Top Idioms

Several words have become part of the language in being used in phrases. Last time we looked at ‘bottom’ and now, of course, look at ‘top’.

From the top, as in from the beginning, is seen as early as the late 14th century. Whilst it may be seen as an Americanism, it can’t be because the earliest forms are before they used English and before the Europeans really knew it existed.

Top of the morning, as a greeting, is first recorded in 1843.

Top of the world has been seen since the 1670s.

Top of the line has only been used since 1950.

Off the top of one’s head is first recorded in 1939.

Top off, as in to finish, is used first in 1836; while the sense of ‘to fill up’ dates from 1917.

Nobody paid top dollar until 1942.

Top drawer, in the sense of ‘the best’, is not used before 1920.

No recording made the top ten until 1942.

Top notch has been seen since 1841, and was once used for a part in umbrella manufacture.

Nothing was top heavy before 1530; although the same phrase was used to mean ‘drunk’ around 1680.

Box tops has been used since 1937 – if you’re too young to remember, people once collected box tops (as proof of purchase) and sent them off to claim a free gift or coupon.

Nobody was described as top dog before 1868.

Top coat was the outer garment from 1804, but not used in decorating until 1959.

Top sail, a nautical term, has been known since 1400.

Roll top, a type of lid used on desks, has been seen since 1884.

Table top has only been seen since 1914.

Over the top is a World War One reference to the onset of an attack.

Treetops are unknown before the late 15th century – of course trees had them, they just weren’t described as such.

Nobody wore a top hat until 1875.

Tip top, as in excellent, is first seen in 1702.

Tank tops were not worn until 1968, but did exist earlier when they comprised the upper part of a swimsuit.

Rooftops first appeared in 1610.

Topsoil suddenly appeared in 1789.

Topknots have been described as such since 1680.

Countertops have been used since 1878.

Bottom Idioms

Several words have become part of the language in being used in phrases. Last time we looked at ‘north’ and now look at ‘bottom’.

Bottom has a couple of meanings in English today, but historically different languages have given very different meanings. For example Old English referred to botm as ‘soil, deepest part’; Old Frisian ‘soil’, Old Norse ‘ground’, Old German ‘earth’, have similar meanings. Old Irish bondreferred to ‘the sole of the shoe’; but ‘bottom’ is the meaning for Sanskrit budhanah, Avestan buna, Greek pythmen, and Latin fundus all mean ‘bottom’.

Nobody got to the bottom of the matter until 1570.

Bottom as in ‘a person’s posterior’ is not seen in English until 1794.

Bottoms up began in 1875.

Bottom dollar dates from 1857, and seen in the UK just after the First World War.

It was felt from the bottom of the heart for the first time in 1540.

Fish were described as bottom-feeders, where applicable, from 1866.

To reach the bottom of (as in to fathom, which was the earlier expression) dates from 1808.

River bottoms were unrecorded until 1752.

Rock bottom dates from 1884.

Nobody referred to this being ‘the bottom line’ until 1832.

Nothing was bottomless (such as a pit) until the early 14th century. By design nothing can actually be bottomless, but ‘very deep’ doesn’t quite cut it.

Bell-bottom trousers were first described in 1882, and enjoyed a resurgence in the 1960s thanks to the fashion choices of the era.

Black bottom was a jazz dance seen at least by 1907, and became a national craze in the USA when it appeared in a Broadway musical.

Scraping the bottom of the barrel is difficult to date as the origin really did mean getting right to the bottom as barrels were used for storing many foodstuffs. However, we do know the metaphorical use dates from the 1930s.

In baseball the phrase ‘bottom of the inning’ refers to the latter stages of the inning, and the earliest known record of that is as early as August 1730.

Smooth (or soft) as a baby’s bottom appears in the middle of the 20th century.

Bottom drawer, in use by 1866, was where young ladies would gather household items for future use as a married woman.

Bottom the house, ie to give it a thorough clean, is first seen in the early 19th century.

Trackie bottoms is a phrase which has become a part of the English language in recent years, but is unknown before about 1999.

Green Idioms

Several words have become part of the language in being used in phrases. Last time we looked at ‘yellow’ and now look at ‘green’.

Green thumb, that is one who has a natural talent for gardening, is first seen as recently as 1938.

Green-eyed monster is first recorded in Shakespeare’s Othello

Green with envy is thought be derived from the green-eyed monster.

Green around the gills is a maritime expression first seen around 1800.

