 19th-century document on English phrases
- 19th-century nicknames for London newspapers
- Eating in the Romance languages
- French pig idioms
- Galloglossia
- The language of domination
- On biblical translations: “what is lacking” vs. “the number of fools”
- On errors in the Oxford English Dictionary
- Our lunatic contributor
- The meaning of ‘temptation’ in the Lord’s Prayer
- ‘Wuthering Heights’
- a/an (indefinite article)
- A1
- a bad quarter of an hour
- a baker’s dozen
- a bastard on Father’s Day
- abdabs, or habdabs (to give somebody the (screaming) abdabs, or habdabs)
- a bit of crackling
- a bit tight under the arms
- above board
- above/below the salt
- a box of birds
- Absurdistan
- a bull in a china shop
- ACAB (all coppers are bastards)
- a calf’s head is best hot
- a car crash in slow motion
- a cat may look at a king
- accident (an accident waiting to happen)
- accidents will happen in the best-regulated families
- according to Cocker
- according to Gunter
- according to Hoyle
- ache
- a Chinaman’s chance
- a chip on one’s shoulder
- a cold day in hell
- a cold day in July
- to act one’s age, and not one’s shoe size
- actress (as the actress said to the bishop – as the bishop said to the actress)
- a cup of tea, a Bex and a good lie down
- Adam and Eve (to believe)
- adder (deaf as an adder)
- admirable Crichton
- ado
- adorkable
- a dose of salts
- adultescent
- aerial ping-pong
- a far cry
- a fart in a spacesuit
- a fly in the ointment
- a foot in both camps
- a fox in a forest fire
- after the Lord Mayor’s Show (comes the dung-cart)
- Aga saga
- age (to act one’s age, and not one’s shoe size)
- age before beauty
- agony aunt – agony column
- a grape on the business
- a green, or hot, Christmas, or winter, makes a fat churchyard
- ailurophile
- aisle (to have people rolling in the aisles)
- a Jap on Anzac Day
- Ajax
- alar(u)ms and excursions
- Alas! my poor brother
- Albany doctor
- albatross (an albatross around one’s neck)
- Albion
- alcoholiday
- a legend in one’s (own) lifetime
- a legend in one’s (own) lunchtime
- Alexandra curl
- Alexandra limp
- a little bird told me
- alive and kicking
- alive and well (and living in ——)
- all behind, like a cow’s tail
- all chiefs and no Indians
- all-dancing, all-singing
- all dressed up with nowhere to go
- all duck or no dinner
- All-Hallown Summer
- all hat and no cattle
- all Lombard Street to a China orange
- all mouth and (no) trousers
- all my eye and Betty Martin
- all of a tiswas
- all one’s Christmases come at once
- all over bar the shouting
- all over the place like a mad woman’s [+ noun]
- all over the shop
- all right, you heard a seal bark
- all roads lead to Rome
- (all) round the houses
- all-singing, all-dancing
- all Sir Garnet
- (all) the world and his wife
- all wool and a yard wide
- a load of cobblers
- alone
- a long streak of pelican shit
- a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do
- a memory like a sieve
- (as) American as apple pie
- am I bovvered?
- a mind like a sieve
- a millstone round someone’s neck
- amour fou
- to amputate one’s mahogany
- an/a (indefinite article)
- an accident waiting to happen
- an albatross around one’s neck
- a nasty piece of work
- an axe to grind
- and not a bone in the truck
- and so to bed
- (and) the best of British luck
- an egg yesterday and a feather-duster tomorrow
- an Englishman’s home is his castle
- angel (on the side of the angels)
- Annie’s room (up in Annie’s room)
- annulaire – ring finger
- a nod is as good as a wink
- an old poacher makes the best gamekeeper
- an old Spanish custom
- another brick in the wall
- another pair of shoes
- the answer to a maidens’ prayer
- the ant’s pants
- antwacky
- any man who hates children and dogs can’t be all bad
- anyone for tennis?
- anything for a quiet life
- anything for a quiet wife
- Apache (member of a North-American people – violent street ruffian in Paris)
- ape (to lead apes in hell)
- a penny soul never came to twopence
- a piece of work (an unpleasant person)
- a poke in the eye (with a sharp stick)
- apostrofly
- to appeal from Philip drunk to Philip sober
- the apple of one’s eye
- apple-pie (adjective: typically American in character)
- apple-pie order
- apple polisher/apple polishing
- apples (Australian usage)
- to apply the blowtorch to somebody’s belly
- (just) a pretty face
- aptonym – aptonymic – aptronym – aptronymic
- a racing dog’s bollocks
- a rat with a gold tooth
- are you decent? (sufficiently clothed to see visitors)
- arm (to chance one’s arm)
- armchair (attributive modifier)
- armed to the teeth
- army boots (your mother wears army boots)
- a Roland for an Oliver
- Arthur (not to know whether one is Arthur or Martha)
- a safe pair of hands
- (as) American as apple pie
- a sandwich short of a picnic
- as Australian as meat pie
- (as) bold as brass
- Asbomania
- (as) busy as a brickie in Beirut
- (as) busy as a one-armed bill-sticker in a gale
- (as) busy as a one-armed milker
- (as) busy as a one-armed paperhanger
- (as) busy as a one-armed taxi-driver with crabs
- (as) camp as a row of tents
- (as) cold as a stepmother’s breath
- (as) cold as charity
- (as) cold as Pharaoh’s heart
- (as) daft as a brush
- (as) dim as a Toc H lamp
- (as) dead as the (or a) dodo
- as demure as a whore at a christening
- (as) drunk as Chloe
- (as) dry as a Pommy’s towel
- (as) fit as a fiddle
- (as) fit as a mallee bull
- (as) flash as a rat with a gold tooth
- (as) fresh as a daisy
- (as) full as a goog
- (as) game as Ned Kelly
- a shag on a rock
- (as) happy as a clam
- (as) happy as a sandboy
- (as) happy as Larry
- (as) hard as Pharaoh’s heart
- (as) hot, or (as) strong, as mustard
- ashtray (as useful as an ashtray on a motorbike)
- (as) independent as a hog on ice
- (as) keen as mustard
- as lucky as the pox doctor’s clerk
- (as) mad as a cut snake
- (as) mad as a hatter
- (as) mad as a March hare
- (as) mad as a meat-ax(e)
- (as) mad as a snake – (as) mad as snakes
- as much use as a chocolate teapot
- as much use as an ashtray on a motorbike
- a snake in the grass
- a sniff of the barmaid’s apron
- a snowball’s chance (in hell)
- a spare tyre around the waistline
- asphalt jungle
- (as) poor as a church mouse
- a sprat to catch a mackerel
- as quick as greased lightning
- (as) right as a trivet
- (as) savage as a meat-ax(e)
- as scarce as pork chops in a Jewish boarding house
- as scarce as rocking-horse manure
- (as) sick as a parrot
- (as) snug as [animal name] (in —)
- (as) sure as God made little apples
- as the actress said to the bishop
- as the bishop said to the actress
- as the blind man said (used in association with ‘see’)
- as the crow flies
- (as) thick as thieves
- (as) thick as two short planks
- a stiff upper lip
- a storm, or a tempest, in a teacup, or in a teapot
- Astroturf
- as useful as a chocolate teapot
- as useful as an ashtray on a motorbike
- (as) warm as toast
- (as) wicked as a meat-ax(e)
- a tempest, or a storm, in a teacup, or in a teapot
- a thumbnail dipped in tar
- Atlantic
- atone
- at one fell swoop
- at sixes and sevens
- at someone’s beck and call
- to attend Lilywhite’s party
- Attila ((somewhere) to the right of Attila, or of Genghis Khan)
- auld lang syne
- Aunt (The Sydney Morning Herald)
- Auntie: The Times (London newspaper) – the BBC
- Aunt Sally
- au reservoir
- Australian (the (great) Australian adjective)
- Australian (the (great) Australian salute)
- autumn-spring
- a verandah over the toy shop
- avoirdupois
- Avon’s Swan
- away with the fairies
- a wet blanket
- a whale of a (good) time
- the awkward age – l’âge ingrat
- awkward turtle
- a word in your shell-like
- axe (an axe to grind)
- baby blues
- backronym
- backroom boys
- backseat driver
- back to the drawing board
- backward in coming forward
- backwards, the way Molly went to church
- bad hair day
- a bad quarter of an hour
- bag lady
