The practice of biting down on a bullet remained in effect until the invention of ether in 1846. It is a point of honor in some regiments, among the grenadiers, never to cry out, or become nightingales, whilst under the discipline of the cat of nine tails to avoid which, they chew a bullet." Here Grose says, "A soldier who, as the term is, sings out at the halberts. Nevertheless, this is a practice that we read about in "A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue" by Francis Grose in 1796. However, there isn't a whole lot of evidence available that doctors would have their patients bite down on a bullet instead of a leather strap. This would prevent them from screaming or, biting their own tongue. Before anesthetics existed soldiers who needed to have painful procedures performed would bite down on a bullet so as to distract them from the pain. The best-known one has to do with the phrase's literal meaning. There are a few different ideas regarding the origin of this phrase. In the same way that there are synonyms for "bite the bullet" there are also antonyms – some of which include: You'll also discover that there are many different ways in which you can say "bite the bullet." While some of these phrases are synonymous with the phrase itself others aren't an exact match or replacement but they do still express a similar sentiment. "Bite the bullet" is such a commonly used phrase today that there are actually many different ways in which it can be said, including: Nevertheless, you can still use this phrase in both of these scenarios. For instance, you may hate doing laundry but it isn't painful in the same sense that getting a root canal would be. In these cases, the phrase may be used hyperbolically (to exaggerate the truth). They may not even be physically difficult or painful. The types of things you may not want to do can vary widely. Typically this situation is unavoidable so you need to be brave and "bite the bullet."
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Instead, what it means is that you have the courage to force yourself through a situation that's either uncomfortable or difficult for you. There may have been a time when someone told you to "bite the bullet." Most people realize that this doesn't mean that they should literally bite down on a hard bullet. "Bite the bullet" is an idiom that dates back to 1891 when Rudyard Kipling used it in his novel "The Light that Failed." It means that you're choosing to do something that's difficult, painful, or unpleasant after you've spent some time putting it off or hesitating over it because it's unavoidable. These phrases are great to use for spicing up your writing if you know what they mean. Bite the bullet may have originated in the civil war.There are a lot of different phrases that are used in the English language today. Bullets are also readily available in times of war, when this type of surgery is frequently called for. Although quite strong they will actually deform somewhat when bitten hard.Hence teeth would not break as would likely happen from biting a stone for example. Why bite on a bullet? Made of lead, bullets are malleable. It may also have helped to reduce the screaming, which probably benefited the surgeon and attendants. The bullet or stick was given to let the patient focus their energy and attention on the biting instead of the cutting and pain. To ease the pain the patient was given a couple of stiff belts of whiskey to numb the senses, then given a stick or lead bullet to bite down on as the surgeon went to work with knife and saw. Amazingly, some of these patients survived, but certainly the success ratio was low (poorly skilled physicians today are called hacks).
PHRASES THAT MEAN BITING THE BULLET SKIN
The skin was then pulled down over the stub and sutured shut. These early surgeries were typically limb amputations or the removal of some object lodged into the body such as a bullet or arrowhead.Ī typical amputation consisted of the surgeon using a saw to hackoff the unwanted limb. (3) Housewives are biting the bullet after another increase in LPG prices.īefore the advent of ether, the first anesthetic surgery was a pretty desperate and painful affair, with the patient fully conscious and feeling the pain. (2) Rohan decided to bite the bullet and pay extra for the car that he really wanted.
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(1) If you want to clear those 8 tickets off your driving record, you will need to bite the bullet and pay the fines.