Fish Idioms

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

Fish out of water is first seen around 1750.

Nobody was said to drink like a fish until 1744.

We have had other fish to fry since the 1650s.

Fish-eye, a type of lens, is first recorded in 1961.

Fish and chips made its debut in 1876.

Fish-fingers first appeared in 1962.

Fishing boats are seen for the first time in 1732, although they had obviously existed for millennia.

Fishing rods are recorded from the 1550s.

Fishing poles are seen from 1791.

Fish stories have been told since 1819, these being highly exaggerated.

Fish hooks must have used for a long time, although not described as such until the late 14th century.

Fish food is first mentioned in 1860 when it referred to fish eaten by humans as food. Three years later and we find the first reference to food fed to fish.

Nobody described their aquarium as a fish tank until 1921.m

Goldfish have been known as such since the 1690s.

Fishnet has been, from prehistory, something used to catch fish. Since 1881 used to refer to a stitch resembling that seen in a net, and since 1912 a reference to women’s attire.

Fishmongers are first referred to as such in the middle of the 15th century.

Fishbowls make their debut in 1850.

Fishwife, used in an unkind sense to mean simply ‘woman’, is seen from the 1520s – an alternative, which fell out of favour rather soon after, was fish-fag.

Fishponds have been around since the middle of the 15th century, although these will have been for food fish rather than ornamental.

We have been overfishing since 1813.

Panfish, that is a fish of grew the right size to fit in a pan for cooking, is first described in 1814.

Flatfish, not a species but those which appear flat, are first described in 1710.

Jellyfish may be among the oldest lifeforms on the planet, but nobody called them that until 1796. By 1883 the term described someone of weak character.

Fishy, as in ‘questionable’, is an adverb first seen in the late 15th century.

Gold Idioms

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

The gold rush is first recorded in 1859.

The first gold medal for a winner was awarded in 1757.

Gold records were first awarded in 1948. Apparently it was awarded to Frankie Laine for his recording of That’s My Desire, it having sold a million copies. Remembering these were 78rpm recordings, a million pressings would represent over 98 tons in weight, around 15 African elephants.

Gold leaf is first recorded in 1727.

The metal was extracted from what was named as a gold mine for the first time in the late 15th century, and the phrase was later used to describe anything producing great wealth in 1882.

One who looks for gold in the ground is described as a gold digger in 1816, then 99 years later we find the phrase used to describe someone using their situation purely for financial gain.

The marigold, as in the flower, is first named as such in the late 14th century, prior to that it was known simply as a ‘golde’.

Goldfish are first described as such in the 1690s when they were first imported from China.

Goldfish bowl, a situation where a person has no privacy, is first used in 1935.

Goldilocks first appears in the Three Bears story in 1837 (in Robert Southey’s collection called The Doctor), but from 1540 it was used to describe a person with bright yellow hair, and from 1570 was another name for the buttercup.

A goldsmith, one who works in the metal, is first seen in Saxon times.