I accumulate those. Additions to this listing are welcome. Additionally, notice that during some instances I have no idea the starting place of a selected expression. When you’ve got wisdom or theories of starting place for anything else beneath, I'd additionally like to listen to from you. I’m hoping you experience those.

Speaking Thru Your Hat

To speak nonsense or to lie. c1885. [In an interview in The World entitled "How About White Shirts", a reporter asked a New York streetcar conductor what he thought about efforts to get the conductors to wear white shirts like their counterparts in Chicago. "Dey're talkin 'tru deir hats" he was quoted as replying.]

Consuming Your Hat

There is not any such factor as a certain factor, however that's the place this expression comes from. When you inform anyone you'll devour your hat in the event that they do one thing, you should definitely're no longer dressed in your easiest hat-just in case. [The expression goes back at least to the reign of Charles II of Great Britain and had something to do with the amorous proclivities of 'ol Charlie. They also named a goat after him that had his same love of life which included, in the goat's case, eating hats.]

Previous Hat

Previous, boring stuff; out of favor. [This seems to come from the fact that hat fashions are constantly changing. The fact of the matter is that hat fashions had not been changing very fast at all until the turn of the 19th Century. The expression therefore is about 100 years old.]

Mad As A Hatter

Completely demented, loopy. [Hatters did, indeed, go mad. They inhaled fumes from the mercury that was part of the process of making felt hats. Not recognizing the violent twitching and derangement as symptoms of a brain disorder, people made fun of affected hat-makers, often treating them as drunkards. In the US, the condition was called the "Danbury shakes." (Danbury, Connecticut, was a hat-making center.) Mercury is no longer used in the felting process: hat-making – and hat-makers – are safe.]

Hat In Hand

An illustration of humility. As an example, "I come hat in hand" implies that I are available deference or in weak spot. [I assume that the origins are from feudal times when serfs or any lower members of feudal society were required to take off their hats in the presence of the lord or monarch (remember the Dr. Seuss book "The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins"? ). A hat is your most prideful adornment.]

Cross The Hat

Actually to go a person's hat amongst contributors of an target audience or workforce as a method for gathering cash. Additionally to beg or ask for charity. [The origin is self-evident as a man's hat turned upside down makes a fine container.]

Tight As Dick's Hat Band

The rest this is too tight. [The Dick in this case is Richard Cromwell, the son of England's 17th Century "dictator", Oliver Cromwell. Richard succeeded his dad and wanted to be king but was quickly disposed. The hatband in the phrase refers to the crown he never got to wear.]

Hat Trick

3 consecutive successes in a sport or some other enterprise. As an example, taking 3 wickets with 3 a success pitches through a bowler in a sport of cricket, 3 objectives or issues received through a participant in a sport of football or ice hockey, and so on. [From cricket, from the former practice of awarding a hat to a bowler who dismissed three batsmen with three successful balls.]

Exhausting Hats

Within the 19th Century, males who wore derby hats particularly Japanese industry folks and later crooks, gamblers and detectives. [Derby hats, aka Bowlers or Cokes, were actually very hard as they were developed in 1850 for use by a game warden, horseback rider wanting protection.] These days, "Exhausting Hats" are development staff [for obvious reasons].

In One's Hat, or In Hat

An expression of incredulity. [Origin unknown. Help us if you can]

Throwing A Hat Within the Ring

Coming into a competition or a race eg a political run for administrative center. [A buyer wrote us with the next: "I learn in" The Language of American Politics "through William F. Buckley Jr. that the word" throw one's hat within the ring "comes from a tradition of 19th Century saloonkeepers placing a boxing ring in the midst of the barroom in order that consumers who sought after to battle every different would have a spot to take action with out beginning a donnybrook.
At one level, Theodore Roosevelt declared he was once operating for administrative center with a speech that integrated a line that went one thing like, "My hat is within the ring and I’m stripped to the waist". The word "my hat within the ring" caught, most probably as a result of "I’m stripped to the waist" is just a little gross.]

Hats Off. . .

"Hats off to the United States Iciness Olympic Crew" for instance. An exclusion of approval or kudos. [Origins must be from the fact that taking one's hat off or tipping one's hat is a traditional demonstration of respect.]

A Feather In Your Cap

A distinct fulfillment. [I assume that the origins on this expression hail from the days when, in fact, a feather for one's cap would be awarded for an accomplishment much like a medal is awarded today and pinned to one's uniform. A feather, or a pin, add a certain prestige or luster to one's apparel.]

