cock-and-bull story

Meaning: A story that is too unlikely to be believed.

Example: “He told his teacher some cock-and-bull story about a goat eating his homework.”

Origin: In print from the early 17th century; Robert Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy (1621) mentions "tales of a cock and a bull." It probably refers to old fables of talking animals, and French had a similar coq-à-l'âne (cock to the donkey) for rambling nonsense. A popular story links it to two coaching inns, the Cock and the Bull, in Stony Stratford, whose travelers swapped tall tales, but that is not documented.

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