- bag of mystery
- a baker’s dozen
- bald-headed (in a rush without care or caution)
- baloney
- Bamboo Curtain
- Bananaland (Queensland) – Bananalander (Queenslander)
- banana republic
- bandwagon
- banger
- bang for the buck
- to bang like a dunny door
- bang went, or goes, sixpence
- bank (to laugh/cry all the way to the bank)
- bankster
- barbecue stopper
- Barcoo (the Barcoo salute)
- Bardolatry
- barefoot(ed) and pregnant
- bark mitzvah
- barmy
- Barney’s bull
- basket case
- basket(ful) of crabs
- a bastard on Father’s Day
- bat (to have bats in one’s belfry)
- Bath (go to Bath (and get your head shaved))
- BCGs – birth-control glasses
- to be able to talk under water (or under wet cement, under wet concrete)
- to be a far cry from
- to be all fingers and thumbs
- to be all hat and no cattle
- to be all mouth and (no) trousers
- to be all thumbs
- to be all to the mustard
- beanfeast
- beano
- to beard the lion in his den
- the Beast from the East
- to beat Banagher
- to beat the bejesus out of someone
- to beat the Dutch
- beauty sleep
- beaver (eager beaver)
- to be a box of birds
- to be barking up the wrong tree
- to be born on the wrong side of the blanket
- to be born with a silver spoon in one’s mouth
- beck (at someone’s beck and call)
- to be decent (sufficiently clothed to see visitors)
- bedlam
- bedside manner
- bee (social gathering for a specific purpose)
- bee (to have a bee in one’s bonnet)
- been there, done that (and got the T-shirt)
- been thrown out of better places than this
- beer and skittles
- beer o’clock
- beer today (and) gone tomorrow
- the bee’s knees
- beetle-crusher
- to beggar belief
- before one can say Jack Robinson
- begging bowl (appeal for financial help)
- behind, like a cow’s tail
- behind the eight ball
- to be in a cleft stick
- bejesus
- to be left holding, or carrying, the baby
- belief (to beggar belief)
- to belittle
- to bell the cat
- below/above the salt
- belt and braces – belt and suspenders
- to be mustard
- Benjamin’s mess – Benjamin’s portion
- to be not so green as one is cabbage-looking
- to be on hand like a sore thumb
- to be on the blanket
- to be part and parcel of
- to be past one’s sell-by date
- to be saved by the bell – être sauvé par le gong
- best bib and tucker
- (and) the best of British luck
- the best thing since sliced bread
- to be the mustard
- better dead than red – better red than dead
- better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick
- Betty Martin (all my eye and Betty Martin)
- between a rock and a hard place
- between the devil and the deep blue sea
- betwixt and between
- to be unable to run a whelk stall
- beyond the pale
- bib and tucker (one’s best bib and tucker)
- Big Ben
- big girl’s blouse
- big hat—no cattle
- the big smoke
- bijou
- bikini
- Bill (black, or dark, over Bill’s, or Will’s, mother’s)
- bimbette
- bingo (the (great) god Bingo)
- bingo wings
- bird (a little bird told me)
- bird (to get the bird)
- (the) birds and (the) bees (the facts about sexual reproduction)
- bird’s-eye view
- birth-control glasses
- biscuit (to take the biscuit)
- bishop (as the bishop said to the actress – as the actress said to the bishop)
- the bitch goddess
- to bite the bullet
- black, or dark, over Bill’s, or Will’s, mother’s
- black sheep
- blackboard jungle
- blanket
- blanket finish
- blarney
- blind date
- blind eye (to turn a blind eye)
- blind Freddy
- blind man (‘said the blind man’ and variants used in association with ‘see’)
- blind scouse
- blonde moment
- blood (someone’s blood is worth bottling)
- blood, sweat, and tears
- blood wagon
- Bloody Mary (cocktail)
- Bloody Mary (unnamed precursors of the cocktail)
- Bloomsday – Bloom’s day
- blotto
- to blow a raspberry
- blowtorch (to apply the blowtorch to somebody’s belly)
- blue (out of the blue)
- blue-arsed fly (like a blue-arsed fly)
- blue Monday
- blue moon
- blues
- blue sky and hot air
- blue-sky research
- blue-sky talk
- blurb
- board (above board)
- bobby
- bob’s your uncle
- Boche
- bodkin (a person wedged between others)
- to bogart
- to boggle (the mind boggles)
- (as) bold as brass
- bollocks (the dog’s bollocks – the bollocks)
- boloney
- bomb (to go (down) like a bomb – to go down a bomb)
- Bombay duck
- Bondi (like a Bondi tram)
- bone (to make no bones about something)
- bone-box
- bone idle
- bonfire
- bonkers
- boo (wouldn’t say boo to a goose)
- boob tuber
- boodle (the whole boodle)
- the books won’t freeze
- boots under the bed
- born in a barn/a field/a sawmill/a tent
- born on the wrong side of the blanket
- born with a silver spoon in one’s mouth
- bothsideism – bothsidesism
- bottle episode – bottle show
- boudoir bandicoot
- boustrophedon
- bovver (am I bovvered?)
- bovver boy
- to bow (down) in the house of Rimmon
- bowler (hat) ((return to) civilian life)
- Box and Cox
- box and dice
- Boxing Day
- a box of birds
- box of dominoes
- box of ivories
- boy (to send a boy to do a man’s work)
- boycott
- boy meets girl
- boys in the backroom
- boys will be boys
- brass (to bring [someone or something] (right) down to the brass)
- brass (to come (right) down to the brass)
- brass monkey (extremely cold weather)
- brass tacks (to come, or to get, down to brass tacks [early instances])
- brass tacks (to come, or to get, down to brass tacks [hypothesis as to the origin])
- bread (to have one’s bread buttered for life)
- bread (it’s no bread and butter of mine)
- bread (to know on which side one’s bread is buttered)
- bread (to want one’s bread buttered on both sides)
- bread-and-butter letter
- bread and circuses
- bread and roses
- bread-artist
- breadline
- to break a butterfly on a wheel
- breakfast (call me anything, so long as you don’t call me late to breakfast)
- to break one’s duck
- to break the ice
- breastaurant
- breath (don’t hold your breath)
- brewery (couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery)
- Brexit
- brick (to drop a brick)
- bright-eyed and bushy-tailed
- to bring [someone or something] (right) down to the brass
- to bring home the bacon
- to bring [someone or something] (right) down to the brass
- Bristol (shipshape and Bristol fashion)
- Briticism
- brolly hop
- brothel-creepers
- brown bomber
- Brownie (Girl Scout or Girl Guide)
- brownie point
- brunch
- Brylcreem Boy
- Buckley’s (chance)
- budget
- budgie smugglers
- Buggin’s turn
- Bugs Bunny (eagle at the top of the Australian-American Memorial in Canberra)
- bull (like a bull in a china shop)
- bullamacow
- bulldozer
- bully
- bullycide
- bums on seats
- Bunburying
- bunny boiler
- burnsides
- to burn the midnight oil
- buroo (on the buroo)
- burton (to go for a burton)
- to bury one’s head in the sand
- bus (to miss the bus)
- bush telegraph
- (as) busy as a brickie in Beirut
- (as) busy as a one-armed bill-sticker in a gale
- (as) busy as a one-armed milker
- (as) busy as a one-armed paperhanger
- (as) busy as a one-armed taxi-driver with crabs
- the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker
- buttered (to have one’s bread buttered for life)
- buttered (to know on which side one’s bread is buttered)
- buttered (to want one’s bread buttered on both sides)
- butterfingered – butterfingers
- butterflies in one’s stomach
- butterfly
- butterfly kiss
- to button-hold – to buttonhole
- butty (sandwich – slice of bread spread with butter)
- to buy a pig in a poke
- by a long chalk
- by hook or by crook
- by the skin of one’s teeth
- cabbage (to be not so green as one is cabbage-looking)
- cab off the rank
- caboodle (the whole caboodle)
- cackleberry
- cahoot
- cake (to take the cake)
- cake (you can’t have your cake and eat it)
- cakeage
- calf’s head is best hot – calves’ heads are best hot
- to call a spade a spade
- calligram
- call me anything, so long as you don’t call me late to dinner
- (as) camp as, or camper than, a row of tents
- can a moose crochet?