The other man’s grass is always greener dates back even before Petula Clark, to the first century BC and to the Greek poet Ovid.

Green light is first used to describe approval in 1937, although red and green lights had been used for stop and go respectively since 1883 – such lights being used only at night when it was impossible to see the semaphore flags.

Greenhorn, used to describe someone inexperienced, dates from the 15th century when it was used to describe immature bulls whose horns had net to fully grow.

Greenback, a reference to US dollar, dates from the American Civil War when emergency paper currency was issued with a green back: Demand Notes in 1861-62 and United States Notes 1862-65.

Green collar worker was first used in the 1970s, although it has only become popular in the last two decades, and used to describe those who seek employment in jobs which will not unduly affect the environment.

Green cheese was originally, in the 14th century, used to describe something which was fresh or new – whether this has any link to the idea that the moon was made of green cheese is unclear.

Greenroom is first seen in 1701, presumably this room for actors who are not on stage would have been painted green.

The Etymology of World Currencies

Having looked at the etymologies of former European currencies recently, I spent most of the next day wondering about the origins of others worldwide. This is what I uncovered.

The dollar of course shares an origin with the Slovenian tolar, as discussed last time. From the former European silver coin the thaler, an abbreviation of Joachimsthaler and telling us it was first minted in Bohemia. Here thal means 'valley' and thaler 'thing or person from the valley'.

Somoans use the tala, a literal translation of 'dollar'.

Several countries use the Russian ruble, the word thought to be derived from the verb rubit meaning 'to chop'. Earlier a ruble was that chopped from an ingot of gold or silver of a certain weight.

I have always found the Albanian lek to be a most curious name so it came as quite a disappointment to find it was named for the first face to appear on the coin, that of Alexander the Great.

Algerians are paid in dinar, clearly derived from the old Roman denarius, itself from Latin deni 'containing ten'. Bahrain and Iraq also use the dinar. The denar of Macedonia shares this origin despite the different spelling.

Since independence in 1977, Angolans have used the kwanza which also happens to be the name of the major river in the country.

Argentina has the peso, clearly derived from Spanish peseta and from a Catalan word peceta meaning 'small piece'.

The Armenian dram literally translates into English as 'money', although there are suggestions this is related to the Greek drachma 'fistful'.

Azerbaijanis hope to have pockets full of manats. Manat is borrowed from moneta meaning 'coin'.

The taka is the currency in Bangladesh, taka being the Bengali word for 'money'.

The rupee, used in India and nearby nations, is from a Sanskrit word meaning either 'silver' or 'made from silver'.

The Kalahari Desert is known for its lack of rain, this arid region occupies large stretches of Botswana. Clearly rain is precious and the currency is thus called the pula, the Setswana word for 'rain'.

Brazilians have the real which means both 'royal' and 'real' in Portuguese, the coinage meaning originally the former.

Until they adopt the euro in 2013 or 2014, Bulgarians have the lev which was an early Bulgariuan word for 'lion'. Similarly the Moldovan leu also means 'lion', the same coin is used in Romania.

The People's Republic of China use a system of currency called the renminbi, literally 'the people's currency'. The basic unit is the yuan meaning 'round object' and is known colloquially as the kuai meaning 'lump'.

The Japanese yen has an identical meaning of a 'round object'.

Similarly the Korean won also speaks of itself as a 'round object'.

In Vietnam the dong is from dong tien, a direct translation meaning 'money'.

Croatians count their kuna, the name meaning 'marten' as the pelts of pine martens were the basic monetary unit in medieval times.

It was on his fourth voyage to the Americas when Christopher Columbus found what is now Costa Rica. The native Spanish name for Christopher Columbus is Cristobal Colon, which is why their unit of currency is the colon.

In the Czech Republic the koruna is one of several currencies derived from 'crown'. The Danish krone is another.

Eritrea named the nafka after the town of Nafka, the base of operations during the Eritrean War of Independence against Ethiopia.

The Ethiopian birr has the literal meaning of 'silver', prior to their introduction they had used thalers (also the origin of the dollar) and blocks of salt called 'amole tchew'.

The lari is used in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, lari being an old word denoting 'hoard, property'.

Ghanains once used cowry shells as currency, they now use coins called cedi which was also the Akan word for 'cowry shell'.

Across the Atlantic in Guatemala a very similar story is found for the quetzal, for in the Mayan culture the tail feathers of the Resplendent Quetzal were used as currency.

In Honduras and the lempira is the basic unit of currency, the name dating from the sixteenth century ruler of the indigeous Lenca culture, Cacique Lempira.

