where does this saying come from?

Question

can you tell me the origin of the saying "its raining cats and dogs" its an english saying. is there a sight where the origin of these sayings can be found?

Answer 1

Try this site, it's really good!

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/index.html

Answer 2

There are a couple origins:

The phrase is supposed to have originated in England in the 17th century when city streets were filthy and heavy rain would occasionally carry along dead animals

Cats and dogs were supposed to be washed from roofs during heavy weather. This is a widely repeated tale.

Another suggestion is that it comes from a version of the French word, catadoupe, meaning waterfall.

Answer 3

Also, rain buckets. Rain very heavily, as in It was raining cats and dogs so I couldn't walk to the store, or It's been raining buckets all day. The precise allusion in the first term, which dates from the mid-1600s, has been lost, but it probably refers to gutters overflowing with debris that included sewage, garbage, and dead animals. Richard Brome used a version of this idiom in his play The City Wit (c. 1652), where a character pretending a knowledge of Latin translates wholly by ear, " Regna bitque/and it shall rain, Dogmata Polla Sophon/dogs and polecats and so forth." The variant presumably alludes to rain heavy enough to fill pails.

Answer 4

We learned about this at Warwick castle. A very very long time ago, when houses all had straw roofs and the animals lived inside, The domestic animals such as cats and dogs used to make thier homes in the straw roofs. When it rained heavily it caused the animals to fall through, thats where raining cats and dogs originate.

Answer 5

Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable gives an unlikely-sounding explanation about cats, in northern mythology, having a great influence on the weather, and dogs being attendants of Odin, the storm god, as a symbol of wind. Brewer concludes that cats=rain and dogs=wind, so raining cats and dogs means a heavy rain accompanied by wind..

Well, I suppose it's about as believable as the other answers you have received!

Answer 6

This was on the Paul o'grady show the other week. It dates back to when the drains would run through the streets (as apposed to underground sewage pipes) When it rained hard, it would wash up all the dead cats and dogs and wash them down the roads, and people would say it's raining cats and dogs because that is what it looked like.

Answer 7

It's an old saying (eighteenth century i believe) that derives from a time when cats and dogs were often thrown from the top of a tall building in a game of 'cats and dog's'. Beggars at the bottom of the building would guess the circumference the impact of the cat or dog had made, Whoever was closets would take the remains of the animal home for stew.

Answer 8

He could have been asserting Jess. I mean i ought to comprehend getting Steph and Jess mixed up. Jess and Steph sound very close even without being groggy. in simple terms in the morning ask him approximately it.

Answer 9

Looking at your avatar, are you worried yours might be coming down with the next downpour?! (A cute doggy like yours should be well cared for!).

Answer 10

a rough trot