- canary in the coal mine
- can eat an apple through a picket fence
- cannon (loose cannon)
- cannon fodder
- can talk under water (or under wet cement, under wet concrete)
- cap-a-pie
- caper (to cut a caper)
- cappuccino
- capsize
- captcha
- Capuchin
- a car crash in slow motion
- car-crash television
- carrot and stick
- to carry coals to Newcastle
- (to be left) to carry the baby
- castle (an Englishman’s home is his castle)
- castles in Spain/in the air
- to cast nasturtiums on, or at
- cat (a cat may look at a king)
- cat (to let the cat out of the bag)
- cat (like a cat on hot bricks)
- cat (like a cat on a hot tin roof)
- cat (to look like something the cat has brought in)
- cat (no room to swing a cat)
- cat (not a cat in hell’s chance)
- cat (to see which way the cat jumps)
- the Cat-and-Mouse Act
- cat mitzvah
- cat-o’-nine-tails
- cats and dogs, to rain (authentic origin)– part 1
- cats and dogs, to rain (hypothesis as to the origin) part 2
- the cat’s whiskers
- caught in the headlights
- caviar to the general
- chain-smoker
- chair à canon
- chalk (by a long chalk)
- champagne socialism – champagne socialist
- to chance one’s arm
- chance would be a fine thing
- to change horses in midstream/while crossing a stream
- chardonnay socialism – chardonnay socialist
- to charge like the Light Brigade
- charity ((as) cold as charity)
- charity dame – charity moll
- charley horse
- to chase the dragon
- Château-la-Pompe
- Château Plonk
- chateau tap-water
- chav
- cheese – fromage
- cherchez la femme
- Cheshire cat (to grin like a Cheshire cat)
- chestnut (old chestnut – marronnier)
- to chew nails and spit rust
- chicken-and-egg
- chief (too many chiefs and not enough Indians)
- Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office
- chillax
- China orange (all Lombard Street to a China orange)
- Chinaman (he must have killed a Chinaman)
- a Chinaman’s chance
- Chinese burn
- a chip on one’s shoulder
- chocolate teapot (as much use as a chocolate teapot)
- choke, chicken: more are hatching
- chook (may your chooks turn into emus and kick your dunny down)
- to chop and change
- Christmas grip – Christmas hold
- Christmas Truce of 1914
- church ain’t out ’till the fat lady sings, ’till the singing is over
- church mouse ((as) poor as a church mouse)
- churchyard (a green, or hot, Christmas, or winter, makes a fat churchyard)
- churchyard cough
- churchyard luck
- ciao
- cicerone
- clam ((as) happy as a clam)
- clanger (to drop a clanger)
- Clapham (the man on the Clapham omnibus)
- the Clapham Sect
- clapper (like the clappers)
- claptrap
- cleanliness is next to godliness
- the clean potato
- cleft stick
- clew
- cloak
- cloak-and-dagger
- clock
- cloud (every cloud has a silver lining)
- cloud-cuckoo-land
- clover (in clover, i.e., in ease and luxury)
- clue
- to clutch the pearls
- coals (to carry coals to Newcastle)
- cobbler (let the cobbler stick to his last)
- cobblers (rhyming slang for ‘balls’, i.e., ‘testicles’, hence ‘nonsense’)
- cock-a-hoop
- to cock a snook
- cock-and-bull story
- cocked hat, to knock into a
- Cocker, according to
- cockle (to warm the cockles of one’s heart)
- cockney
- coconut (black) (Australian Aborigine who has ‘betrayed’ his identity)
- codswallop
- Coggeshall job
- coil (this mortal coil)
- (as) cold as a stepmother’s breath
- (as) cold as charity
- (as) cold as Pharaoh’s heart
- cold call
- cold comfort
- a cold day in hell
- a cold day in July
- cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey
- the cold shoulder
- cold turkey (as used of a drug addict)
- Collins (letter of thanks for hospitality)
- column (one from column A (and) one from column B)
- to come a cropper
- to come a gutser
- to come, or to get, down to brass tacks (early instances)
- to come, or to get, down to brass tacks (hypothesis as to the origin)
- to come (right) down to the brass
- to come out of the woodwork
- to come (right) down to the brass
- to come to a sticky end
- to come the old soldier over someone
- to come up with the rations
- coming? so is Christmas!
- concreteberg
- concrete jungle
- conspicuous by one’s/its absence
- Continent isolated (satirical of British insularity)
- contranym
- contredanse
- contronym
- conundrum
- cookie (that’s how, or the way, the cookie crumbles)
- cookie ((that’s when) the cookie crumbled)
- cookie pusher
- cool Britannia
- cootie
- Corbynista
- corduroy
- coronation chicken
- Corrupticut
- costa (Spanish noun used in invented place names)
- couch potato
- could eat an apple through a picket fence
- couldn’t knock the skin off a rice pudding
- couldn’t lead a flock of homing pigeons
- couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery
- couldn’t punch a hole in a wet Echo
- couldn’t stop a pig (in a gate)
- couldn’t work in an iron lung
- could sell refrigerators to the Eskimos
- could talk under water (or under wet cement, under wet concrete)
- to count sheep – compter les moutons
- counter (to nail to the counter)
- to cover more ground than Burke and Wills
- coward
- cowardy, cowardy custard
- crackling (women regarded collectively as objects of sexual desire)
- to crawl out of the woodwork
- crazy bone
- crébilloner – lèche-vitrine(s) – window shopping
- credit (to give credit where credit is due)
- cretin
- Crichton, admirable
- criss-cross
- croque-madame
- croque-monsieur
- cross I win (and) pile you lose
- cross my heart (and hope to die)
- to cross the floor
- crow’s nest
- crumbs from a rich man’s table
- crumpet (sexual meanings in British English)
- crumpet (not worth a crumpet)
- cruse (widow’s cruse)
- to cry/laugh all the way to the bank
- cucumber sandwiches on the lawn
- cuff (off the cuff)
- culture vulture
- cupboard love
- a cup of tea, a Bex and a good lie down
- the cup that cheers
- curate’s egg
- curfew
- curiosity killed the cat
- curiouser and curiouser
- to curse one’s stars
- curtain lecture
- curtain-twitcher – curtain-twitching
- cut (to have one’s work cut out)
- to cut a caper
- cut and dried
- to cut both ways
- to cut off one’s nose to spite one’s face
- to cut the mustard
- to cut to the chase
- Cymru
- dadchelor party
- dad-dancing
- dad-joke
- Daily Fail, Daily Heil, Daily Wail (nicknames for the Daily Mail of London)
- daisy, (as) fresh as a
- daisies, to push up
- damn, not to give a tinker’s
- damnall at Blackall
- (you’re) damned if you do and damned if you don’t
- dandelion
- dandy
- dark, or black, over Bill’s, or Will’s, mother’s
- day (the day’s (only) a pup)
- daylight robbery
- dead (— is dead but won’t lie down)
- dead and never called me mother
- dead man’s shoes, to wait for
- deadline
- dementia Americana
- devil (between the devil and the deep blue sea)
- devil (the devil to pay)
- Dickless Tracy
- Dicky’s meadow, in
- dictionary (to have swallowed a dictionary)
- different ships, different long splices
- different strokes for different folks
- (as) dim as a Toc H lamp
- dine and dash
- dinner (call me anything, so long as you don’t call me late to dinner)
- dinnyhayser
- Disgusted
- to do a Dame Nellie – to do a Melba
- doesn’t buy (the) groceries
- to doff
- dog mitzvah
- dog’s letter, the
- dole, on the
- dolly (up to dolly’s wax)
- domino (figurative uses)
- domino-box
- to don
- done up like a pox doctor’s clerk
- donkey
- donkey’s years
- don’t argue (the straight-arm fend-off in rugby)
- don’t do anything I wouldn’t
- don’t hold your breath
- don’t laugh—your daughter may be inside
- don’t look a gift horse in the mouth
- don’t spoil the ship for a ha’p’orth of tar
- dook (the hand or fist)
- doolally
- doona day
- Dorothy Dix (Australian politics)
- dose (like a dose of salts)
- Double Pay (i.e., Double Bay, in Sydney, Australia)
- down the back of the sofa
- down the river, to sell
- down the side of the sofa
- dozen, a baker’s
- dozen, thirteen to the
- drawing board, back to the
- dressed to the nines
- Dr. Greenfield (to worship under Dr. Greenfield)
- to drink the Kool-Aid
- to drive pigs (to market)
- to drop something or somebody like a hot potato
- (as) drunk as Chloe
- (as) dry as a Pommy’s towel
- duck (to break one’s duck)
- ducks on the pond
- dumb bunny
- to dumbsize
- dunny (in Australian phrases)
- duration, for the
- Dutching
- duvet day
- eager beaver
- early door(s) (early admission to a theatrical performance)
- early doors (near the beginning)
- earthling
- earworm
- to eat humble pie
- to eat the calf in the cow’s belly
- eavesdrop
- eggs, to teach one’s grandmother to suck
- eight ball (behind the eight ball)
- eighth wonder of the world
- elbow grease
- eligible bachelor
- ember months
- Emma Chisit
- the Emmaville Express
- enemy (How goes the enemy?)
