Eating Humble Pie

Posted on | January 13, 2010 | No Comments

pies

Where does the phrase humble pie come from you ask? It’s kind of gross, but an interesting story, so here it is according to word.com:

“Around the time the adjective humble was meekly making its way into English, lords of the manor would lead hunting parties on their estates. Once the prey was felled, butchers would reserve the haunch and large cuts for the master, and give gamekeepers and other lowborn folks the edible viscera (such as the liver, heart, and kidneys). These cuts (variously known as nombles, numbles, umbles, and humbles) were traditionally cooked in a thick stew with a crust – known as umble pie.

“Although nombles had no linguistic link to humble, by the early 1800s, the figurative eating of humble pie was being used to describe a person’s lowering of tone and becoming submissive. Is there a link between the edible humble pie and the earth-derived adjective humble? Lexicographers aren’t sure, but they suspect it’s nothing more than happy punning born of coincidence.”

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Eating Humble Pie

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