Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
The origin of the expression: Lame duck
never know, might come in handy...
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/lame-duck.html
SNIP
The actual origin of the term is nothing to do with politics though and is quite specific in meaning. It comes from the London Stock Market and referred to investors who were unable to pay their debts. In Horace Walpole's Letters to Sir Horace Mann, 1761, we have:
"Do you know what a Bull, and a Bear, and a Lame Duck are?"
In 1771, David Garrick, in Prologue to Foote's Maid of Bath wrote:
"Change-Alley bankrupts waddle out lame ducks!"
In 1772, the Edinburgh Advertiser included:
"Yesterday being the settling day for India stock, the bulls had a balance to pay to the bears to the amount of 23 per cent. Only one lame duck waddled out of the alley, and that for no greater a sum than 20,000."
We are still familiar with the terms 'bull market' and 'bear market', referring to rising and falling markets respectively, but 'lame duck' in the specifically stock trading context is now little used.
Why should someone who has no assets be called a 'duck'? Could it be related to the cricketing term, 'out for a duck' - used when a batman is out without scoring any runs? It seems not. That term is much later and refers to the zero on the scoreboard being similar to a duck's egg. First used in 1867, in G. H. Selkirk's Guide to Cricket Grounds:
"If he makes one run he has 'broken his duck's egg'."
The actual origin of the term is nothing to do with politics though and is quite specific in meaning. It comes from the London Stock Market and referred to investors who were unable to pay their debts. In Horace Walpole's Letters to Sir Horace Mann, 1761, we have:
"Do you know what a Bull, and a Bear, and a Lame Duck are?"
In 1771, David Garrick, in Prologue to Foote's Maid of Bath wrote:
"Change-Alley bankrupts waddle out lame ducks!"
In 1772, the Edinburgh Advertiser included:
"Yesterday being the settling day for India stock, the bulls had a balance to pay to the bears to the amount of 23 per cent. Only one lame duck waddled out of the alley, and that for no greater a sum than 20,000."
We are still familiar with the terms 'bull market' and 'bear market', referring to rising and falling markets respectively, but 'lame duck' in the specifically stock trading context is now little used.
Why should someone who has no assets be called a 'duck'? Could it be related to the cricketing term, 'out for a duck' - used when a batman is out without scoring any runs? It seems not. That term is much later and refers to the zero on the scoreboard being similar to a duck's egg. First used in 1867, in G. H. Selkirk's Guide to Cricket Grounds:
"If he makes one run he has 'broken his duck's egg'."
3 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
