Hatchet:
When one buries the hatchet peace is made with a foe or rival. The
hatchet in this instance was one wielded by Red Indians. When they were
about to make peace with an enemy the Great Spirit required them to
smoke the Pipe of Peace and to bury all weapons until they were out of
sight.
Hatter: Mad as a hatter is a term used to describe crazy behaviour and
has a basis truly in the concept of mad hat makers. In olden days felt
and other hats were prepared with the aid of mercurous nitrate. This is
a highly toxic substance which can produce a tremoring disease similar
to Parkinson's disease. Such people were assumed to be mad. The most
famous Mad Hatter is in Lewis Caroll's "Alice in Wonderland" but the
original is thought to be the 17th century Robert Crab, an eccentric
who lived in Chesham, who gave away all his worldly goods to the poor
and lived on dock leaves and grass.
Havock or Havoc: To wreak havock means to cause confusion and possibly
death to one's enemies. The expression started out as Cry Havock an old
military cry derived from the old French havot meaning "plunder". The
cry was very common in the 14th and 15th centuries but was banned, on
pain of death, in the ninth year of Richard II's reign. The expression
is used in a number of Shakespearean plays.
Haywire: To go haywire is to go out of control; to behave wildly. I
have found several suggested origins for this phrase, all from the USA.
The first says that wire, properly only intended to bale up hay, (ie
haywire) was used, instead, by many farmers to make their boundary
fences. The wire rusted quickly with the result that the properties
were unkempt and had an appearance of being out of control.
A second suggestion says that the wire, when correctly used to bundle
up hay, would writhe and wriggle when cut to eventually release the
hay.
The third says the notion comes from the disorder and chaos present in
a farm yard when the used lengths of wire were left dumped in a corner.
Heath Robinson: A Heath Robinson affair/solution is something
characterised by apparent muddle. It comes from a famous English
cartoonist whose 'trade mark' style was one of drawing of pieces of
apparatus, designed to perform simple tasks, in an over complex way.
These drawings contained a jumble of badly assembled bits and pieces,
often joined up by scraps of string or rope to produce an over complex
solution to the task in hand. He was a great draughtsman and eccentric
and his name is remembered in the above phrase.
Some of his cartoons can be seen on Heath Robinson - well worth a look!
In the U.S. they speak of "a Rube Goldberg contraption". Mr. Goldberg's
cartoons similarly illustrated fanciful, overelaborate devices for
doing something simple.
Hector: To hector someone is to continually worry and harass them. The
origin is somewhat obscure but probably relates to the name of one of
the several London street gangs in and around the reign of Queen Anne.
These had names like The Scowerers, The Nickers. One of the gangs was
The Hectors, presumably named after Hector, the ancient Trojan warrior.
Hedge: To hedge one's bets is to support more than one outcome or
person; to put in cross bets. Although it is clear from my researches
that hedge in this context is very old, none of my references explain
this particular use. Hedge was used to imply inferiority (perhaps
because hedges are themselves low in height) with examples like
hedge-priest for a poor, impecunious priest. However, the 1811
dictionary gives a clue; "Hedge. To make a hedge; to secure a bet or
wager, laid on one side, by taking odds on the other, so that, let what
will happen, a certain gain is secured, or hedged in, by the persons
who takes this precaution".
Hem (Hum) and Haw. As an expression for hesitancy, to Hem and Haw isn't
recorded until 1786. But it is found centuries earlier in similar
expressions such as to hem and hawk, hem and ha, and hum and ha, which
Shakespeare used. These are all sounds made in clearing the throat when
we are about to speak. When a speaker constantly makes them without
speaking he is usually hesitating out of uncertainty, which suggested
the phrase. Said the first writer to record the idea in 1469: "He wold
have gotyn it aweye by humys and by hays but I would not so be
answered. " The modern version is to "Um & Ah".
Hep: A Hep-cat is a now dated American expression used to indicate that
someone is knowledgeable about popular music. The hep goes back to hip
(from which "hippie" comes) which, in turn, derives from the west
African Wolof word hipi meaning "to open one's eyes". The cat is also
derived from the same source since hipi-kat in Wolof means "one who has
opened his eyes".
Herring: A red herring is an alternative, somewhat old fashioned, name
for a smoked herring. Such fish have a very strong smell and were
usually known, not as kippers, but as red herrings in many parts of
17th century Britain. Because of their smell they were good at masking
other smells; as a result they could easily cover the scent of a fox. A
red herring pulled across the trail could divert the hounds onto a
false path. Thus, by analogy, the phrase came to be used to describe
any false trail. First recorded in this sense1686 (OED).
Hiding: A hiding to nothing is used to suggest that there is no way to
win in a particular situation. I am intrigued by this
combination of words. To start with but I could find no
recorded reason why they should be used together in this way. A 'hiding
OR nothing' would be clearer. However, later, I found the following:
'Hiding,' in this expression, is synonymous with 'thrashing,' and a
'hiding to nothing' means 'a thrashing to bits.'
Hijack: A hijack is the theft of some form of transport or other,
usually associated with the threat of force, with the object of
material or political gain. Why this combination of words? The only
explanation that I have found is rather unsatisfactory. It suggests
that the expression goes back to the days of US prohibition when
hold-ups were apparently accompanied by the order "stick 'em up high,
Jack!".
Hippie: see Hep-Cat
