Living daylight

Posted by Smokey Stover on May 10, 2009 at 22:07

In Reply to: Living daylight posted by ESC on May 10, 2009 at 17:38:

: : Where does 'to frighten the living daylight out of you' come from?

: Frighten or beat the living daylights out of you. Probably from "daylights" for eyes. Earliest citation 1884. (Another meaning for daylight - windowpane.) "Dictionary of American Regional English," Volume II, D-H, by Frederic G. Cassidy and Joan Houston Hall (1991, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., and London, England). Page 19.

The first usage of daylights as eyes cited in the OED is "1752 FIELDING Amelia I. x. (D.), If the lady says such another word to me..I will darken her daylights." Does he mean he will blacken her eyes? In later quotations, a few are ambiguous, in that one would have to see the context to know if one should equate daylights literally with eyes. If so, then a degree of brutality rarely seen today outside of prisons and interrogation centers (and historically during public executions) must have been tolerated by the public with equanimity.
But I'm going to assume that most expressions using "daylights" for eyes were metaphorical.
SS