"Another One Bites the Dust"

[Patricia S. Kuhlman]

The  phrase "bite the dust" meaning to die may have come from a
translation of Homer's Greek phrase in the Iliad.  I don't remember what
the Greek phrase was describing the fall of a warrior, just that it
translated into English as "eat dust" or "bite dust".  At the time I was
struck that this must be where the English idiom "bite the dust" came
from.

Patricia Kuhlman
pskuhlman at juno.com
Brooklyn, NY

On Tue, 18 Mar 2003 12:58:06 -0000 Michael Quinion
<TheEditor at WORLDWIDEWORDS.ORG> writes:
> Fred Shapiro wrote:
>
> > Can anyone help me determine whether the phrase "another one
> bites
> > the dust" was popularized by the 1980 Queen song of that name, or
> > whether it predated the song?
>
> Presumably you are looking for this exact phrase, not merely for
> variations on "bite the dust" in the sense of die? If the latter, I
> can give you examples from Mark Twain, Bret Harte, Zane Grey,
> Robert
> Louis Stevenson and even Sir Walter Scott.
>
> --
> Michael Quinion
> Editor, World Wide Words
> E-mail: <TheEditor at worldwidewords.org>
> Web: <http://www.worldwidewords.org/>
>
>