Lamb’s Legs

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Yes, hello. This is Ben Gurnett from Quincy, Florida.

What can we do you for today?

Well, I had a question about, I’m from Indiana, and growing up there, I never remember it from my childhood,

But I now have two children, and my parents, whenever the kids have a runny nose where it’s just dripping down their lips, you know,

They call that, they say it has lamb’s legs.

Lamb’s legs?

Lamb’s legs.

For a runny nose, like the glazed lip, right?

The donut face?

Right, right.

Exactly.

Oh, what a nice question.

I thought it was a fitting question for the show.

Yeah.

So you’ve got a couple of kids yourself.

I have one, so it’s a common feature of childhood, right, is the glazed face.

Right, right.

So what do you know about this?

Is this something that they learned from their parents?

They don’t know where it came from.

They both grew up in West Lafayette, Indiana.

So what would they say about it exactly?

How would you use it in a sentence?

We need to wipe the lamb’s legs off his nose.

Oh, that’s so cute.

Yeah, so I don’t know if you guys have come across that.

That is fantastic.

Well, it is a term that we see in dictionaries back to, what, the 19th century?

Probably, yeah.

In Britain.

Either lamb’s leg or lamb’s tail as well.

Although I like the idea of the legs, you know.

The two coming down.

The two little legs hanging down there, I guess.

That’s all I know to suggest is that it’s a resemblance.

So we got it from the naughty Brits is what you’re saying?

Yeah.

And is this widespread in this country?

No, it’s not in the south or the west so much.

It’s more in the Indiana, Wisconsin.

So north of the Ohio River.

Yes, yes.

North of the Mason-Dixon line.

So that would fit perfectly with your experience.

Oh, very good.

I’ve never heard that.

I’ve never heard that at all.

That’s great.

I love it.

It’s terrific, isn’t it?

Mm—

Yeah.

There’s only one other weird expression like that that I know in English, and that is candle.

Who uses that?

Well…

So like a dripping of wax, then.

Exactly.

Exactly.

And there’s a similar expression in Spanish.

That’s what made me think about it.

And I looked into it, and sure enough, George Eliot wrote about a little seven-year-old

Vainly contending against candles at his nose by feeble sniffing.

Candles at his nose.

It’s like candle dripping.

Same thing in Spanish.

But I do like lamb’s leg.

That’s nice.

It’s a constant predicament.

The boogery boy in my house is a common feature several times a year.

Right.

How old are your children?

Four and one and a half.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, my.

Prime years for mucus phase.

You have a whole flock of lamb legs there, don’t you?

Yeah, usually at the same time.

Yeah, so we know a little bit about lamb’s leg.

We know that it comes into American English from British English.

It’s got some widespread use.

Still not that common in the Ohio River Valley,

Especially to the north of that and south of the Great Lakes.

And so your parents are speaking a dialect term

That’s part of a larger pattern rather than just something they made up.

Yeah, a longer tradition.

Ben, I bet a lot of people pick this up now.

It’s just too picturesque to pass up, I think.

Right.

Thanks for calling, Ben.

All right.

Thank you.

Take care.

Bye-bye.

Have a good day.

Bye.

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