three sheets to the wind

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three sheets to the wind - 12/14/2005 6:44:04 AM

warhead2

Posts: 92
Joined: 7/31/2003
From: alabama
Status: offline

what's the origin of this expression?

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RE: three sheets to the wind - 12/14/2005 6:50:45 AM

Hanal

Posts: 2312
Joined: 11/1/2003
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Ask the mighty Google and the answer appears......

Three Sheets to the Wind
The phrase dates to 1821. The sheet is a reference to a rope on a sailboat. To have a sheet loose in the wind is bad seamanship, to have three loose means you are not capable of controlling the boat. Occasionally you will see one sheet to the wind meaning half-drunk.

Here's another variation:

Meaning

Drunk.

Origin

Three sheets to (or in) the wind is a nautical expression. If three sheets - which are the ropes holding the sails rather than the sails themselves - are loose and blowing about then the boat will lurch about like a drunken sailor. Dickens uses it in Dombey and Son.

< Message edited by J P Falcon -- 12/14/2005 6:52:19 AM >

(in reply to warhead2)

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RE: three sheets to the wind - 12/14/2005 5:46:02 PM

sol_invictus

Posts: 1961
Joined: 10/2/2001
From: Kentucky
Status: offline

Very interesting; never really thought about it. Someone should write a book; somebody probably has; about all of the colorful phrases that have come into common useage in the English language. It seems that there are many nautical terms used.

< Message edited by Arinvald -- 12/15/2005 3:41:00 AM >

(in reply to Hanal)

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RE: three sheets to the wind - 12/14/2005 7:56:02 PM

RevRick

Posts: 2617
Joined: 9/16/2000
From: Thomasville, GA
Status: offline

There are a number of them.

Son of a Gun
Letting the cat out of the bag.
even the word 'aloof" has a nautical origin.

I did a whole paper on this subject for my Master's work in English, before seminary. It's on an old floppy which I cannot find now.

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(in reply to sol_invictus)

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