Saturday, November 19, 2011

Finally! Finally, I know! ...where the connotation for 'dog's bollocks' comes from. At the end of QI (BBC's "Quite Interesting" - post to follow) Series C Episode 6, Steven. Fry relates that in the 'early years of the twentieth century' children''s construction sets were sold in two varieties, 'boxed - standard' which became 'bog standard' and 'boxed - deluxe' which became 'dog's bollocks' in London slang.

I've wondered about this in the past, because 'bollocks' - literally meaning 'testicles' - is used in a negative context, as in "That's just bollocks' - read: "That's crap" for American audiences - or "Bollocks!" - "Crap!" or as an expletive, such as "Goddammit!". But- "the Dog's Bollocks" means something good for some reason, the cause of which has always eluded me - 'testicles' = bad, dog testicles = good. "Hmmmm," I thought, "now why is that?" Now I know. Thank you Mr. Fry and the QI elves for the third series.

No comments:

Post a Comment