- Energizer bunny
- English as she is spoke
- an Englishman’s home is his castle
- enemy within, the
- esprit d’escalier
- even ash
- even a stopped clock is right twice a day
- even paranoids have enemies
- every cloud has a silver lining
- every Preston Guild
- everything but the kitchen sink
- everything’s apples
- everything’s wrong in Wollongong
- Eve-teaser – Eve-teasing
- excuse-me dance
- excuse my French
- to extract the urine
- to extract the Michael
- eye (all my eye and Betty Martin)
- eyes, to pull the wool over someone’s
- face, to cut off one’s nose to spite one’s
- fag end
- fair-weather friend
- to fall off the turnip truck
- false dawn
- famous for fifteen minutes
- fang-farrier
- Fanny Adams – Harriet Lane
- far from the madding crowd
- a fart in a spacesuit
- fatberg
- fat churchyard (a green, or hot, Christmas, or winter, makes a fat churchyard)
- father (is your father a glazier?)
- fat lady (church ain’t out, the opera ain’t over, until the fat lady sings)
- fawn
- feather-duster (an egg yesterday and a feather-duster tomorrow)
- fed up
- fedora
- feeding time at the zoo
- to feel like a bastard on Father’s Day
- fell swoop, at one
- feminophobia – femiphobia
- femme, cherchez la
- fetus
- fiddle, (as) fit as a
- field bishop
- fifteen minutes, famous for
- fifth column
- to fight like Kilkenny cats
- to fight one’s way out of a paper bag
- figures won’t lie, but liars will figure
- Fiji uncle
- (fingernails) in mourning for the cat
- fire (to set the Thames on fire)
- first catch your hare
- (as) fit as a fiddle
- (as) fit as a mallee bull
- five o’clock shadow
- (as) flash as a rat with a gold tooth
- flat out like a lizard drinking
- flea market
- flexible friend (i.e. credit card)
- flexitarian
- flirt
- to fly a kite
- fly-by-night
- a fly in the ointment
- fly-tipping
- foaled of an acorn, a horse that was
- fog in Channel—Continent isolated
- foie gras
- food for powder
- foolometer
- for the duration
- the forbidden fruit
- forelock, to take time by the
- forlorn hope
- for show and not for blow
- forty winks
- four-leaf, or four-leaved, clover
- the fourth estate
- fox (a fox in a forest fire)
- Franglais
- Franken-
- Frankenstein food
- Frankenstein’s monster
- freedom fries
- Fremantle doctor
- French, excuse my
- French hours
- French kiss
- French leave
- (as) fresh as a daisy
- frightener (to put the frighteners on somebody)
- frog (to have a frog in one’s throat)
- Froggy
- to frog-march
- frogspawn (tapioca pudding)
- fromage – cheese
- from hero to zero
- from marbles to manslaughter
- from pillar to post
- from soup to nuts
- from the horse’s mouth, straight
- from zero to hero
- front (more front than)
- fudge factor
- (as) full as a goog
- full monty
- funny bone
- the funny things you see when you haven’t got your gun
- further back, or further behind, than Walla Walla
- galaxy
- gallery, to play to the
- (as) game as Ned Kelly
- garbage in, garbage out
- garbageologist – garbageology
- garbologist (refuse collector)
- garbology (refuse collection)
- garters, to have someone’s guts for
- gas and gaiters
- gauntlet, to run the
- gavroche
- gazette
- geek
- General February/Fevrier
- General January/Janvier
- General Winter
- Georgium Sidus
- get inside and pull the blinds down
- get on your bike
- to get off, or out, at Redfern, at Gateshead, etc. (to practise coitus interruptus)
- to get the bird
- gianduja
- gift horse (don’t look a gift horse in the mouth)
- giggle-house
- GIGO (garbage in, garbage out)
- gigolo
- ginger group
- gippy tummy
- girls will be girls
- to give a poke in the eye (with a — stick)
- to give a raspberry
- not to give a tinker’s damn
- to give credit where credit is due
- to give someone furiously to think
- to give the little lady a (great) big hand
- glad and sorry (hire purchase)
- Glasgow kiss
- glazier (is your father a glazier?)
- globaloney
- glutton for punishment
- to go (and) jump in(to) the lake
- to go ballistic
- gobsmacked
- Goddam (an Englishman)
- God help those who are caught helping themselves
- to go down a bomb – to go (down) like a bomb
- to go down like a lead balloon
- God slot
- godwottery
- to go for the jugular
- to go from hero to zero
- to go from zero to hero
- to go haywire
- to go home in an ambulance
- golf widow
- go to Bath (and get your head shaved)
- gone to Gowings
- good field, no hit
- to go postal
- gone on the padre’s bike
- gongoozler
- goose, wouldn’t say boo to a
- gooseberry, to play
- to go over like a lead balloon
- Gorgeous Wrecks
- gorilla dust
- gory details
- gossip
- got a feed at the Tweed
- to go to Lilywhite’s party
- to go to Specsavers
- got the arse at Bulli Pass
- government stroke
- Granny (The Sydney Morning Herald)
- granny-bashing – granny-battering
- a grape on the business
- grasshopper (a tourist, Australia)
- grass widow
- grass widower
- Grauniad
- grease monkey
- the (great) Australian adjective
- the (great) Australian salute
- green (to be not so green as one is cabbage-looking)
- a green, or hot, Christmas, or winter, makes a fat churchyard
- Greenfield (to sleep in Mother Greenfield’s (lodgings) – to worship under Dr. Greenfield)
- green fingers
- green thumb
- Greek (it’s (all) Greek to me)
- grey meanie
- grimalkin
- to grin like a Cheshire cat
- grog
- grotty
- Guardianista
- Gundy (no good to Gundy)
- Gunter (according to Gunter)
- guts (to have someone’s guts for garters)
- gutser
- guy
- gyppy tummy
- hail-fellow-well-met
- hair (keep your hair on)
- hair of the dog
- hairy dog
- hairy eyeball
- hairy goat
- halcyon
- half seas over
- the Ham and Egg Parade
- ham-fisted – ham-handed
- Hamlet without the Prince
- hand (the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand’s doing)
- handbag (verb)
- handbags at ten paces
- hand of glory
- happy as a bastard on Father’s Day
- (as) happy as a clam
- (as) happy as a sandboy
- happy little Vegemite
- (as) hard as Pharaoh’s heart
- hardy annual
- hare (first catch your hare)
- Harriet Lane – Fanny Adams
- hash (to make a hash of something)
- hash (to settle someone’s hash)
- hat trick
- hatter, (as) mad as a
- to have a bee in one’s bonnet
- to have a foot in both camps
- to have a frog in one’s throat
- to have a person’s name on it
- to have a tiger by the tail
- to have bats in one’s belfry
- to have both oars in the water
- to have butterflies in one’s stomach
- to have death adders in one’s pocket
- to have got sand in one’s shoes
- to have passed one’s sell-by date
- to have someone’s guts for garters
- to have someone’s name on it
- to have swallowed a dictionary
- to have two left feet, or, two left hands
- haywire, to go
- headless chicken
- heads I win (and) tails you lose
- to heap Pelion upon Ossa
- heart (to warm the cockles of one’s heart)
- heart of hearts
- heart of oak
- Heavens to Betsy
- hell (to lead apes in hell)
- hell (not a cat in hell’s chance)
- hell hath no fury like a woman scorned
- hell is paved with good intentions
- “Hell!” said the duchess
- hellzapoppin’
- helpmate
- Hesperus (like the wreck of the Hesperus)
- hewer of wood and drawer of water
- to hide the salami
- to hide the sausage
- hikikomori
- Hobson’s choice
- Hogs Norton
- hold (don’t hold your breath)
- holier-than-thou
- Hollywood ending
- home (an Englishman’s home is his castle)
- home (away) from home
- home is where the heart is
- home, James (and don’t spare the horses)
- honest Injun
- honeymoon
- hooligan
- Hooray Henry
- hope your rabbit dies
- horror stretch
- a horse that was foaled of an acorn
- horse (to change/swap horses in midstream/while crossing a stream)
- horse (don’t look a gift horse in the mouth)
- horse (straight from the horse’s mouth)
- hospital pass
- hot (like a cat on hot bricks)
- hot (like a cat on a hot tin roof)
- hot-arsed
- a hot, or green, Christmas, or winter, makes a fat churchyard
- hot dog
- hot mess
- hovercraft
- how about a game of tennis?
