[Ads-l] "snatch a knot in" = "hit, spank"

[ADSGarson O'Toole]

Newspapers.com has some interesting matches:

Date: March 13, 1889
Newspaper: Our Mountain Home
Newspaper Location: Talladega, Alabama
Database: Newspapers.com

https://www.newspapers.com/image/306632869/

[Begin excerpt]
This is a high compliment to the American press, but the chances are,
if Whitelaw accepts, that he will want to fly the bloody shirt from
Parliament House, and jerk a knot in the tail of the British lion
before he has been in London a day.
[End excerpt]


Garson

On Wed, Jul 26, 2017 at 7:13 PM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:
> A commenter noted the related expression "jerk a knot in (someone's) tail,"
> which HDAS includes. I've added an update to the Strong Language post.
>
>
> On Wed, Jul 26, 2017 at 6:32 PM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Now blogged on Strong Language...
>>
>> https://stronglang.wordpress.com/2017/07/26/snatch-a-knot-in-their-ass/
>>
>> On Wed, Jul 26, 2017 at 4:55 PM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> An earlier cite from Georgia:
>>>
>>> Macon (Ga.), Telegraph, Apr. 15, 1941, p. 4, co. 5 [Genealogybank]
>>> BUT if he [F.D.R.] expects ALL the people to "rally round the flag, boys"
>>> and do it with a snap and determination he'll have to snatch a knot in the
>>> tails of those hellions who are deliberately trying to tie up production --
>>> and do it NOW.
>>> --J.N. Foreman, Norman Park, Ga.
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Jul 26, 2017 at 4:42 PM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> http://www.marketwatch.com/story/suddenly-everyone-is-snatch
>>>> ing-a-knot-and-heres-why-2017-07-26
>>>> Expressing befuddlement — and engendering it at the same time — over the
>>>> Senate’s failure to pass, as yet, any of its several legislative efforts to
>>>> overhaul the Affordable Care Act, Rep. Buddy Carter, a Georgia Republican,
>>>> offered a colorful and presumably aggressive strategy during an MSNBC
>>>> interview Wednesday: "Somebody needs to go over there to that Senate and
>>>> snatch a knot in their ass."
>>>>
>>>> Video here:
>>>> https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/890295376611344385
>>>>
>>>> Twitter thread discussing the expression:
>>>> https://twitter.com/mattizcoop/status/890289306857811968
>>>>
>>>> I don't see anything in the slang dictionaries on this. It appears to be
>>>> primarily a Southernism -- perhaps originating in Georgia and the Florida
>>>> panhandle. The earliest cite I found is from Pensacola, Fla., and the
>>>> second earliest is from Roy Blount Jr., who grew up in Decatur, Ga.
>>>>
>>>> ----
>>>> Pensacola (Fla.) News Journal, Dec. 25, 1978, p. 64
>>>> "Santa pulls them aside and gives them the word he's going to snatch a
>>>> knot in their heads if they don't behave," he says with a twinkle in his
>>>> eye.
>>>> https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/265357254/
>>>> ----
>>>> Roy Blount Jr., _One Fell Soup: Or, I'm Just a Bug on the Windshield of
>>>> Life_, 1982 [1984], p. 71
>>>> "But if you could find it in your heart not to saddle them with a
>>>> criminal record, could you just let me snatch a knot in them?"
>>>> And I would snatch a knot in them.
>>>> I don't mean physically. I don't pound on my children.
>>>> https://books.google.com/books?id=56w6u-oNtRMC
>>>> ----
>>>> Springfield (Mo.) Leader and Press, June 16, 1986, p. 11
>>>> I am willing to concede my suggestion that those people snatch a knot in
>>>> that child might be ill-founded.
>>>> https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/309489104/
>>>> ----
>>>> Philadelphia Daily News, Sep. 28, 1987, p. 37
>>>> If you read the piece carefully, you can feel the pain and indignation
>>>> of a parent who would snatch a knot in her child before she would see him
>>>> become one the vermin who sell death and misery on street corners.
>>>> https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/186270600/
>>>> ----
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>
>
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