Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Idioms 233.The idiom today is straight from the
horse's mouth. Okay. Let's take a look at the note here. If someone gets
information straight from the horse's mouth. it means it is directly from the
most reliable source or someone got information firsthand. So either way, then
we say you got you've got the information straight from the horse's
mouth. All right. Let's continue. This idiom has the
same origin as another proverb we covered. Yeah. I covered this one, oh I
don't know maybe about four or five months ago at least. Where the the
proverb was don't look a gift horse in the mouth.
Okay. The origin of both phrases is related to the old custom of inspecting
a horse's teeth to judge its age or health. That's why I come up ... we kind
of joked about that one. Like a lot of times when somebody gives you a present
you shouldn't really be inspecting the present and saying, " huh what is this ? What did
you give me? " So the same idea originally came from that phrase. You know, if you ...if
someone was nice enough to give you a horse, remember in the old days giving in
somebody horses like giving somebody a car today.
If somebody was nice enough to give you a horse you shouldn't complain about it,
But the way to check you know, how healthy or how old the horse was you
opened and you looked in its mouth. And I forget all the details exactly but as
the horse ages, I think some teeth actually kind of move forward and some
spread a little bit. And if you know enough you could really figure out
exactly how old they are, or sometimes how healthy they are. So both is
important. So that was the way you're getting it right from the horse's mouth.
So one, you don't look a gift horse in the mouth meaning don't complain about
gifts that you got. You don't say uh ? How old is this horse ? Whether you give me an
old horse a used horse. You don't do that. You just say thank you very much for a
gift. But in this case, it means this is where you got the
information from. Directly from that. All right. And then I've heard some others
say to that not only is it inspecting it , but sometimes like to get the
information straight from the horse's mouth , sometimes they used to ask like
the guys that worked in the stable or took care of the horses about that
information. Because they would be the ones that would be inspecting the horse's
mouth. So I think this was to do with horse racing. If they wanted to gamble you
know, somebody said they got a tip but maybe they got it straight from the
horse's mouth. Maybe the person... now of course it was not a
talking horse, like the old TV show like I think it was called MR. Ed. But this
is actually from the person that takes care of the horses or looks at them they
would know how healthy they are or maybe even how old they are and that might
help a lot in deciding whether they could have a good chance to win or not.
All right. Anyway, let's, let's take a look a couple examples here. Example
number one. You can trust when I tell you. I got it straight from
the horse's mouth. So you got it directly from the source that you needed it from.
Or number two. That business analyst claims you can trust his advice because
he has inside connections. And they told him they got it straight from the
horse's ... they got the information straight from the horse's mouth. Yeah.
Maybe they got it directly from the boss or the CEO or something like that. So
he's giving you advice to either buy or sell the stock. But anyway , so they're
saying they got that information straight from the horse's mouth. Anyway I
hope you got it. I hope it's clear. Thank you for your time. Bye-bye.