- how are you off for soap?
- how goes the enemy?
- how long is a piece of string?
- Hoyle, according to
- Hughie (Australian usage)
- huile de coude (i.e., elbow grease)
- human bean
- humble pie, to eat
- humongous
- hung parliament
- I don’t care what they call me, so long as they don’t call me late to dinner
- if it should rain — (and variants, used of ill luck)
- if it’s Tuesday, this must be Belgium
- if my aunt had been a man, she would have been my uncle
- if the mountain will not come to Mahomet, Mahomet must go to the mountain
- if your aunt had been a man, she would have been your uncle
- if you want to get ahead, get a hat
- ignorance is bliss
- I hope your rabbit dies
- I’ll go to the foot of our stairs
- imbecile
- imbuggerance (absolute indifference)
- immolate
- impressionism – impressionist
- I’m talking to the butcher, not to the block
- in a cleft stick
- in a nutshell
- in Annie’s room, up
- in cahoots
- in clover (in ease and luxury)
- incunabula
- (as) independent as a hog on ice
- Indian burn
- Indian summer
- in Dicky’s meadow
- in jail at Innisfail
- in more trouble than Speed Gordon
- in mothballs
- (fingernails) in mourning for the cat
- inoperative statement
- interview without coffee
- in the grip of the grape
- in the pudding club
- in the swim
- I resemble that remark
- Irishman’s rise
- iron lung (wouldn’t work in an iron lung)
- iron maiden
- Iron Weathercock (Liz Truss)
- — is dead but won’t lie down
- I see, said the blind man
- is your father a glazier?
- itching palm
- itchy feet
- it’s (all) Greek to me
- it’s all over bar the shouting
- it’s moments like these
- it’s no bread and butter of mine
- it’s raining in London
- it takes two to tango
- it will be all right at night (theatrical phrase)
- I’ve been thrown out of better places than this
- I’ve got the time if you’ve got the inclination
- ivory-box
- ivory tower
- Jack Robinson (before one can say Jack Robinson)
- jam butty – jam sandwich (police patrol car)
- a Jap on Anzac Day
- Jenny Darby (policeman)
- jerry-builder
- Jesus boots
- Jesus Hilton
- Jimmy Woodser
- jingo
- job (that job’s jobbed)
- Joe Bloggs
- Joe Six-Pack
- Joe Soap
- Johnny Arab
- Johnny Canuck
- Johnny Crapaud
- Johnny Darm (policeman)
- Johnny Foreigner
- Johnny Onions
- jolly hockey stick(s)
- Joneses, to keep up with the
- jot – tittle
- to judge a book by its cover
- to jump one’s horse over the bar
- to jump the queue
- jump up whitefellow
- (just) a pretty face
- to kangaroo (to receive or to give kangaroo care)
- kangaroo care
- kangaroo visit
- Kathleen Mavourneen
- to keep an ear to the ground
- to keep the bastards honest
- to keep up with the Joneses
- keep your eye on the sparrow
- keep your hair on
- keep your shirt on
- Kensington Gore (artificial blood)
- kettle of fish, a pretty
- keytar
- to kick the bucket
- kidnap
- kidney, of that
- kidult
- Kilkenny cats
- Kilroy (early instances)
- Kilroy (origin?)
- Kindertransport
- King (to take the (King’s/Queen’s) shilling)
- King Charles’s head
- kingdom come
- kippers and curtains
- kiss cam
- kissing-trap
- kitchen sink, everything but the
- kite, to fly a
- knife-and-forker – knife-and-fork man
- knight in shining armour
- to knock into a cocked hat
- to knock the skin off a rice pudding
- to know one’s onions
- knuckle-butty – knuckle-sandwich
- kompromat
- Kruschen (that, or the, Kruschen feeling)
- kunlangeta
- Lady Blamey
- lager lout
- the land of fruits and nuts
- land of Nod
- to lark about
- last, to stick to one’s
- La Stupenda
- to laugh like a drain
- to lead apes in hell
- lead balloon
- lead in one’s pencil
- leather and prunella
- leave, French
- to leave in the lurch
- to leave no stone unturned
- the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand’s doing
- leg, to pull someone’s
- to let the cat out of the bag
- let the cobbler stick to his last
- lettuce
- to lick into shape
- lightbulb moment
- like a Bondi tram
- like a cat on hot bricks
- like a cat on a hot tin roof
- like a country dunny
- like a deer caught in the headlights
- like a dose of salts
- like a dunny in a desert
- like a headless chicken
- like a pork chop in a synagogue
- like a rabbit caught in the headlights
- like a red rag to a bull
- like a stunned mullet
- like a twisted sandshoe
- like billy-o
- like death warmed up
- like one o’clock
- like pulling teeth
- like the back (end) of a bus
- like the wreck of the Hesperus
- like watching paint dry
- Lilywhite’s party
- limerence
- limousine liberal
- Linus blanket
- the (little) man in the boat
- little man, you’ve had a busy day
- little old ladies in tennis shoes
- little rabbits have big ears
- to live on the smell of an oil rag
- liver, to wash the milk off one’s
- Liverpool gentleman (as opposed to Manchester man)
- Liverpool pantile (sea-biscuit)
- Liverpudlian
- lobster
- loco-foco
- locust
- all Lombard Street to a China orange
- Londongrad
- London to a brick
- a long streak of pelican shit
- to look like a pox doctor’s clerk
- to look like something the cat has brought in
- look (mum, or ma), no hands!
