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Archiver > OLD-WORDS > 2004-03 > 1079038218


From: Elsi <>
Subject: Re: [O-W] First Source of Phrase?
Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 14:50:18 -0600
In-Reply-To: <4050B945.2080302@pars.net>


At 01:08 PM 3/11/2004 -0600, you wrote:
>So perhaps some of you might be able to tell me if, when and
>(particularly) where you may have ever encountered the phrase "the
>unvarnished Truth".


Searching online, I found a couple of references at the online Webster's
Dictionary ( http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/ ) See "real",
"truth", and even "intrinsic".

Another search led me to a play presented in 1830 "Guy Faux; Or, The
Gunpowder Treason An Historical Melo-Drama, In Three Acts", By George
Macfarren. This transcription is "As performed at the Royal Coburg
Theatre. Original April 9, 1830."

-----------------
Enter Master Richard Catesby and Sir Everard Digby from the house, R. S.e.
Cat.(C.) "What I speak is an unvarnished truth."
---------------

I also found the phrase used with qualifiers, "the plain, unvarnished
truth" and "simple unvarnished truth".


From Scorpio Tales at
http://users.tinyonline.co.uk/gswithenbank/sayindex.htm -- "Unvarnished
truth: Something made of wood that is unvarnished is still rough, without
embellishments, and that is the image behind this expression. The first
recorded use in any sense of unvarnished is Shakespeare's 'I will a round,
unvarnish'd tale deliver,/Of my whole course of love (Othello, I.iii), and
we probably owe our use of the word to mean 'plain, direct', to this. The
linking of truth to unvarnished was established by the 19th century."

Given that Shakespeare died in 1616, this usage has been around for a
*LONG* time.

And, searching bartleby.com I found "unvarnished truth" used to define
"matter-of-fact" in a dictionary of phrases published in the 1890s.



Lastly, there's this related usage: Bishop Fulton J. Sheen is quoted as
saying, "Baloney is the unvarnished lie laid on so thick you hate it.
Blarney is flattery laid on so thin you love it."


Regards,
Elsi

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