until the cows come home
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.91 in modern English
37
Scrabble Score
20
Letters
4
Syllables
12
Unique Chars
Meaning
phrase
For a very long period of time.
Example Sentences
- "Near-synonym: until one is blue in the face"
- "You can crank the engine until the cows come home, but it won’t start without fuel."
- "Good Morrow, / Drinke tell the Cow come home, 'tis all pay'd boyes."
- "If there be any lazy Fellow, any that cannot away with Work, any that would wallow in Pleaſures, he is haſty to be prieſted. And, when he is made one, and hath gotten a Benefice, he conſorts with his Neighbour Prieſts, who are altogether given to Pleaſures; and then both he, and they, live, not like Chriſtians, but like Epicures; drinking, eating, feaſting, and revelling, till the Cow come Home, as the saying is; [...]"
- "Come my brave Man of War, trace out thy darling, / As you my learned Council, ſit and turn boyes, / Kiſs till the Cow come home, kiſs cloſe, kiſs cloſe knaves. / My Modern Poet, thou ſhalt kiſs in couplets."
- "Miſs, if I had ſaid ſo, I ſhould have told a Fib; I warrant you lay a Bed till the Cows came home: But, Miſs, ſhall I cut you a little Cruſt now my Hand is in?"
Etymology
Possibly from the fact that cattle let out to pasture may be only expected to return for milking the next morning; thus, for example, a party that goes on “until the cows come home” is a very long one. Alternatively, the phrase may have a Scottish origin, and may derive from the fact that cattle in the Highlands are put out to graze on the common where grass is plentiful. They stay out for months before scarcity of food causes them to find their way home in the autumn for feeding (a pattern of seasonal grazing called transhumance).
Inflected Forms
Phrases
Frequently Paired Words
a cold day in hell
at latter Lammas
donkey's years
that'll be the day
when hell freezes over
when pigs fly
all day