The curious origins of four English expressions – including will-o’-the-wisp and against the grain

The origins of English expressions are often obscure and require deep linguistic and documentary research to be explained. Being phrases, not single words, their intrinsic meanings can be reconstructed by studying old texts and their earliest use.

Once the intricacies of their origins are unravelled, they can tell us a lot about how our language has developed over centuries. In the end, they often unveil to us fascinating and unexpected stories. Let’s try to briefly analyse four of them.

1. So long

Though now considered dated, “so long” was once a common English expression. It was used to bid farewell, with different degrees of definitiveness, depending on the context.

The phrase can be interpreted as “goodbye until we’ll meet again”. However, if considered literally, the idiom means just “so long” and nothing else. What happened to its meaning and what are its origins, then?

If the expression was generated from the English language, it could be considered a shortened form of a sentence like this: “It will only be so long before we meet again.” However, this explanation is based on a retrospective interpretation of the idiom.

Another option is to consider “so long” as an adaptation from another language. The Irish slán is a possible parallel. It literally means “safe”, but is used in the same way as “goodbye”. The German phrase adieu so lange means “goodbye while we’ll be apart”. This is similar to the Norwegian Adjø så lenge and the Swedish Hej så länge. “So long” could also be compared to the Hebrew shalom (Yiddish sholom) and Arabic salaam, which both mean “peace”.

To understand the origins of phrases, we need to look for the earliest known use, or “attestation”. For “so long”, that’s it’s use in So Long!, the final poem of the 1860 edition of Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman.

At that time, the idiom was not yet popular, and the poet had to explain it as a “salutation of departure” among people belonging to specific social categories (like sailors) who are not sure they’ll ever meet again. By the 20th century, “so long” became a widespread and commonly understood expression, but the puzzle of its origins endures.

2. God speed

“God speed” is another, now largely defunct, salutation for those who are leaving, and a wish for success. But its origins are murky.

It is not clear whether the component “god” actually refers to the notion of “god or of "good”, because in Old English “god” was spelled god, while “good” was gōd. In turn, the Old English word sped (spede in Middle English) originally meant success, good fortune, prosperity, luck or progression.

At the beginning of the 14th century, god spede and god speid were also used as adverbs, meaning speedily and quickly. However, by the end of the 14th century they consistently started to indicate a wish for success granted by god (but, if the idiom comes from gōd and sped, the meaning could have been just “good luck”).

The current interpretation of “god speed” became widespread after the first half of the 15th century. While “god speed” is not as obscure as “so long”, its origins are not completely explained yet.

3. Will-o’-the-wisp

The expression “will-o’-the-wisp” indicates something unattainable – an elusive goal. As far as we know, it was first used at the beginning of the 17th century as “Will with the wisp”. It is a conceptual parallel to “Jack-o’-lantern” (which was first used in the second half of the 17th century). That’s because the “Will” component was originally capitalised, because it is a person’s name (like “Jack” in “Jack-o’-lantern”).

The expression is equivalent to the Latin term coined in Germany in the 16th century, ignis fatuus (literally, “fire foolish”). It describes an atmospheric evanescent light that can be spotted at night over marshes and swamps. The expression therefore indicates a little sprite flying in the darkness with a fading “wisp” of light.

The expression is a personification of the natural phenomenon in local folklore, which became, over time, the metaphorical representation of an illusory hope.

4. Against the grain

When we say that somebody is acting “against the grain”, we mean that they are doing something that goes against what is commonly thought to be normal, logical, preferred, expected or acceptable.

The idiom, which is the opposite of “with the grain”, also indicates an action performed against someone’s personal inclinations. The expression has been attested since the 17th century and figuratively refers to carpentry and to the wood grain – the longitudinal pattern of wood fibres in a wooden slab.

Working against the arrangement of the fibres of a piece of wood is harder than cutting along them. The idiom is, therefore, a metaphor connected with woodworking and one of its first literary uses is in Shakespeare’s play Coriolanus (1608).

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Francesco Perono Cacciafoco does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.