Yeoman's Effort

Posted by ESC on March 13, 2005

In Reply to: Yeoman's Effort posted by Jeff on March 12, 2005

: I know what it means. Where does it come from?

"Yeoman" means "a middle class of small freeholders." "Yeoman service" is "Effectual service, characterized by hard and steady work. The reference is to the service of yeomen in the English armies of former days." From Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable revised by Adrian Room (HarperCollinsPublishers, New York, 1999, Sixteenth Edition).