"stiff upper lip" etymythology

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On Mon, 11 Jul 2005 11:22:58 -0700, Geoffrey Nunberg
<nunberg at CSLI.STANFORD.EDU> wrote:

>According to a story in the Toronto Globe and Mail on "stiff upper lip":
>
>The Oxford English Dictionary traces the phrase to 1815, when it
>appeared in an edition of a Boston newspaper called Massachusetts Spy.
>
>Another explanation that cleaves the expression firmly to Britain
>says it originated in the Royal Navy. According to legend, dead
>sailors being sewn into their shroud for burial at sea would have the
>final stitch passed through the upper lip and nose.
>
>This was apparently to ensure that the corpse was not actually
>clinging to life. In theory, the pain would literally wake the dead.
>And if it was a malingerer hoping to escape the hard life at sea, he
>would have had to keep a very stiff upper lip to continue to pass for
>dead
>
>http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20050709/BLASTLIP09/TPInternational/Europe

Sheesh, where do they get this stuff?  The Globe & Mail seems particularly
credulous when it comes to etymythology (as Barry can attest).

A bit of Googling finds a potential source for the story-- at least this
version is a bit more vivid, with the stiff-upper-lipped malingerer making
a Houdiniesque escape from his shroud and swimming to shore...

-----
http://www.gensdbutlerdet.org/scuttlebutt/07_04_scuttlebutt.pdf
General Smedley D. Butler Detachment
Scuttlebutt, July 2004

“STIFF UPPER LIP”
Keeping a “stiff upper lip” means bearing difficulties and
setbacks with fortitude. Today it is used in a figurative
sense, but when the expression was first coined in the
early days of British Royal Navy, keeping a “stiff upper
lip” was exactly what had to happen.
The phrase apparently originated in the tradition of
burying the dead at sea. Sailors who died aboard, or
were killed in action, were sewn into a weighted shroud
and then dropped over the side of the ship. It was
customary for the last stitch in the shroud to be passed
through the upper lip and lower part of the nose of the
corpse. This is a very sensitive part of the body and if
any signs of life were to be seen at the final stage of
burial preparation, it was believed that a needle pushed
through this area of delicate flesh would produce some
reaction in even a seemingly lifeless corpse. Sailors
trying to escape the harsh and brutal routine of the
Royal Navy by feigning death knew that they would
have to endure the agony of this final stitch. They who
succeeded in keeping a “stiff upper lip” gave away no
sign of life and were duly “buried” at sea. Once in the
water, they would be able to cut themselves out of the
shroud using a hidden knife and swim to freedom.
Clearly one prerequisite of this desperate form of
escape was to ensure that your “burial at sea” took
place within swimming distance of the shore.
~~Submitted by J.J.V. Cook
-----


--Ben Zimmer