I hosted an awards night last week at Crown, for the Baking Industry of WA (I have friends in the industry, some of whom are loyal Perth Football Club supporters). During the evening to celebrate some of this State’s hardest working people, accustomed to early starts rather than late nights, the term “baker’s dozen” got a mention. I knew what it meant (a baker’s dozen is 13), I didn’t know the saying came from the days when bakers were severely punished for baking underweight loaves.
To be above suspicion, the would often add an extra loaf to a batch of a dozen. This all lead to a discussion of other old sayings and their origins. “Big wig”, “doubting Thomas” and “bite the bullet” are easy to work out, but did you know a “hat trick” in cricket comes from the tradition of awarding anyone who took three wickets in a row a new hat? One of my former footy coaches once described me as being “born with a silver spoon in my mouth” which wasn’t exactly true, but probably needs no explanation here.
Another teammate was even accused of having “Dutch courage” — this saying apparently goes back to the 17th century, when it was said (unfairly, I’m sure) that the Dutch needed to drink alcohol to build up the courage for battle. Along those lines, I’ve always been wary of great men and women having “feet of clay” but until a young person asked me what the hell I was talking about, I didn’t fully understand the reference. Supposedly, the sayi.