tinker's damn
English
[edit]Alternative forms
[edit]- tinker's dam
- tinker's darn (minced oath)
Etymology
[edit]Merriam-Webster finds tinker's damn in print since 1839 and suggests that it derives from tinkers' reputation for swearing.[1] The spelling tinker's dam is attested since 1858,[2] and phrases.org.uk notes the disagreement over whether the term originated from tinkers' swearing or instead from their use of small, single-use dams to hold solder.[3] The latter explanation has been offered since 1877;[3][4] on the other hand, the phrase tinker's curse is attested since 1824 and the phrase worth a tinker's cuss is attested since 1854, for which reason Etymonline considers the "dam" derivation an "ingeniously elaborate but baseless" invention of later writers.[4]
Noun
[edit]- An insignificant or worthless amount or thing.
- 1 May 1823, Mrs Chatterly, Anon in Ramblers Magazine, Vol 2 No 5, p. 216:
- […] is not worth (to use expression excited by honest indignation) a tinker's damn : and if Mrs. Chatterly has no other salvo for her precious reputation. […]
- 1921, Harvey Wickham, “Introducing the Garden of Eden”, in The Clue of the Primrose Petal, New York, N.Y.: Edward J. Clode, page 9:
- So now, stimulated by some further experience with that world which does not care a tinker’s damn whether a verb agrees with its subject in number and person or not, she permitted the taxicab to jounce her smile out of all semblance to anything calmly superior and into a very unschoolmarmish grin.
- 2012, Django Unchained:
- […] and I wouldn't sell you a tinker's damn.
- 1 May 1823, Mrs Chatterly, Anon in Ramblers Magazine, Vol 2 No 5, p. 216:
Synonyms
[edit]- tinker's cuss (chiefly British)
- tinker's toot
Derived terms
[edit]References
[edit]- The Maven's Word of the Day
- 1868 March, Mr. Thom. White's Little Sermon, in Putnam's Magazine, page 555: "No, Peter; women, now, are not worth a tinker's mill-dam—that's what I think." [...] Just what a "tinker's dam" is, I have no means of knowing; but I believe it to be something very worthless indeed.
- ^ “tinker's damn”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
- ^ 1858 December, January Searle, Hyra, the gipsy Prophetess, chapter XXI, in Frank Leslie's New Family Magazine, volume 3, number 6, page 546: "[...] and I doesn't care a tinker's dam about him."
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Gary Martin (1997–) “A tinker's damn”, in The Phrase Finder, retrieved 26 February 2017.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “tinker”, in Online Etymology Dictionary, retrieved 26 February 2017.