| 词汇 | out of kilter |
| 词源 | out of kilter. Many have tried to explain the origins of kilter in this expression meaning to be out of order, out of whack, but no one has succeeded. The best suggestions, I think, are the kil- ter, meaning a “useless hand in cards,” the dialect kilt, “to make neat,” and the Dutch keelter, “stomach,” because stomachs are often “out of order” with digestion problems. We only know that the expression is first recorded in 1643, as kelter. |
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