- loony bin
- loony doctor
- loose cannon
- lorem ipsum
- to lose one’s marbles
- to lose the dressing room
- love (no love lost)
- lower than a snake’s belly
- low man on the totem (pole)
- lucky as a bastard on Father’s Day
- lupus
- lurch, to leave in the
- Lushington
- MacGyver
- Maconochie
- (as) mad as a cut snake
- (as) mad as a hatter
- (as) mad as a March hare
- (as) mad as a meat-ax(e)
- (as) mad as a snake – (as) mad as snakes
- Madchester
- madding crowd, far from the
- madeleine
- mad money
- magpiety
- mahogany (to amputate one’s mahogany)
- mahogany reef
- mahogany ridge
- maiden’s prayer, the answer to
- to make a better door than (a) window
- to make a hash of something
- to make a spoon or spoil a horn
- to make a Virginia fence
- to make (both) ends meet
- to make no bones about something
- to make one’s marble(s) good
- Malabar Hilton
- Mallaby-Deeley
- Malley’s cow
- Mamamouchi
- MAMIL
- Manchester man (as opposed to Liverpool gentleman)
- man from Mars
- Manhattanhenge
- the (little) man in the boat
- the man on the Clapham omnibus
- the man outside Hoyt’s
- a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do
- marbles, to lose one’s
- March hare, (as) mad as a
- mardy
- mare nostrum
- marines, tell that to the
- Marquis of Queensberry (rules)
- marronnier – old chestnut
- marrowsky
- Martha (not to know whether one is Arthur or Martha)
- martini lunch
- maudlin
- mauley (the hand or fist)
- mauldy
- Maundy
- Mayday
- mayonnaise
- may your chooks turn into emus and kick your dunny down
- may your rabbits die
- meat (one man’s meat is another man’s poison)
- meat and two veg
- a memory like a sieve
- men in buckram
- the men in (the) white coats
- merrythought – wishbone
- mess of pottage
- Mexican standoff
- mice and men, of
- midinette
- midnight oil, to burn the
- might find a berth in Perth
- milk (to wash the milk off one’s liver)
- milliner
- million (as a magic number)
- a millstone round someone’s neck
- milquetoast
- a mind like a sieve
- Mintie
- Miss – Ms
- Miss Otis regrets
- to miss the bus
- Moab
- mockumentary
- molly (in molly-dook, molly-handed, etc.)
- Mondayitis
- money for old rope
- monkey (to put [something] where the monkey put(s) the nuts)
- Monsieur Crapaud
- Montezuma’s Revenge
- moon, once in a blue
- moon, over the
- moonraker
- moonshine
- more camp than a row of tents
- more front than (early Australian uses)
- more front than (British and Irish uses)
- more hide than Jessie
- morning, noon and night
- moron
- Morrison hour
- mortal coil, this
- Morton’s forkMother Carey’s chicken
- mothball (in/out of mothballs)
- Mother Carey’s chicken
- Mother Greenfield’s (lodgings)
- motherhood and apple pie
- Mothering Sunday
- mother’s ruin
- mouseburger
- mouser
- Mr – Mrs
- Mr Fixit
- Mr Nice Guy
- Mr Plod (policeman)
- Mrs Grundy
- Ms (combination of Mrs and Miss)
- Mummerset
- must have killed a Chinaman
- muttons, to return to one’s
- my (giddy, sainted, etc.) aunt!
- myrmidon
- my stars and garters!
- mystery bag
- Nacht und Nebel
- to nail one’s colours to the mast
- nail, on the
- to nail (to the counter)
- to name and shame
- nanny state
- nasty piece of work
- neatnik
- neck and crop
- neck of the woods
- neighbour(s) from hell
- neither fish nor fowl
- Nelson (until/when Nelson gets his eye back)
- nice but dim
- night (the night’s (only) a pup)
- nightcap
- nincompoopiana
- Nine-nine-nine
- nines, dressed to the
- the nineteenth hole
- no bread and butter of mine
- nod (a nod is as good as a wink)
- Noddy suit
- no feedin’ at Eden
- no good to Gundy
- no joy without alloy/annoy
- no love lost
- no lucre at Echuca
- no man’s land
- nom de —
- nom de disc
- no more Mr Nice Guy
- no names, no pack drill
- no room to swing a cat
- nose (to cut off one’s nose to spite one’s face)
- nose, to pay through the
- nosey parker
- not a bone in the truck
- not a cat in hell’s chance
- nothingburger
- not just a pretty face
- not the only pebble on the beach
- not the sharpest —— in the ——
- not to be able to fight one’s way out of a paper bag
- not to be able to [verb] for toffee
- not to be just a pretty face
- not to have two yachts, or Rolls-Royces, to rub together
- not to know whether one is Arthur or Martha
- not worth a crumpet
- nul points
- nuppence
- nutshell, in a
- off one’s trolley
- of mice and men
- of that kidney
- oil on troubled waters, to pour
- ointment, a fly in the
- old chestnut – marronnier
- old school tie
- old soldier (to come the old soldier over someone)
- Oliver (a Roland for an Oliver)
- omelette
- OMG
- omnibus (the man on the Clapham omnibus)
- omnishambles
- once in a blue moon
- one for show and one for blow
- one from column A (and) one from column B
- one fell swoop, at
- one flash and you’re ash
- one for the road – stirrup cup
- one man’s meat is another man’s poison
- one may as well have the game as the name
- one’s best bib and tucker
- one’s trumpeter is dead
- one swallow does not make a summer
- onion (to know one’s onions)
- Onion Johnny
- the only game in town
- on the blanket
- on the buroo
- on the dole
- on the nail
- on the pig’s back
- on the side of the angels
- on the spur of the moment
- on the wrong side of the tracks
- oojah
- oojah-cum-spiff
- oojamaflip
- open and shet, sign o’ more wet
- to open the kimono
- opera (the opera ain’t over until the fat lady sings)
- orange (all Lombard Street to a China orange)
- ordeal
- the order of the bootout of one’s skull
- Ossa (to pile Pelion upon Ossa)
- to out-Herod Herod
- out of mothballs
- out of the blue
- outside the box
- to out-Zola Zola
- overpaid, overdressed, oversexed and over here
- over the moon
- over the top
- owlhoot
- Oxford comma
- oxygen
- oxymoron
- oyster, the world is one’s
- padoodle
- padre (gone on the padre’s bike)
- to paint the Forth Bridge
- to paint the map red, or pink
- to paint the town red
- pale, beyond the
- panda (pedestrian crossing)
- panda (police patrol car)
- pandemonium
- panier de crabes
- panjandrum
- pan-loafy
- pantile (flat cake or biscuit – sea-biscuit)
- paparazzi
- paper bag (not to be able to fight one’s way out of a paper bag)
- paper tiger
- paper yabber
- paranoid (even paranoids have enemies)
- paraphernalia
- Paris syndrome
- parlour (attributive modifier)
- parlour patriot
- parlour socialist | parlour socialism
- parson’s week
- part and parcel
- Parthian shot
- parting shot
- passion-killer
- to pass the parcel
- pastiche – pastis
- the patter of tiny feet
- Paul Pry
- to pay through the nose
- PC Plod (policeman)
- peaceable kingdom
- pebble (the only pebble on the beach)
- pedigree
- peeping Tom
- Pelion (to pile Pelion upon Ossa)
- pen (the pen is mightier than the sword)
- penny (the penny dropped)
- a penny soul never came to twopence
- permacrisis
- person from Porlock
- pester power
- the Pest from the West
- Peter Grievous
- petrichor
- Pharaoh’s Revenge
- Philip (to appeal from Philip drunk to Philip sober)
- philtrum
- piano player in a brothel
- Piccadilly window
- picnic
- picnic (a sandwich short of a picnic)
- piece of work (unpleasant person)
- pig (to buy a pig in a poke)
- pig (to sweat like a pig)
- pig in a python
- pigs might fly
- pigeon à la crapaudine – toad-in-the-hole
- to pile Pelion upon Ossa
- pillar to post, from
- pineapple, the rough end of the
- pink
- pink on the map
- pin-up girl
- pip (to squeeze until the pips squeak)
- pipe dream
- piping hot
- Pip, Squeak and Wilfred
- pizza face (a person with facial acne)
- place in the sun
- plain vanilla
- to play a good knife and fork
- to play gooseberry
- to (play) hide the salami
- to (play) hide the sausage
- to play possum
- to play to the gallery
- please the pigs
- Plod (policeman)
- plonk (cheap inferior wine)
- plot (the plot thickens)
- plus-fours and no breakfast
- poacher turned gamekeeper
- pogue
- point-blank
- poison (one man’s meat is another man’s poison)
- the politics of the warm inner glow
- Pollyanna
- poodle-faker
- Pooh-Bah
- (as) poor as a church mouse
- to pop one’s clogs
- pork pie – porky pie – porky (rhyming slang for ‘lie’)
- port – starboard
- posh
- postal, to go
- postcode (used attributively)
- potato-box
- potato-jaw
- potato-trap
- POTUS
- poulet
- pound-noteish
- pour encourager les autres
