At Sixes and Sevens

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi there, this is Kian calling from Dublin, Ireland.

Hi, Kian from Dublin, welcome.

Hi, Kian, welcome to the show. How can we help?

Thanks, guys. Yeah, I just had a quick query about a phrase.

I hear it all the time on television over here.

It’s being at sixes and sevens.

What does that mean when you hear that? What are they saying?

So, normally you’d hear from, like, sportscasters, if they’re commentating on, you know, soccer or rugby or something. The context would sort of mean that, you know, the defense is a bit disorganized, muddled, you know, sort of all over the place.

And you use this yourself?

Oh, yeah. I think it would be a pretty common term over here. But nobody seems to actually understand the actual literal meaning. But everyone, you know, understands what it means just through context.

Martha, do you use this to say you’re at six and six, to mean you’re disorganized?

Every once in a while. Well, I’m not disorganized.

Are you sure?

If I’m talking about the idea of being disorganized, every once in a while, yeah. Or if I’m nonplussed, if I just can’t figure out how to do something, I’ll say I’m at sixes and sevens.

I know it, but it’s only from watching British TV shows and reading British newspapers on the Internet and listening to the BBC, that sort of thing. But it’s not something I ever use.

Really?

At sixes and sevens to mean disorganized or chaotic.

I do.

Yeah.

And the phrase itself is sort of that way. Sort of disorganized and chaotic.

And its history.

It’s hard to figure out.

Yeah, its history. Its etymology is disorganized as well, Kian. There are a number of theories, and as often the case, most of the theories are rubbish, but there may be one theory that has some legs, as they say in Hollywood about a successful film, and that is it might come from an old dice game that used French language for the numbers, which was cinq et six, and it was misunderstood in English as sixes and sevens.

And you wanted to get or didn’t want to get a certain combination on your dice rolls. And therefore, if you got the wrong combination, you were at sixes and sevens.

It’s vaguely like the modern day craps.

Yeah, that particular combination was the most risky when we were throwing dice.

Yeah, and it was called hasard, which is also the root of our English word hazard.

Yes.

Which is very interesting.

Yes, it goes all the way back to Arabic.

Arabic, oh, very nice, very interesting.

So it’s probable all of the best etymological resources, the ones that we trust, the Michael Quinion there in the U.K., well, not there, but not far from you in the U.K., and Oxford English Dictionary and a couple other resources, all are pretty firm on this coming from the dice game.

Okay, so it would be a pretty old term then.

Yeah, it’s very old, hundreds of years.

But you’re hearing it a lot with sportscasters.

That’s interesting.

It seems to be their default go-to when, you know, somebody goes through the defense and scores a goal, and, you know, the defense is all over the place. They always say it’s sixes and sevens.

Oh, interesting.

I guess it kind of always makes me laugh because, you know, I never knew the origin of it.

Did you get what you were after?

Absolutely, yeah. I’ve been looking for that for a while, so, you know, I really appreciate that.

All right.

Thanks for calling.

Bye-bye.

Great.

Thanks very much.

Cheers.

All right.

Bye-bye.

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