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Where did it come from? - Guest - 01-21-2009
Where did it come from
My wife “Barbara” came to me today and asked me where did the expression “gone to Hell in a hand basket” come from? I had to admit that I had no idea but have heard that saying all of my life.
We started talking about “where did it come from” and came up with a bunch that I know where. I’m willing to bet that Punaweb people have a lot of this very important knowledge,
for example:
“The cats out of the bag”
It’s an old maritime expression meaning, someone was about to get a lashing aboard the ship. The Chief Boatswain Mate would take his cat-of-nine-tails out of it’s storage bag on the Captain’s orders to implement a disciplinary action, say “twenty lashes” The crew knew what was about to happen and the word would spread “The cat is out of the bag”.
Another example:
“Freeze the balls off a brass monkey”
Again this comes from an old maritime expression. When we had navel war ships with cannon aboard the cannon balls were stacked in a pyramid fashion on top of a brass monkey as not to roll around the deck. This worked well as long as they were in fair weather, but when the temp. went really freezing cold, brass monkey base plates and steel cannon balls would expand and contract at different rates and the cannon balls would rolling around the deck, hence the saying, “freeze the balls off a brass monkey”
Barbara would love to hear your expression and the explanation of where it came from.
The Lack
RE: Where did it come from? - Erlinda - 01-21-2009
Here's an article that might shed some light on this:
On Language: To Wherever In a Handbasket
By WILLIAM SAFIRE
Published: April 29, 1990, New York Times
HARRY AND I HAVE been wondering,'' writes Lois Reasoner of Westport, Conn., ''about the origin of the phrase going to hell in a handbasket. We have heard it used in conversation five times in the past few months.''
I have the vision conjured in my mind of the genial inquisitor of ''60 Minutes,'' counting the times his Connecticut neighbors use this phrase, and finally exploding, ''Five! That's it, Lois - roust out Safire and find out why.''
Lexicographers call this ''old slang'' - a figure of speech used by people who stopped picking up the latest slang about two generations ago. To hell in a handbasket means either ''to one's doom'' or -if used mockingly to describe a small dissipation - merely ''mildly indulgent.''
The origin is believed to be to heaven in a handbasket, a locution that Dialect Notes spotted in 1913 in Kansas, where it was taken to mean ''to have a sinecure.'' One who was nicely ensconced in an untouchable job was said to be on the way to heaven in a handbasket. When used in Wisconsin a decade later, the term was defined as ''to do something easily.''
Then the direction changed. The alliteration remained the same, but the first stage of this rocket dropped off and was lost in the sea of archaic phrases; the second stage, with hell substituted for heaven, took us to where we are today: the meaning is ''to degenerate rapidly; to fall apart suddenly.'' The final stage? We cannot tell; down the tubes in a handbasket uses modern surfers' lingo but lacks the alliterative zing.
What is it about a handbasket - a word rarely used now outside the hellish phrase - that makes it so useful in talk of decadence, degeneration, declension and downfall?
The key quality is portability; the basket is small enough to be carried in one hand, and anything in it is little or light. From a couple of centuries after its coinage, the word lent itself to belittlement in phrasemaking: in the play ''Juliana, or the Princess of Poland'' by John Crowne in 1671, a character says, ''I can see when I see, surely; I don't carry my eyes in a hand-basket.'' Most people who use old slang are long in the tooth, a folk metaphor of uncertain age first used in print by William Makepeace Thackeray in an 1852 novel: ''She was lean, and yellow, and long in the tooth; all the red and white in all the toyshops of London could not make a beauty of her.''
Enjoy! Erlinda
RE: Where did it come from? - Seeb - 01-21-2009
" may be going to hell in a bucket
but lest I'm enjoying the ride "
RE: Where did it come from? - Devany - 01-21-2009
Those were all great guys... thanks for enlightening us!
devany
RE: Where did it come from? - roseroo14 - 01-22-2009
Buzz,
That’s great, here is another:
How it got its name, again from the maritime trade. Many years ago fertilizer was shipped from one port to another in a cargo hold. The manure would build up methane gasses in an inclosed area and on a few occasions a sailor had gone down below smoking a pipe. BANG, that was the end of that ship. Then on the cargo manifest it became necessary to designate where as to store the manure. Ship high in transit became the rule, trying to keep it from building gasses below deck. The manifest read S.H.I.T. or ship high in transit, the rest is history.
The Lack
RE: Where did it come from? - JonP - 01-22-2009
Hate to rain on anyone's parade but these canards have been around for a long while...
http://www.snopes.com/language/apocryph/pluckyew.asp
do your own search for the s.h.i.t. baloney
**edited because the link didn't work very well**
RE: Where did it come from? - Kelena - 01-22-2009
Getting back to the original question, the phrase "going to hell in a handbasket" actually has a Hawaiian origin. Here's how it came about, according to oral traditions.
Hawaiians did not orginally have a concept of "Hell" as we understand it. Nor did they have European pigs. But Captain Cook and the missionaries brought both, and both figure into the origins of this unusual phrase.
Back at this time, imus were very, very popular, and the European pigs (which were bigger than the pigs brought by the polynesians), grew fat on the land and so were enormous. The art of the imu was very highly developed and a particular practitioner, whose name is lost to history, was particularly adept at creating charming baskets out of food, including ham. Her most popular basket was one that she carefully wove together using strips of ham. She would fill these foodbaskets with delicious fruit and they, and she, were very popular.
One day, there was a great celebration in Waipi'o. At the edge of Waipi'o, near the beach is an area that the Hawaiians believed was a portal to the underworld. The Europeans likened this to hell, although for the Hawaiians, it was just a portal to another world.
The famous basket weaver had carefully laid out an enormous basket, made out of ham and filled with fruit on a lauhala mat near the edge of the surf. A European walked over, tasted the basket, and became completely entranced. About that time, a big wave came up and took the basket out to sea. The European vainly attempted to retrieve the basket, so smitten was he with the mixture of artistry and taste. He was last seen heading out to sea virtually atop the basket, where a shark gobbled him up.
When his wife asked what became of him, they said "He went to hell in a ham basket". Of course, the phrase has been corrupted over the years. Now you have heard my story. Repeat the refrain! Haina mai ka puana!
RE: Where did it come from? - Menehune - 01-22-2009
Glen - you need kids/grandkids - or rent yourself out as a surrogate - such talent and imagination - Mahalo!
"Each thing I do I rush through so I can do something else" - Cemetery Nights/Stephen Dobyns
RE: Where did it come from? - roseroo14 - 01-22-2009
Glen,
Love it, one has to enjoy a yarn and you have a talent for it better than most. One of the best joys in life to me is putting people on and having them think that you are serious.
The Lack
RE: Where did it come from? - Kapohocat - 01-23-2009
Here's one that my significant other used that not only dont I get but wonder where it came from:
In a sentence - "I told them where the cow ate the cabbage".
Any ideas?