Face Idioms

Several words have found themselves used in a number of phrases. We looked at 'touch' last time and this time it's 'face'.

Face to face is from as early as the 14th century. This seems odd looking back as, aside from a handwritten letter or a messenger, it was the only means of communication.

Face time appeared as an application on 24 June 2010. The expression came from 20 years earlier, when it meant exactly the same as 'face to face' did. Again, this seems odd for the application is designed to enable two people to chat and see one another without having to be in the same place.

To lose face dates from 1835, a translation of the Chinese tu lien.

To show one's face or put in an appearance dates back as far as the middle of the 14th century.

To make a face, and in the sense of showing disgust or disapproval (not gurning!), is found documented in 1560.

Two faces under one hood is from the middle of the 15th century. Having now fallen out of use, it suggested duplicity.

Face lift, and while nobody had a face lift before 1934, face-lifting is documented from 1922. This is another example of a process, and thus the verb, become a noun.

Face plates did not offer any protection under than name before 1874, prior to that they covered the face and this face plate is simply a guard over something.

Face value originated as a reference to stocks, shares and banknotes and is first attested in 1842.

Face card, otherwise known as a court card, are the King, Queen, Jack in a pack of plying cards. Not known as such until 1826, the name is somewhat inaccurate as three cards (jack of spades, jack of hearts, and king of diamonds) are shown in profile and thus not 'facing' us.

Face off, used in hockey and also lacrosse, is used in a sporting sense from 1867. As this is the means to start (or restart) a contest, it is thought to have a link to stand-off, where the two sides are facing one another without yet competing.

Facebook began online in 2004, but the term existed rather earlier. In 1983, it referred to a directory of college students where names and head and shoulders images of students was made available to help students remember their colleagues.

Po-faced is used to mean 'without expression' and dates from 1934. This can be taken back further to 1893, and a word which is rarely heard today and when 'po' was a dialect pronunciation of 'poor'.

Barefaced, as an adjective, is used to mean 'unconcealed' - we use this today in combinations such as 'barefaced lies' or 'barefaced cheek'. In its earliest appearances it was used to mean 'face uncovered, unshaven' and thus in its most literal sense.

Health and Safety

Monday 19th June 1854 must have started out as a normal working day for John Hudson. On reaching the Shire Hall at Stafford he climbed the scaffolding as usual and was returning to where he had finished work two days earlier. He failed.

Moments later, having slipped through an opening in the scaffolding, he was falling back toward the ground. Such a fall would have been unlikely to have killed him, for this was no great height. Furthermore, his fall was broken by the window sill of the floor below. Hudson bounced off the sill, which threw him away from the building and he landed on the iron railings surrounding the building.

Unfortunately the decorative iron railings were topped by spikes and he landed on one. The spike entered one side of his face through the upper jaw and exited on the other side, just below his eye. Taken to Stafford Infirmary he survived to tell the tale and return to work.

In October 1968, almost fifty years ago, a damp and misty autumnal morning at Yardley Grammar School in Birmingham saw one pupil looking out for his best chum whose late appearance was highly unusual. By stepping up and standing on the low wall, this highly intelligent 12-year-old could peer over the top of the school railings and look along the street for his absent friend. He slipped. A railing impacted his face and he was concerned that there was a rather bad scratch across his most handsome face. He was mistaken.

The spike had actually entered the fleshy part of his face below the jawline and as he attempted to lower himself to the ground, had only succeeded in pushing it further into his face and exiting through the cheek. Luckily he managed to pull himself back up to where he had been standing on the wall and effectively lift his face back off the spike. Thinking now might be a good time to seek medical treatment, he sauntered off to the medical room where a mirror revealed two holes in the righthand side of his face and shortly afterwards an ambulance raced him to hospital. Doctors sewed him back together with, what he then thought, an impressive 39 stitches and then reported back to his parents how the railing had missed the artery by just a fifth of an inch (5mm to we youngsters).