- to pour oil on troubled waters
- powfagged
- pox doctor’s clerk
- pregnant
- pregnant and barefoot(ed)
- the proof of the pudding is in the eating
- prosecco socialist
- prunes and prism(s)
- P’s and Q’s
- public enemy number one
- pudding (in the pudding club)
- pudding (the proof of the pudding is in the eating)
- to pull one’s socks up
- to pull out all the stops
- to pull someone’s leg
- to pull the wool over someone’s eyes
- pumpkinification
- to punch a hole in a wet Echo
- pup (the night’s (only) a pup)
- pup, to sell a
- to push up daisies
- pussy’s bow (up to pussy’s bow)
- put a sock in it
- to put a tiger in one’s tank
- to put on one’s thinking cap
- to put [something] where the monkey put(s) the nuts
- to put the cat among the pigeons
- to put the frighteners on somebody
- to put the toothpaste back in the tube
- Queen (to take the (King’s/Queen’s) shilling)
- Queen Anne front and Mary Ann back
- Queen Anne is dead
- Queen Anne’s fan
- Queen Elizabeth is dead
- Queensberry rules
- Queensland (the Queensland salute)
- queue-jump
- (in) quick sticks
- quiz
- (white) rabbit(s) (good-luck incantation)
- Rachmanism
- rainbow (the end of the rainbow)
- to rain cats and dogs – part 1
- to rain cats and dogs – part 2
- to rain stair rods
- ranz-des-vaches
- raspberry (rude sound made by blowing with the tongue between the lips)
- a rat with a gold tooth
- rat (to smell a rat)
- razor gang
- to read the riot act
- real George
- the real Simon Pure
- to recharge one’s batteries
- red, to paint the town
- red herring
- red-light district
- red on the map
- red rag to a bull
- Red Sea pedestrian
- red top
- to reinvent the wheel
- reseda
- to return to one’s muttons
- rhesus
- rhubarb (theatrical term + denoting ‘nonsense’)
- rice pudding (couldn’t knock the skin off a rice pudding)
- Richard’s himself again
- Richard Snary
- to ride shotgun
- rift in the lute
- (as) right as a trivet
- the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand’s doing
- ring finger – annulaire
- riot act, to read the
- river, to sell down the
- river, to send up the
- roaring forties
- robot
- to rob Peter to pay Paul
- rocking-chair job
- rocking-chair money
- rocking horse (as scarce as rocking-horse manure)
- Roland (a Roland for an Oliver)
- Roman holiday
- roost, to rule the
- rose-coloured spectacles
- rosinback
- rôti sans pareil – turducken
- Rotten row
- the rough end of the pineapple
- royal we
- Ruby Murray (curry)
- rugby, racing and beer
- —— rule(s) OK
- to rule the roost
- to run like a hairy goat
- to run the gauntlet
- to sack
- sæva indignatio
- a safe pair of hands
- said the blind man (used in association with ‘see’)
- Sally, Aunt
- sandboy, (as) happy as a
- sandwich
- sandwich (a sandwich short of a picnic)
- sanglier
- sauce (what’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander)
- (as) savage as a meat-ax(e)
- to save the day
- saved by the bell – sauvé par le gong
- savoury duck
- say boo to a goose, wouldn’t
- to say prunes
- scarlet letter
- schoolgirl complexion
- Scouse
- Scousette
- Scout’s honour
- sea (between the devil and the deep blue sea)
- season
- to see a man about a dog
- see that’s wet, see that’s dry
- to see which way the cat jumps
- see you later, agitator
- segocia
- to sell a pup
- sell-by date (to be past one’s sell-by date)
- to sell down the river
- to sell refrigerators to the Eskimos
- to sell sand in the Sahara
- to send a boy to do a man’s work
- send it down, Hughie!
- to send to Coventry
- to send up the river
- serendipity
- to set the cat among the pigeons
- to set the Thames on fire
- to settle someone’s hash
- sex and shopping
- a shag on a rock
- shambles
- Shank’s pony
- sheep, black
- shell-like (a word in your shell-like)
- shell out
- she’s apples
- shilling (to take the (King’s/Queen’s) shilling)
- ship (don’t spoil the ship for a ha’p’orth of tar)
- shipshape and Bristol fashion
- shirt (keep your shirt on)
- shiver my timbers
- Shock-headed Peter
- shoe (another pair of shoes)
- shoe (to wait for a dead man’s shoes)
- to shoot the cat
- shopaholic – shopaholism
- shoplifting
- shopping trolley (i.e., Boris Johnson)
- to shop till one drops
- short-arm inspection
- short of a —— (mentally deficient, slightly crazy)
- short shrift
- shotgun (to ride shotgun)
- shotgun wedding
- shoulder, a chip on one’s
- shoulder, the cold
- should’ve gone to Specsavers
- show a leg
- Siberian Express
- sieve (a memory, or a mind, like a sieve)
- silent like the ‘p’ in swimming
- silk (you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear)
- silver lining, every cloud has a
- silver spoon (to be born with a silver spoon in one’s mouth)
- simon-pure
- Simon says
- simples (British interjection)
- sing ’em muck
- singing milkshake
- sirloin
- sixes and sevens, at
- six-hat and fifty-shirt
- six o’clock swill
- sixty-four (thousand) dollar question
- a skeleton at the feast
- skin (by the skin of one’s teeth)
- skinflint
- skinhead
- skirt patrol
- skull (out of one’s skull)
- slapstick
- Slav – slave
- to slave over a hot stove
- to sleep in Mother Greenfield’s (lodgings)
- to sleep like a top
- Sloane Ranger
- slobber-knocker – slobber-knock
- the Slough of Despond
- sly grog
- small beer
- small potatoes
- to smell a rat
- to smoke (you’ll be smoking next)
- smoke and mirrors
- a snake in the grass
- Snary, Richard
- sneeze
- a sniff of the barmaid’s apron
- (as) snug as [animal name] (in —)
- soap (how are you off for soap?)
- soapedy
- soap (opera)
- soccer
- soccer mom
- Socceroo
- social distancing
- sock (to pull one’s socks up)
- sock (put a sock in it)
- soft Mick
- soldier (to come the old soldier over someone)
- someone’s blood is worth bottling
- something nasty in the woodshed
- (from) soup to nuts
- sow (you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear)
- Spam medal
- spare the rod and spoil the child
- a spare tyre around the waistline
- Speed Gordon (in more trouble than Speed Gordon)
- spick and span
- to spin a yarn
- spine-bash
- spit and sawdust
- to spit the dummy
- spoil (don’t spoil the ship for a ha’p’orth of tar)
- spoon (to be born with a silver spoon in one’s mouth)
- spoonerism
- sport
- a sprat to catch a mackerel
- spud
- spud-barber
- spud-bash – spud-basher – spud-bashing
- spur of the moment, on the
- Spy Wednesday
- squander-bug (British usage)
- square-eyed | square eyes
- squaw winter
- squeaky clean
- to squeeze a nickel until the Indian is riding the buffalo
- squeeze pidgin
- to squeeze until the pips squeak
- squid (you can’t tell the mind of a squid)
- squillion – squillionaire
- stalking horse
- stand and grow good
- starboard – port
- staycation
- to steal someone’s thunder
- stepmother ((as) cold as a stepmother’s breath)
- to sticker-lick – sticker-licker
- stick it up your jumper
- sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me
- to stick to one’s last
- stickybeak
- stirrup cup – one for the road
- stone (to leave no stone unturned)
- a storm, or a tempest, in a teacup, or in a teapot
- storm on Channel—Continent isolated
- straight and narrow, the
- straight from the horse’s mouth
- strawberry preacher
- Strine
- to study the history of the four kings (to play cards)
- summer of discontent
- sun (place in the sun)
- sunlit uplands
- sunstruck bone
- (as) sure as God made little apples
- svengali
- to have swallowed a dictionary
- one swallow does not make a summer
- to swap horses in midstream/while crossing a stream
- to sweat like a pig
- to sweat the small stuff
- swellegant
- swim, in the
- swoop, at one fell
- tabloid (1)
- tabloid (2)
- tace is Latin for candle
- Taffia
- take me to your leader (demand made by an extraterrestrial)
- to take one’s courage in both hands
- to take the checkered flag
- to take the (King’s/Queen’s) shilling
- to take time by the forelock
- to talk a glass eye to sleep
- to talk through (the back of) one’s neck
- tango (it takes two to tango)
- to tap the Admiral
- tar (don’t spoil the ship for a ha’p’orth of tar)
- tart
- to teach one’s grandmother to suck eggs
- Teddy boy
- teeth like stars (false teeth)
- teetotal
- teetotum
- tell that to the marines
- a tempest, or a storm, in a teacup, or in a teapot
- une tempête dans un verre d’eau
- tennis
- tennis, anyone?
