Pay through the nose

Posted by ESC on May 28, 2005

In Reply to: Pay through the nose posted by Bruce Kahl on May 27, 2005

: : I can't find the phrase "to pay through the nose" on this site. Anyone got any ideas or even enough information to make this into an entry on the site?

: Just a guess.
: Blood is a very valuable commodity to things living.

: Blood can leave the body via the nose very easily.
:
: I am not 100% on this but I think your phrase may have to do with bleeding,paying for something with a high value contentlike blood.

I always think of the guy who got his nose slit in the movie "Chinatown."

PAY THROUGH THE NOSE - "Be charged an exorbitant price. Why nose? One superstition is that this kind of paying is as irksome as a nosebleed. Another tale has it that the Danes levied a tax on the Irish in the 9th century, and that anyone who failed to pay it was punished by having his nose slit. In any event, we find Andrew Marvell writing in 1672 (in 'The Rehearsal Tranposed' (: "Made them pay it most unconsciously and through the Nose." From The Dictionary of Cliches by James Rogers

• Pay through the nose - a little bit more James Briggs 30/May/05