词汇 | pull a boner |
词源 | pull a boner. “Mistah Bones” in American minstrel shows was the end man in the line who rhythmically played a pair of bones, originally polished rib bones from an animal. It is said that “Mistah Interlocutor,” the middle man in the line, fired questions at him designed to evoke ridiculous or stupid an- swers, which became known as pulling boners. This is possible, or to pull a boner may simply derive from the older American term “a bonehead,” a stupid error, slang since about 1860. There is no connection between the Americanism of about 60 years’ duration and the British expression a boner, a sharp blow on the spine that dates back about a century and a half, or boner, slang for an erection. |
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