My friend used this expression, "flat as a flitter", last night and said it came from her Mom, who hails from Kansas. Anyone know what a flitter could be?
Could that be a mutation of flinders?
When you pound the hell out of something brittle, it fllies in flinders. Dictionary.com defines flinders it as fragments or splinters.
The OxED has for its third noun entry:
Etymology: < German flitter.
‘A minute square of thin metal, used in decoration; collectively, a quantity of such squares’ ( Cent. Dict.).
18.. Beck's Jrnl. Dec. Art 2 40 (Cent. Dict. Suppl.) Strong and brilliant colors are freely used, together with gilt flitter, in the representation of flowering plants, fountains, and other devices [for window-shades].
A Ngram search found many books containing flitter but on the first page of books from 1825 to 1908 was this one.
Since there was a significant German influence in the central US, this origin is likely. BTW, it is a phrase also heard in southwest Missouri.
EmmettRedd said
Since there was a significant German influence in the central US, this origin is likely.
I recently read that there are more Americans of German ethnicity than English.
Not that it really matters. Until 1917,the house of Windsor caslled itself the house of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, and made no effort to hide their German heritage.
I decided to try flat as a flitter at this Google Ngram. This is the earliest I found in 1899.