Coventry:
Sent to Coventry; if someone is "sent to Coventry" then they are
shunned by their fellow citizens and friends. There are several
possible explanations for this phrase. The first comes from the English
Civil War. Birmingham was strongly Parliamentarian; the citizens were
aware of a small group of Royalists in their midst. Some of these they
killed and others they sent as prisoners to nearby Coventry, also a
Parliamentary town. Why they did this is not clear and, by being sent
to Coventry, these people were rescued. In truth they had good fortune
- their colleagues were killed. Thus, I don't like this explanation.
However, there was a notorious prisoner of war camp in Coventry where
solitary confinement (and no one to talk to) was the rule. This could
be the explanation.
The second possibility rings a little truer. In this case the citizens
of Coventry were in a phase of hating the military, possibly also as a
result of the Civil War. Such was this hate that the young women of the
town were forbidden to speak to the soldiers garrisoned there.
Naturally no soldier welcomed such a posting.
The third possibility is the one that I like best. It is suggested that
the name Coventry is derived from Covin-tree, an oak which is supposed
to have stood in front of the castle in feudal times. The tree was used
as the gallows and those to be executed were sent to the covin-tree.
A fourth possibility relates to the days of Lady Godiva and her naked
ride through the town. She did this ride in order to persuade her
husband to reduce the heavy taxes he had introduced. Such was
the gratitude of the inhabitants that they stayed indoors in silence
and did not indulge themselves in her nakedness.
Cox: To Box and Cox means to chop and change. It comes from the farce
by JM Morton (1811-1891) called Box and Cox which he adapted from the
French. In this story a deceitful lodging house lady called Mrs Bouncer
let a single room to a Mr Box; without telling him she also let the
same room to a Mr Cox. Since one worked at night and the other during
the day they never met but, I guess, there was a great deal of scheming
needed by Mrs Bouncer in order to achieve this.
Creek: To be up the creek means that you are in trouble or in an
awkward situation. The expression is a gentrified version of a WW2
saying "Up shit's creek without a paddle" which summons up a mental
picture more graphic than the current refined one.
Cropper: To come a cropper implies that there has been a tumble, either
actual or metaphorical. The saying is based on horse riding where to
fall neck and crop means that the horse has hit the ground with both
its neck and its crop; i.e. a potentially serious accident.
Cross: Criss-cross. The use of this expression implies that something
is repeatedly crossed, such as " the field is criss-crossed by cart
tracks". This meaning is very far from the original one, which truly
relates to a Cross. The spelling can be quite variable but originally
it was Chriss-cross or Christ-cross and referred to the alphabet in a
Hornbook, which had a cross like a Maltese cross at the beginning and
end. The emphasis today is more in the sense of crossing a barrier or
hurdle in an undisciplined way, not the neat and orderly manner of a
Hornbook. Incidentally, a Hornbook was a thin board about 9"x 5" with a
handle. It served as a backing for a sheet of vellum or paper on which
was written or printed the alphabet, the Lord's prayer, an exorcism or
Roman numerals. The whole was covered by a piece of transparent horn.
The handle had a hole so that it could be tied to a schoolchild's belt.
Such books were still in use in England in the 18th century.
Crows. Stone the crows. This expression is used to express amazment,
wonder, etc. - 'well, stone the crows!'. I found it difficult to find
the origin of this very British saying. However, in March 2003 in the
Q&A section of the Times, the following was offered.
"For many centuries, young children (and others) were employed as bird
scarers, especially of crows. They used whatever means were available
to frighten away the birds, hence the expression "stone the crows".
The Norfolk Labour MP, Sir George Edwards, who founded the National
Union of Land Workers, even called his autobiography, written in 1922,
"From Crow Scaring to Westminster", and there are many references in
old country accounts to "crow scaring", "crow keeping", "crow stoning"
and "rook starving". The rewards were modest - at the age of six,
Edwards was paid a shilling for a seven-day week in Norfolk. In
Gloucestershire, things were more varied - the going rate was from 6d a
day, although if you were unfortunate enough to live in Winchcombe, all
you received was 1d or 2d plus a swede.
Professor Stefan Buczacki, author, Fauna Britannica,
Stratford-upon-Avon"
Cuckoo: To be in Cloud cuckoo land implies that someone is divorced
from reality. It comes as a translation of the word Nephelococcygia the
name of an imaginary city, built in the sky by birds, and part of a 5th
century BC Greek comedy called "The Birds" written by Aristophanes.
A further insight into this phrase appeared in the Times Q&A of
14th October 2002, in response to a query about its origin:
The phrase "cloud-cuckoo-land" was coined by Rabelais (1490-1553) and
features in his extraordinary mythical chronicles Gargantua and
Pantagruel. He also had a significant knowledge of classical literature
and he published the Greek text of the Aphorisms of Hippocrates in
1532. Aristophanes' "The Birds", and the word "Nephelococcygia", might
have been known to Rabelais, but Rabelais is surely the true
originator. Geoffrey Hinton. Oxford
Cuff: To speak off the cuff means to speak spontaneously, without much
preparation. Why cuff? This comes from the habit of some after dinner
speakers making quick notes on the cuff of their stiff shirts in order
to remind themselves of some points or other that they had, perhaps,
not considered before. It was all done with virtually no preparation.
Curry: To curry favour is to seek to get into someone's good books; to
ingratiate oneself. It has absolutely nothing to do with Indian food.
The "curry" in this instance is a horse riding term for grooming or
rubbing down an animal. The "favour" is an alteration of the word
Favel. Favel was the name of the half horse, half man Centaur in the
early 14th century French satirical romance Le Roman de Fauvel. This
beast was cunning and evil and it was just as well to keep on the right
side of him. To curry him kept him in a good mood.
