May as well be hanged for a sheep as for a goat.

Posted by GPP on September 24, 2003

In Reply to: May as well be hanged for a sheep as for a goat. posted by Smokey Stover on September 23, 2003

: : : : Perhaps this is better known, or appears in the thesaurus, in some other form. I'm not sure what it means precisely. In olden times sheep were considered more valuable than goats. But I don't see how that matters.

: : : I know it as 'a sheep for a lamb'. This makes more sense as sheep are more valuable than lambs. I can't say I recall ever hearing the 'goat' version here in the UK. I await correction!

: : I see you managed a second posting on this one - and got the same answer as I just gave!

: I managed a second posting because I wasn't sure my first had worked. I'm new and somewhat confused by how the system works.

Smokey, I'm not sure why you're asking the same question again, unless you weren't satisfied with the Quinion answer you got on the first go-round, below. "Goat" is a misquotation, used by someone who got the phrase confused and put in "goat" instead of "lamb". It doesn't make any sense with "goat".