COLD ENOUGH TO...
Posted: Sat Aug 09, 2008 10:28 am
All this time, you thought that this was a vulgar expression...
It was necessary to keep a good supply of cannon balls near the cannon on old war ships. But how to prevent them from rolling about the deck was the problem. The best storage method devised was to stack them as a square based pyramid, with one ball on top, resting on four, resting on nine,which rested on sixteen. Thus, a supply of 30 cannon balls could be stacked in a small area right next to the cannon. There was only one problem --how to prevent the bottom layer from sliding/rolling from under the others.
The solution was a metal plate with 16 round indentations, called a Monkey. But if this plate were made of iron, the iron balls would quickly rust to it.
The solution to the rusting problem was to make the monkeys out of brass. However, it was discovered that brass shrinks much more and much faster than iron when chilled. Consequently, when the temperature dropped too far, the brass indentations would shrink so much that the iron cannon balls would come right off the monkey. Thus, it was quite literally, cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass
monkey...
Apocryphal or not? If the balls would rust to the iron monkey, why didn't they rust to each other? Why was it called a "monkey"? Why not a "base" or "stacking plate" or a "muffin tin" or something? Hmmm...
Here's what snopes.com has to say:
http://www.snopes.com/language/stories/brass.asp
Any ideas? Any other odd word origins?
It was necessary to keep a good supply of cannon balls near the cannon on old war ships. But how to prevent them from rolling about the deck was the problem. The best storage method devised was to stack them as a square based pyramid, with one ball on top, resting on four, resting on nine,which rested on sixteen. Thus, a supply of 30 cannon balls could be stacked in a small area right next to the cannon. There was only one problem --how to prevent the bottom layer from sliding/rolling from under the others.
The solution was a metal plate with 16 round indentations, called a Monkey. But if this plate were made of iron, the iron balls would quickly rust to it.
The solution to the rusting problem was to make the monkeys out of brass. However, it was discovered that brass shrinks much more and much faster than iron when chilled. Consequently, when the temperature dropped too far, the brass indentations would shrink so much that the iron cannon balls would come right off the monkey. Thus, it was quite literally, cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass
monkey...
Apocryphal or not? If the balls would rust to the iron monkey, why didn't they rust to each other? Why was it called a "monkey"? Why not a "base" or "stacking plate" or a "muffin tin" or something? Hmmm...
Here's what snopes.com has to say:
http://www.snopes.com/language/stories/brass.asp
Any ideas? Any other odd word origins?