The Hungarian forint was named after Florence in Italy, where the original gold coins were minted.

Kyrgyzstan uses the som, literally meaning 'pure' and implies it was originally made from 'pure gold'.

South Africans use the rand, which takes its name from Witwatersrand, the name of the ridge of land on which Johannesburg is built. The place name describes 'the white waters ridge'.

Macau use the pataca, a name borrowed from the Portuguese reference to the Mexican dollar as the Pataca Mexicana.

Madagascar uses the ariary meaning 'silver dollar', which is divided into five iraimbilanja, a name meaning 'one iron weight'. This is one of only two currencies in the world which does not employ a decimal system.

Malawi has the kwacha, which happens to be the word for 'dawn' in both the Nyanja and Bemba languages.

In Malaysia they use the ringgit, a Malay word meaning 'jagged' for the term was originally used to describe the serated edges of the silver Spanish dollars seen here from the sixteenth century.

The evolution of the rufiyaa, the currency of the Maldives, is something of a mystery, however there can be no doubt it is from Hindi and ultimately Sanskrit words for 'silver'.

In Papua New Guinea the locals used a pearl shell as a token when trading until the introduction of the kina. This was derived from the Kuanua of the Tolai region, which was where these pearl shells were obtained.

In Poland the zloty means 'golden'.

Tajikistan use the somoni, named after the man known as the Father of the Tajik Nation, Ismail Samani whose name is also spelled Ismoil Somoni.

Tonga has the pa'anga, also the name of a vine which produces large pods with reddish-brown seeds which can be up to five centimetres in diameter.

Ukraine uses the hryvnia, which comes from the former word for the currency grivna used in the eleventh century.itself from a Slav word meaning 'mane' and probably suggesting something valuable worn around the neck.

The Euro

The euro was hardly the most imaginative name for the single European currency, although with numerous languages to take into consideration it was inevitable ever since the concept was first suggested. Despite the obvious name for the currency, it is believed the official suggestion was made in a letter to the then President of the Euopean Commission, Jacques Santer, in August 1995. That letter was written by one Germain Pirlot, a Belgian teacher of French and history.

To date the euro has replaced the national currencies of no less than twenty countries since its official debut on January 1st 1999. I was soon researching the origins of the names of those early currencies, some of which had been in existence for centuries.

The franc was common to Belgium, France, Luxembourg, and Monaco. This can be traced back to the earliest gold coins and the legend Francorum Rex 'king of the Franks'.

Similarly the lira was legal tender in Italy, the Vatican, San Marino and Malta. This word is derived from liura and ultimately from Latin libra or 'pound'. This also led to the British pound and the Irish pound or punt, and the pound of Cyprus, the latter two also replaced by the euro.

In Estonia they used the kroon, the Slovaks the koruna. Both have identical origins in meaning 'crown', for this is the image on the money. The same origin is shared by the Swedish krona, the Icelandic krona, the Danish krone, and the Danish krone.

The Portuguese escudo derives its name from the Latin scutum or 'shield'.

In Spain the peseta came from a Catalan word peceta, which is not hard to see as a 'small piece'.

The German Mark is easily seen as sharing an origin with the Finnish markka. Here an Old English or Saxon word marc is related to the Proto-German marko and all refer to 'precious metal'. To some degree the Dutch guilder has a similar meaning, the Middle Dutch adjective gulden is the basis for guilder and means 'golden'.

The Slovenian tolar comes from the former European silver coin the thaler, an abbreviation of Joachimsthaler and telling us it was first minted in Bohemia. Here thal means 'valley' and thaler 'thing or person from the valley'. This has also given us the monetary term 'dollar'.

In Greece the drachma has been used, on and off, since ancient times. The term is ultimately from the ancient Green verb drassomai meaning 'to grasp' and evolved to mean 'fistful'.

Austrians had the schilling, introduced as recently as 1924 to replace the corona. For those who remember pounds, shillings and pence it is obvious this is related to the British shilling, a monetary value which had existed since Saxon times. Indeed it is from this ancient Germanic tongue from which the term is derived. To the Saxons a scilling was an accounting term deemed to be equal to the value of a sheep anywhere in England outside of Kent, where the scilling was the value of a cow.

Being old enough to remember when European countries had their own coinage it must be said the introduction of the euro has taken away the delight of seeing fellow Brits struggling with the mental conversion to sterling when abroad. Not to mention watching them closely scrutinise every note and coin to discover its value. Priceless!