hale and hearty
Meaning: Healthy and strong, especially in old age.
Language: English
Literally: (Already vivid in English)
Example: “At ninety, my grandmother is still hale and hearty.”
Category: Body & Senses
Origin: "Hale" is an old northern English word for whole or healthy, related to "whole" and "health." The alliterative pair is found from the 18th century.
Equivalents in other languages
- French: Avoir bon pied bon œil — literally: To have a good foot and a good eye
More idioms — Body & Senses
- break a leg — Good luck, said to a performer before going on stage.
- an eye for an eye — Punishment should match the injury; revenge in kind.
- grease someone's palm — To bribe someone.
- go by shanks' mare — To walk; to travel on foot.
- have a foot in both camps — To be involved with two opposing sides at once.
- deaf as a post — Completely deaf.
More English idioms
- find one's sea legs — To get used to a boat's movement; to grow comfortable in a new situation.
- hey presto — Said when something happens suddenly, as if by magic.
- search me — I don't know.
- set the cat among the pigeons — To say or do something that causes trouble or uproar.
- storm clouds are gathering — Trouble is coming.
- be rolling in it — To be very rich.
From our tongue twisters
- The sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep's sick. — Believed by Guinness to be among the hardest in English — 'six/sick/sheikh/sheep' blur in…
- Betty Botter bought some butter, but she said the butter's bitter. — A 'b / t / tt' plosive drill that bounces between Betty, butter, and bitter.
- She sells seashells by the seashore. — The definitive 's' versus 'sh' alternation — the tongue has to switch place of articulati…