Where did "p1$$ poor" come from?

Interesting history.

They used to use urine to tan animal skins, so families used to all pee in a pot.

And then once it was full it was taken and sold to the tannery...

if you had to do this to survive you were "P1$$ Poor".

But worse than that were the really poor folk who couldn't even afford to buy a pot...

They "didn't have a pot to p1$$ in" and were the lowest of the low.

The next time you are washing your hands and complain because the water temperature isn't just how you like it, think about how things used to be.

Same derivative as "Dirt Floor Poor", most of these phrases come from way back, even before the great depression, coal miners in the hills of WVA and surrounding states, the families were put up in shacks that had no floor, basically just a roof and four walls, living quarters were very small and often times several children shared the same room, rooms were seperated by bed sheets hung as a divider.

 

As history comes and goes, I take nothing for granted, I am thankful for each and every day and each and every thing I work for.

I had a college instructor who loved to talk about the meeting behind phrases like this.

 

How a dollar got called a buck, goes back to when fur trading was going on as the west was settled. A dear skin was worth $1.

 

Or "be there will bells on", goes back to the days or horse drawn carriages. If you ran into trouble you gave the bells from your carriage to who helped you. so showing up with bells on meant you had a safe trip. 

England is old and small and the local folks started running out of places to bury people.

So they would dig up coffins and would take the bones to a bone-house, and reuse the grave.

When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive.
So they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell.

Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night (the graveyard shift) to listen for the bell; thus, someone could be, “saved by the bell" or was "considered a dead ringer."

Brass Monkey

 

http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq107.htm

 

 

In 1500's England:

 

It was customary to hang up the bacon when visitors came over, It was a sign of wealth that a man could, "bring home the bacon." They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around and "chew the fat."

 

 

They "didn't have a pot to p1$$ in" and were the lowest of the low.

 

 

No sir. You are incorrect. Not having a pot to pi$$ in is bad, but if you don't have a window to throw it out, you are the lowest of the low. Hence the saying "you don't have a pot to pi$$ in or a window to throw it out of" -Grandma had some other doozies, none of which are appropriate for a public forum.

Here's my pot