Where does (one) Nautical expression comes from....

Do you wonder where various expressions in common use come from, especially at this time of year when the weather is getting colder?

So we have all heard the phrase, 'cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey' but did you know this has a maritime connection.


Way back in history when ships sailed with cannons for protection, they had to find a way to keep a supply of cannon balls near each cannon without them rolling away. So they developed a storage devise so that the cannon balls could be stored in a pyramid in a safe way, which was a metal pate with indentations to hold the bottom row of cannon balls, called a 'monkey'.

Now for the science, not done that for a long time!, if the monkey was made from iron because of the damp on ship the cannon balls would rust onto it, no good; so the solution was to manufacture the money out of brass.

However, brass will contract when it is cold. So, in colder temperatures the indentations would shrink so much so that the cannon balls would come adrift from the monkey. Hence 'cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey'.

No I am not so sure how true the science is here and how cold it needs to be, but it is an interesting story.

Now for an irrelevant fact, the "brass monkey" is the nickname of the house flag of the Cunard Line, adopted in 1878.