eye [OE] An Old English word that has given rise to a huge number of phrases in English. The eyes are the window of the soul is a proverb that goes back at least to 1545, when it is found in the form ‘The eyes…are the windows of the mind, for both joy and anger…are seen through them’. The same idea was expressed by the Roman orator Cicero in the 1st century bc: ‘The face is a picture of the mind as the eyes are its interpreter.’ An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth refers to the law set out in the Old Testament book of Exodus: ‘Thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, wound for wound.’ The eye of a needle is a tiny opening through which it would seem impossible to pass. The reference is to the Gospel of Matthew, where Jesus said, ‘It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.’

A person who has an eye for the main chance [L16th] is on the lookout for an opportunity to profit. The origins of this expression lie in the gambling game of hazard, in which the person about to throw the dice calls out a number between five and nine. This number is called the main or the main chance, and if someone rolls it they have won. If you would give your eye teeth for something [M17th] you would do anything in order to have it. The eye teeth [M16th] are the two pointed teeth in the upper jaw, so called because they are more or less immediately below the eyes, and which are essential for tearing off chunks of food. They are more usually called canine teeth from the Latin for dog, referring to this animal’s prominent examples. To give someone the hairy eyeball [M20th] is to stare at them coldly or contemptuously. The image behind this American expression is of someone glaring with their eyes narrowed and partly closed: the hairy eyeball is the effect of seeing the eyeball through the eylashes. Keep your eyes peeled comes from the idea of ‘peeling’ the covering from your eyes to see as clearly as possible. It goes back to the 1840s in the USA.