- Thames (to set the Thames on fire)
- to thank one’s (lucky) stars
- thank your mother for the rabbit(s)
- that cock won’t fight
- that dog won’t hunt
- that job’s jobbed
- that Kruschen feeling
- that schoolgirl complexion
- that way madness lies
- the answer to a maiden’s prayer
- the ant’s pants
- the Barcoo salute
- the Beast from the East
- the bee’s knees
- the big smoke
- (the) birds and (the) bees (the facts about sexual reproduction)
- the books of the four kings (playing cards)
- the books won’t freeze
- the cat’s whiskers
- the Clapham Sect
- the clean potato
- the cold shoulder
- the cup that cheers
- the day’s (only) a pup
- the devil to pay
- the dog’s letter
- the eighth wonder of the world
- the Emmaville Express
- the end of the rainbow
- the enemy within
- the fat lady (church ain’t out, the opera ain’t over, until the fat lady sings)
- the first cab off the rank
- the full monty
- the funny things you see when you haven’t got your gun
- the girls are bandy at Urandangie
- the gory details
- the (great) Australian adjective
- the (great) Australian salute
- the (great) god Bingo
- the Ham and Egg Parade
- the higher the fewer (answer to why is a mouse when it spins?)
- the history of the four kings (playing cards)
- the Kruschen feeling
- the land of fruits and nuts
- the land of Nod
- the last cab off the rank
- the (little) man in the boat
- the man on the Clapham omnibus
- the man outside Hoyt’s
- the men in (the) white coats
- the morning after the night before
- the next cab off the rank
- the night’s (only) a pup
- the nineteenth hole
- the only game in town
- the only pebble on the beach
- the opera ain’t over until the fat lady sings
- the order of the boot
- the patter of tiny feet
- the pen is mightier than the sword
- the penny dropped
- the Pest from the West
- the plot thickens
- the politics of the warm inner glow
- the proof of the pudding is in the eating
- the Queensland salute
- the real Simon Pure
- there’s no work in Bourke
- (there’s) trouble at t’mill
- the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand’s doing
- the river that flows upside down (the Yarra River)
- the road to hell is paved with good intentions
- the rough end of the pineapple
- the sharpest —— in the ——
- the skin of one’s teeth
- the Slough of Despond
- the straight and narrow
- the thick plottens
- the things I’ve done for England
- the things you see when you haven’t got your gun
- the toast of the town
- the Volvo set
- the whole boodle
- the whole box and dice
- the whole caboodle
- the witching hour
- the wogs begin at Calais
- (all) the world and his wife
- the world is one’s oyster
- the wrong side of the tracks
- (as) thick as thieves
- (as) thick as two short planks
- thick (the thick plottens)
- things are crook in Muswellbrook, or in Tallarook
- things are weak at Julia Creek
- the things you see when you haven’t got your gun
- thinking cap
- to think outside the box
- thirteen to the dozen
- this mortal coil
- three-martini lunch
- three on the hook and three on the book
- thrown out of better places than this
- a thumbnail dipped in tar
- thunder, to steal someone’s
- tickety-boo
- tiger (to have a tiger by the tail)
- tiger (to put a tiger in one’s tank)
- time (to take time by the forelock)
- time flies? you cannot: they go too fast
- tinker (not to give a tinker’s damn)
- tiswas
- tit for tat
- tittle – jot
- to a T – to a tee
- toad-in-the-hole – pigeon à la crapaudine
- toast (the toast of the town)
- toast, (as) warm as
- to toe the line
- toffee (not to be able to [verb] for toffee)
- toffee-nosed
- to toilet-paper
- Tom Mix in Cement
- Tom Pepper
- Tom Tiddler’s ground
- (with) tongue in cheek
- toot sweet
- tooth fairy
- top, to sleep like a
- Torygraph (nickname for The Daily Telegraph of London)
- Tory-lite
- to toss in a blanket
- to the nines, dressed
- tough titty
- tour d’ivoire – ivory tower
- town red, to paint the
- to T.P.
- to trail one’s coat
- to treat with ignore
- trick or treat
- trigger-happy
- trolley (off one’s trolley)
- trolley-dash
- (there’s) trouble at t’mill
- trumpery
- trumpeter (one’s trumpeter is dead)
- tulip
- turban
- turducken – rôti sans pareil
- to turn a blind eye
- T.W.O.C. (taking without owner’s consent)
- two is company, three is a crowd
- two left feet, or, two left hands
- two-martini lunch
- (Yorkshire) tyke
- uncle (Fiji uncle)
- underground mutton
- underpaid, underdressed, undersexed and under Eisenhower
- une tempête dans un verre d’eau
- to unfriend
- unshirted hell
- until hell freezes over
- until Nelson gets his eye back
- up in Annie’s room
- up the river
- up to dolly’s wax
- up to pussy’s bow
- useful idiot
- useful innocent
- valentine
- vanilla sex
- Vaseline Valley
- Vatican roulette
- a verandah over the toy shop
- Vicar of Bray
- vinegar trip
- Virginia fence (to make a Virginia fence)
- virtus dormitiva
- the Volvo set
- to wait for a dead man’s shoes
- Wales
- to walk a crack – to walk one’s chalks
- Wardour-Street English
- (as) warm as toast
- to warm the cockles of one’s heart
- warts and all
- to wash the milk off one’s liver
- watching paint dry, like
- we aim to please (you aim too, please)
- to wear cotton drawers
- to wear army boots
- well, I’ll go to the foot of our stairs
- were you born in a barn/a field/a sawmill/a tent?
- wet blanket
- to wet one’s whistle
- we’ve got the time if you’ve got the inclination
- a whale of a (good) time
- what can you expect from a hog but a grunt?
- what’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander
- when Nelson gets his eye back
- when push comes to shove
- where did you get your licence?
- where’s your white stick?
- where the bugs wear clogs
- where the monkey put(s) the nuts
- where there’s muck, there’s brass
- where the rubber meets the road
- white ants
- white poppy
- (white) rabbit(s) (good-luck incantation)
- the whole boodle
- the whole caboodle
- who’s for tennis?
- who’s robbing this coach?
- who’s robbing this train?
- who’s ‘she’—the cat’s mother?
- who stole your scone?
- why is a mouse when it spins?
- (as) wicked as a meat-ax(e)
- widow’s cruse
- Will (black, or dark, over Bill’s, or Will’s, mother’s)
- william-nilliam
- windfall tax
- window
- winedot
- wink (a nod is as good as a wink)
- winter of discontent (the winter of 1978-79 in Britain)
- wishbone – merrythought
- wishful thinker – wishful thinking
- witches’ knickers
- witching hour
- Witham
- within a bull’s roar of
- without a bone in the truck
- (with) tongue in cheek
- wogs begin at Calais
- wokerati
- wood-and-water joey
- woodshed, something nasty in the
- wool (to pull the wool over someone’s eyes)
- a word in your shell-like
- the world is one’s oyster
- worm’s-eye view
- to worship under Dr. Greenfield
- wouldn’t say boo to a goose
- wouldn’t work in an iron lung
- would you buy a used, or a second-hand, car from this man?
- wreck (like the wreck of the Hesperus)
- wrong tree, to be barking up the
- Xmas
- yabber
- ye gods and little fishes
- yellow peril
- Yorkshire tyke
- you can call me anything, so long as you don’t call me late to dinner
- you can’t have your cake and eat it
- you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear
- you can’t tell the mind of a squid
- you’ll be smoking next
- (you’re) damned if you do and damned if you don’t
- you’re so sharp you’ll cut yourself
- your head’s on fire
- your mother wears army boots
- you, too, can have a body like mine
- you’ve shot your granny
- zero tolerance