The next day, the Marquis paid for all the damages to the property and people.
When more police arrived in numbers, they finally captured one of the troublemakers and threw him in prison. Several policemen tried to stop the madness at different points, only to be beaten up and painted for their efforts. They vandalized the Leicestershire Banking Company and Post Office before attempting to overturn a caravan where a man was soundly sleeping. The Marquis was hoisted on a friend's shoulders to paint the carved swan inn sign red at the Old Swan Inn. They pulled down the sign at the Red Lion (now part of the Harborough Hotel) and threw it into the canal. The mob knocked over flower pots, pulled on door knockers, and painted doors as they passed. They painted him red, nailed up the door, painted that red too, and marched into town carrying the stolen equipment. Instead of paying the toll, the Marquis and his cronies grabbed brushes and pots of nearby red paint and attacked the tollkeeper. They arrived at the Thorpe End Tollgate after drinking heavily at Croxton races.
#Paint the town red meaning full
There are quite a few other theories about the origin of “paint the town red,” some more plausible (or perhaps less implausible) than others, but I suspect that a full explanation may never be known.On April 6,1837, the Marquis of Waterford and a few friends literally painted a town red. The citation doesn’t explain, however, why the word “red” was used. Grant’s supporters during the Republican National Convention in 1880. He cites an article in an Ohio newspaper indicating that the phrase was coined to describe the exuberance of former President Ulysses S. The language researcher Barry Popik suggests that the expression may actually have originated in Chicago. In fact, the dictionary’s earliest reference is from a Boston newspaper in 1884. So where did “paint the town red” come from? The expression, which means to go on a boisterous or riotous spree, originated in the United States, according to the OED. I have my doubts, however, since the first OED citations didn’t appear until nearly half a century after the incident. Eric Partridge, in A Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, appears to accept the Melton Mowbray story. Bradley of the conquests of Carthage, Jerusalem, Epirus, and so on).Īt any rate, it’s hardly likely that Roman atrocities would be the source of “paint the town red.” The expression is relatively recent-the earliest published references in the Oxford English Dictionary date from the late 19th century.Īnother widespread explanation is that the expression originated in 1837 when the Marquis of Waterford and a bunch of rowdy friends painted some public spots red in the English town of Melton Mowbray. Roman society depended heavily on slavery, and the Romans tended to enslave rather than massacre conquered people (see accounts by Livy, Josephus, and the modern historian K.R.
I’ve found no evidence that the Romans routinely painted the walls of captured towns with the blood of conquered people. Who’s correct?Ī: Sorry, but I’m with your girlfriend on this one.
Q: My girlfriend and I have been arguing about the expression “paint the town red.” I’ve heard that it comes from ancient times when the Roman Legions used to wash the walls of conquered towns with the blood of the defeated people.
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