Dangle On To Your Hat (s)

A caution that some excitation or risk is approaching. [When riding horseback or in an open-air early automobile, the exclamation "hold on to your hat" when the horse broke into a gallop or the car took-off was certainly literal.]

Bee In Your Bonnet

A sign of agitation or an concept that you’ll no longer let pass of and simply have to precise. [A real bee in one's bonnet certainly precipitates expression.]

Dressed in Many Hats

This after all is a metaphor for having many alternative tasks or jobs. [Historically, hats have often been an integral, even necessary, part of a working uniform. A miner, welder, construction worker, undertaker, white-collar worker or banker before the 1960s, chef, farmer, etc. all wear, or winter, a particular hat. Wearing "many hats" or "many different hats" simply means that one has different duties or jobs.]

All Hat and No Farm animals

All display and no substance. As an example, in October 2003, Senator Robert Byrd declared that the Bush management's declarations that it sought after the United Countries as a spouse in reworking Iraq had been "All Hat and No Farm animals". [This Texas expression refers to men who dress the part of powerful cattlemen, but do not have the herds back home.]

To Hold Your Hat (or no longer)

To decide to one thing (or no longer), or stake your popularity on one thing (or no longer), like an concept or coverage. As an example "I’d no longer cling my hat on George Steinbrenner's resolution to fireplace his supervisor." [Origin unknown. Can anyone help with this one?]

On the Drop of a Hat

Speedy. [Dropping a hat, can be a way in which a race can start (instead of a starting gun for example). Also, a hat is an apparel item that can easily become dislodged from its wearer. Anyone who wears hats regularly has experienced the quickness by which a hat can fly off your head.]

To Tip Your Hat or A Tip of the Hat

An approval of appreciate, approval, appreciation, or the like. Instance: "A tip of the hat to American troops for the seize of Saddam Hussein." [This is simply verbalizing an example of hat etiquette. Men would (and some still do) tip their hat to convey the same message.]

My Hat As a substitute of Myself

That is an expression from Ecuador, house of the "Panama" hat. It approach what’s says; it’s most well-liked to surrender your hat than your lifestyles. [The Guayas River runs through Guayaquil, Ecuador's largest city on the Pacific coast. People from the city were known to hunt alligators for their hides in the river by swimming stark naked wearing Panama hats on their heads and long knives between their teeth. When the reptiles open their jaws and go for the swimmer, he dives leaving his hat floating on the surface for the alligator to chew on while he plunges the knife into the animal's vitals. From THE PANAMA HAT TRAIL by Tom Miller.]

Unhealthy Hat

I consider it is a French expression for a nasty particular person. [Ludwig Bemelmans' MADELINE series of children's books, set in France, includes one MADELINE AND THE BAD HAT. In this story Madeline, our heroine, refers to a little boy neighbor as a "bad hat". She clearly means this as a metaphor for a bad person and because I do not know the expression in English, I assume this is a common French reference. If anyone out there knows more about this, please drop us an email.]

Hat through Hat

Step-by-step. [Nevada Barr's book SEEKING ENLIGHTENMENT: Hat by Hat means just that. Has anyone heard this expression otherwise? If yes, please email us.]

Conserving One thing Beneath One's Hat

Conserving a secret. [People kept important papers and small treasures under their hats. One's hat was often the first thing put on in the morning and the last thing taken off at night, so literally keeping things under one's hat was safe keeping. A famous practitioner of this was Abraham Lincoln. The very utilitarian cowboy hat was also commonly used for storage.]

Right here's Your Hat, However What's Your Hurry

When anyone has taken up sufficient of your time and you wish to have him / her to go away. [Origin unknown.]

Lift His Place of business in His Hat

Working a industry on a shoestring. [Important papers and the like were often transported in one's hat.]

Units Her Cap

A tender woman "units her cap" for a tender guy who she hopes to pastime in marrying her. [Long ago, maidens wore caps indoors because homes were poorly heated. A girl set her most becoming hat on her head when an eligible fellow came to call.]

Pondering Cap

To position for your "pondering cap" is to present some drawback cautious concept. [Teachers and philosophers in the Middle Ages often understood distinct caps that set them apart from those who had less learning. Caps became considered as a symbol of education. People put them on (literally or figuratively) to solve their own problems.]

Black Hat. . .

Black hat ways, black hat intentions, and so on. check with nefarious movements or designs. [Black hats in Western lore and literature were the bad guys.]

White Hat. . .

Even though I don’t see or pay attention this expression up to "Black Hat", it merely is the other of the above. [Good guys wear / wear white hats.]