Idiom: living high on the hog; eating too high up on the hog (antedating 1919 November 28)

[George Thompson]

VS writes:
The problem with tracking down explanations of old phrases is that there
are always alternatives. For example, there are competing theories for "to
go
whole hog".  ***
The third, however, which is not fully spelled out, is the one that may
be relevant here.
"Hog" (see hog n.1 11.a. and b.) is a shilling (or a dime, if 11.b.
is accurate). If this is the original sense of "hog" in "living high on
the hog", then the phrase is far more ironic than the "eating high [up]
on/off the hog" might suggest.

     It seems that the earliest form of this expression is

"*Go /the/ Whole Hog*"  This is a slang phrase in Kentucky, or some of the
western states. . . .

New-York Evening Post, October 22, 1828, p. 2, col. 1

HDAS: 1828, citing OED2, a different passage; Whiting, EAPPS: 1830; Taylor &
Whiting: 1836

So, if a "hog" is a coin, then "go the whole hog" = "bet all the money"
makes sense.  But early users of the expression seem to have taken the "hog"
to be the animal:

"I'm flambergasted! if that ain't what I call *goin the whole cretur*, he'd
go to Congress from old Kentuck as easy as I could put a gin sling under my
jacket."

[William A. Caruthers.]  *The Kentuckian in New-York, or, the Adventures of
Three Southerns*.  By a Virginian.  2 vols.  N. Y.: Harpers, 1834.  vol. 1,
p. 188

HDAS: (this passage)


And I think I have seen "go the entire animal" in newspapers of this era,
but haven't made a note of where.


GAT





On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 9:50 AM, Garson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>wrote:

> At a dinner party last night I was asked about the expression "living
> high on the hog." The OED has this phrase listed under the entry for
> hog with a first citation dated 1940:
>
> hog, n.1,
> Phrases 8. orig. and chiefly U.S. to live (also eat) high off (also
> on) the hog : to live in an extravagant or luxurious style. Hence: to
> live (also eat) low off (also on) the hog (and variants).
>
>
> The Phrase Finder website has a page on this topic with valuable
> information. The earliest citation is a New York Times article dated
> March 4, 1920. The phrase in the newspaper differs slightly from the
> one given in the OED:
>
> Southern laborers who are "eating too high up on the hog" (pork chops
> and ham) and American housewives who "eat too far back on the beef"
> (porterhouse and round steak) are to blame for the continued high cost
> of living, the American Institute of Meat Packers announced today.
>
> http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/high-on-the-hog.html
>
>
> Here is an excerpt from citation in 1919. The article is labeled "From
> the Chicago News," so an earlier cite probably exists. The article
> consists of a "joke" in "dialect" with a framing commentary:
>
> Cite: November 28, 1919, Kansas City Star, One Cause for the H. C. L.:
> We Eat "Too Far up on the Hog," District Attorney in Chicago Says
> [Comment: H. C. L. may mean High Cost of Living], Page 13, Missouri.
> (GenealogyBank)
>
> "What is the reason for high prices on everything?" United States
> District Attorney Charles F. Clyne was asked the other day. His answer
> was enigmatic.
>
> 'There was a negro woman down South whose husband was rather no
> account," he said.
>
> [Comment: The woman leaves the husband. At a later time she meets him.
> He offers her "pickled pigs' feet," but she rejects them because she
> says that these days she is eating "furder up on de hog."]
>
> "We're eating too high up on the hog," Mr. Clyne concluded.
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



--
George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ.
Pr., 1998, but nothing much since then.

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org