One Foot in the Phrase

In 1546, John Heywood published a book of English proverbs called A Dialogue Conteinyng the Nomber in Effect of All the Prouerbes in the Englishe Tongue.

In it, he creates a conversation between two speakers Heywood calls simply A and B. The whole point of the book is to share wisdom in the form of proverbs commonly heard around England at the time. There are loads of common sayings in there, including early versions of a penny for your thoughts; the more the merrier; and out of sight, out of mind.

One phrase probably printed in English for the first time stands out to me:

The one foote in the grave.

Now, Heywood is very likely the first person to publish this phrase, but phrases like it had no doubt been around for a long time.

14 centuries earlier, the ancient Greek writer Lucian recorded a similar idea by writing in his dialogue about Charon, the god who takes you across the river Styx in Greek mythology. Here, he describes a relatively thin boundary between life and death, with a transition in between—a boat ride, in this case.

Ancient Romans called a person who might be about to die in extremis, which literally means on the edge, or at the extreme limit of life. This Greco-Roman influence came to dominate much of Europe, leading to the Middle Ages and the Church’s growing influence.

In the late Middle Ages, the Western Church formalized the idea of purgatory—an area between life and death. This introduced the idea of a state between life and death that helped to reinforce the idea of mortality.

Death was all around in Europe, especially between the years of 1347 and 1351, as the bubonic plague devastated the population by somewhere around half. Mementos mori were all around during this time, both metaphorical and literal, and that’s probably no surprise.

Since the time of Heywood, one foot in the grave has taken off and become a big part of the English language. If you want to describe feeling badly, but you want to cut it with humor, this is the card you typically play.

Strict interpretations of both Judaism and Islam prescribe burying any limb that’s severed, although I don’t know of any specific examples of where someone literally had one foot in the grave while they were alive. If you know about any, please do let me know in the comments:

I’ve actually had one literal foot in the grave, while digging Molly’s and Hallie’s final burial sites, and I did feel a sense of my own mortality, just for a moment. If you want to read about that experience, I wrote a bit about it here:

I have the strong sense that people still use this term quite a bit, but I’m also admittedly a lot less traveled than I was a few years ago. I don’t meet and talk to nearly as many different types of folks in person as I used to, so I need to rely on your reporting.

Do you say one foot in the grave from time to time? Is the phrase still commonly used where you are?