"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

I cast this one out to sea on the alt.folklore.urban newsgroup and was
rewarded with further etymyths for the expression:

-----
http://www.rootsweb.com/~genepool/meanings.htm

Keep a stiff upper lip

Andy in Scotland wrote: Before the Napoleonic wars there was a bizarre
fashion among officers to have tarred moustaches. Their moustaches would
be smeared with hot pitch and then moulded into shape before it
solidified. And so these brave officers would keep a stiff upper lip.

Definition from Steve Sabram: European nobility term to dictate how to
behave in court so as to not show favoritism nor your feelings toward an
issue brought up.

>From Barb Petty quoting from "phrase and origins a study of familiar
expressions" (sic - no caps) by Alfred H. Holt (1936, reprinted by Dover
Pubs. Inc. 1961), p. 150: New England origin (about 1830). It means,
"Don't let your lip quiver, as if about to cry," i.e., "Don't be a
baby." The story is told of a singer who, making her debut on the radio,
was advised by a friend experienced in radio technique to "keep a stiff
upper lip." Unfortunattely the novice was so flustered that she took the
advice literally, and the result was that her first audition was a failure.
-----

The Rootsweb site has a number of the usual suspects, from "posh" to
"pluck yew".


--Ben Zimmer