Re: Great Scott

Posted by Bruce Kahl on August 06, 2001

In Reply to: Great Scott posted by Milo on August 06, 2001

: Why people make that statement in certain situations.

People will make that statement because they are amused or shocked by some thing or event. I should have said that when I saw my daughter's newly acquierd tatoo instead of what I did say to her.

The German word for god is "gott".
Brewers says that the "go" in "gott" was gradually changed to an "sc" which makes it a minced pie, no , whoops, a Minced oath.

A minced oath is what we say as a substitute for a more offensive word or statement.
For instance, when you accidentally delete a system file in Windows you wanna yell out "Oh, S_ _ T!!" but instead you yell out "Oh, darn".

• Brewer's Phrase & Fable