Leg Idioms

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

Leg in a cricketing sense probably began in the earliest days when cricket was played, thought to be in the 16th century. Although there is also the phrase ‘to take leg bail’ found in 1774, which had no connection with cricket but slang for running away.

Leg referring to furniture is not used before 1670s.

Legs in clothes are not recorded as such before the 1570s.

Nobody had a leg up until 1837.

Last leg, first leg, referred to parts of a journey, became popular during the 1920s. Prior to that it referred to a a run made on a single tack when sailing into the wind and more often said to be a long leg or a short leg.

Shake a leg may mean to rise from one’s bed today, but in 1869 you would be expected to dance.

On one’s last legs is a phrase first seen in the 1590s.

Leg work is first recorded in 1891, and originally applied exclusively to news reporters.

Leg room only came into use in 1846.

Leg warmers are not seen before 1974.

Leg man has one meaning today, but when first recorded in 1923 it described an assistant who was the more mobile of the two.

Bootleg is used to refer to unauthorized recordings in the modern era, but when was first used in the 1630s it referred to the upper part of the boot, and as a reference to illegal alcohol in 1889.

Blacklegs were originally swindlers in the 1770s, and not until 1865 was it used to refer to strike breakers.

Dogleg was chosen to describe the bent shape from 1843, but earlier the term dog legged described a staircase without a well hole and consists of two flights with or without winders.

Rabbits!

As the first of the month falls on a Sunday, I recall my childhood and being asked if my first words that morning had been "Rabbits" or, should the first of the month be a Sunday, "White rabbits". I was told doing so would invite good fortune, although in retrospect it was more likely to be a way of warding off the reverse.

I have since learned few differentiate between the 1st on a Sunday or when it falls on any other day of the week. Most use one or the other at all times. However this has not helped to uncover the origins. The phrase, at least as it is today, cannot have existed prior to the fourteenth century as until then the animal was known as a cony. Indeed even the introduction of 'rabbit' was initially only used for their young, as evidenced by the 1398 translation where John de Trevisa wrote: "Conynges bringeth forthe many rabettes and multiplieth ful swithe (breed like rabbits)". Later we find Edward Topsell writing in 1607 in The Historie of the Foure Footed Beastes: "If two males be out to one female, they fight fiercely; but they will not hurt the rabbets". It was shortly afterwards that the term applied to adults too.

The saying is first seen in print in 1922, where it is said if the first words out of your mouth on the morning of the first "Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit" a present will arrive before the month has ended. However there seems to be several references to the superstition from around 1800, and in several different English-speaking nations.

Perhaps this will remain as mysterious as the origins of the lucky rabbit's foot, although we cannot rule out the two having something in common. It should be pointed out that it is rather odd that the rabbit be considered so lucky when the other lagomorph, the hare, is seemingly associated with more superstition and folklore than any other other British mammal.