Every saying has an origin. Not every origin is true.
Watch Hill Press publishes carefully sourced nonfiction, starting with the real histories behind the words we use every day.
Meet the first bookThe Hidden History of Everyday Sayings
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The Hidden History of Everyday Sayings
Where everyday sayings actually come from, traced to the earliest evidence in print. Each phrase gets the same treatment: when it first appeared, its likely origin, the story people usually tell, and a verdict on whether that story holds up.
The book is laid out like a museum, in ten galleries. Some of the most confidently repeated origin stories in English turn out to be inventions. When nobody knows the real answer, the book says so.
Five verdicts, used the same way every time
Each chapter closes with a verdict box, so you always know how solid the evidence is.
The popular story matches the documented record.
Part of the story holds up. The rest was added later.
Credible sources disagree, and the evidence doesn't settle it.
The story may be right, but nothing in the record supports it yet.
A specific origin story is out there, and the evidence shows it's wrong. Printed in red.
Keeping watch over the lost word
In the ancient world, news traveled by fire. Lookouts stood on high ground and passed signals from hill to hill, so one watchman could warn a whole region.
Around 588 BC, a Judean officer wrote to his commander that he was watching for the fire signals of Lachish, because he could no longer see the signals of Azekah.
Watch Hill Press takes its name from that work: standing on a high place, watching closely, and passing on only what can be confirmed. The press mark is a circumpunct, one of the oldest symbols for the sun, rising over a hill like a beacon at dawn.
Words lose their origins over time, and invented stories fill the gap. Our books go back to the evidence and recover what was lost.
Thomas Calimano
Thomas Calimano spent more than two decades in emergency medical services, including as a paramedic and tour chief, and now leads healthcare emergency management. His working life has been about finding out what really happened, and this book applies that habit to the phrases we use without thinking.
Rights, review copies and launch news
For press, bookstore and library inquiries, or to hear when the book launches, write to:
[email protected]- Video: The Phrase Files on YouTube