Ever since the astonishing theft of the French crown jewels from the Louvre Museum of I have struck by how often the expression ‘brazen heist’ has been used to describe the theft.
Let’s look at those two words separately.
The word ‘heist’ began life (in the 1930s) as an American slang variation on the word ‘hoist.’
And ‘hoist’ is an ancient word (of Germanic origin) and just means ‘to lift.’
When someone steals the French crown jewels, they ‘lift’ them and carry them way—they ‘hoist’ them—making their theft a ‘heist.’
As for ‘brazen’—this appeared in Old English more than a thousand years ago and (literally) meant ‘made of brass.’
In fact, as you can see, ‘brazen’ is constructed from the word ‘brass.’
Where ‘brass’ came from is (the Oxford says) ‘unknown’—but there are related words in Old Swedish and Danish.
The Old English ‘brass’ was, usually at least, an alloy of copper and tin (that is, ‘bronze’); in much later times the alloy of copper and zinc came gradually into general use and became the ordinary ‘brass’ of England.
In its earliest times ‘brass’ was known principally for its hardness.
And it's this quality of ‘hardness’ that gave us the metaphorical extension where ‘brass’ and ‘brazen’ were used to mean something like ‘hardness of heart’ or boldness.
The Merriam-Webster says it means ‘marked by shameless or disrespectful boldness.’
From at least the 1600s (and perhaps slightly earlier) ‘brazen’ was used to mean ‘a type of insensibility to shame: hence, Effrontery, impudence, unblushingness.’
And both ‘brazen’ and ‘brass’ continue to be used in that way up until today.
If someone is pushing themselves forwards in a bold and insensitive way, we can still say either ‘he’s got a lot of brass’ or ‘he’s being brazen.’
And we have the common simile ‘as bold as brass.’
Which is exactly what the Louvre thieves were—bold as brass!
Hence, when they lifted (or ‘hoisted’) those jewels it was a ‘brazen heist.’
The November-December issue of Australian Geographic is in newsagents now. On the front cover is the tiny pygmy possum, and inside are my two small columns -- one on 'Placenames' and the other on 'Ozwords.'
What is the unspoken truth about climate change? I spell it out in my latest column for Sky Online. You can read it here:
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If you'd like to see my A-Z list of Aussie slang, you'll find it here in the Australian Geographic website -- A-Z list of Aussie slang. Here’s the link: The A-Z of Aussie slang - Australian Geographic
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