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单词 to know a hawk from a handsaw
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(not) to know (also tell) a hawk from a handsaw
Contrasted with hawk n.1 as being something obviously different; esp. in (not) to know (also tell) a hawk from a handsaw: to be knowledgeable and competent (or ignorant and incompetent). [Apparently first used by Shakespeare (see quot. 1604). In this quot. handsaw has often been interpreted as either a folk-etymological alteration or a variant (with excrescent -d- ) of heronshaw n. (see to know a hawk from a hernshaw at heronshaw n. Phrases, and compare discussion at that entry). Other conjectures take hawk to show a different meaning here, e.g. denoting a plasterer's tool (hawk n.3, although this is first attested considerably later). See further the discussions in the Arden edition of Hamlet by H. Jenkins (1982) 473–4 and in H. Kökeritz ‘Five Shakespeare Notes’ in Rev. Eng. Stud. (1947) 23 311–20. Although the emendation of handsaw to heronshaw is regarded as plausible by many modern editors of Shakespeare, it has also been pointed out that the conceptual dissimilarity of the two noun elements need not exclude the possibility that handsaw denotes something else than a bird; compare e.g. the phrases containing chalk and cheese at chalk n. 6a.]
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1604 W. Shakespeare Hamlet ii. ii. 381 I am but mad North North west; when the wind is Southerly, I knowe a Hauke, from a hand saw.
1677 T. D'Urfey Fond Husband ii. iii. 19 He's a pretty spruce Fellow, Madam, and ifack knows a Hawk from a Handsaw, as the saying is.
1703 S. Centlivre Stolen Heiress iii. 41 San. He knows not a Hawk from a Handsaw. Fran. The Man's distracted, Sir.
1748 L. Pilkington Mem. II. 106 Finding when the Wind was in one particular Point, I was as wise as Hamlet, and knew a Hawk from a Handsaw.
1833 S. Smith Life & Writings Major Jack Downing 241 The great mass of them were about as much like the original letters, as a hawk is like a hand-saw.
1840 W. G. Simms Border Beagles I. viii. 127 A fellow wise enough to speak only upon cues..; and one who..can always ‘tell a hawk from a handsaw’.
1886 Harper's Mag. June 55/1 Capps knew a hawk from a handsaw when it came to talking about ‘moonshine’ whiskey.
1929 Times 9 Nov. 10/2 The famous jazz opera..was declared..to be sorry stuff and its jazz as little like the real thing as a hawk is like a handsaw.
1963 L. Kochan Struggle for Germany iii. 37 The Soviets knew a hawk from a handsaw, especially where foreign loans were concerned.
1998 B. Crick Ess. Citizenship (2000) x. 187 Too many literary editors do not know a hawk from a handsaw.
extracted from handsawn.
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更新时间:2024/12/23 5:24:26