Who ORIGINALLY ate all the pies? It was THIS guy!!

Revealed: Chubby Victorian footballer who inspired 'who ate all the pies' chant

Last updated at 12:36pm on 9th November 2007 Comments (2)

His name was William 'Fatty' Foulke, a rather large Victorian goalkeeper who inspired the derisory football terrace chant 'who ate all the pies?'.

Researchers discovered the origins of the mocking football chant and many other of the English language's most colourful chants, clichés and catchphrases.

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William 'Fatty' Foulke in his prime (left) before he became the object of derision for the chant 'who ate all the pies?'

The findings have been put into a new dictionary, with Foulke being the most interesting and intriguing.

Foulke kept goal for Sheffield United, Chelsea and Bradford City between 1894 and 1907.

Sheffield Utd footie fans playfully directed the chant at Foulke in 1894 who was in the Guinness Book of Records at the time as the heaviest ever footballer.

It has been used from the terraces at anyone with a less than Twiggy-like figure including ex-Newcastle United frontman Mickey Quinn who took the phrase 'Who ate all the pies?' as the title of his autobiography

But it is not just the fans who are recycling antique catchphrases.

Managers and players who claim to be 'over the moon' are using an expression first coined by Victorian and Edwardian aristocrats.

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William 'Fatty' Foulke lines up with his team-mates for a game at Chelsea's Stamford Bridge

An upper class crowd nicknamed The Souls developed their own language so they could exclude outsiders and took 'over the moon' from the nursery rhyme line 'the cow jumped over the moon' to mean joyous.

The dictionary uncovered hundreds which had their origins in sport from the expression 'you can run but you can't hide' to the US term 'taking a rain check.'

Julia Cresswell, author of The Cat's Pyjamas: The Penguin Book of Clichés, delved through documents and records at Oxford University's Bodleian Library, to try and find the first recorded use for many phrases.

The book's chapter on sport and games also shows 'you can run but you can't hide' was first coined by champion boxer Joe Louis of fleet-footed opponent Billy Conn in 1946.

And 'taking a rain check' goes back to 1884 when a 'rain check' was a free ticket to another baseball game for fans who had bought tickets to a game called off for bad weather.

The phrases 'off your own bat' and 'a safe pair of hands' both come from cricket but are now commonly used while a 'blow by blow' account and someone having a 'fighting chance' are both from boxing.

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William 'Fatty' Foulke pictured when he was becoming larger

But the term "fun and games" was found to have first been used in military circles at the turn of the 20th century rather than sporting ones to describe "exciting goings-on". It can now be a "sexual euphemism" too, the book adds.

Ms Cresswell said: "Where do clichés come from? Some have been in the language since our earliest records...others are news.

"Fashion plays a role in their use as do changes in society."

Other surprises uncovered by the book include 'mad for it', an expression associated with Manchester and in particular the Oasis brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher, actually dates from documents published in 1670.

It appears to have been used in much the same context as today to describe being excited about something, said Ms Cresswell.

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Victims: Gazza (left) and Crystal Palace defender Neil Ruddock became victims of the chant

Some catchphrases go even further back. To get out of the 'wrong side of the bed' dates back to the Romans who thought the left hand side was unlucky and 'to strike while the iron's hot' was used by Chaucer.

Men who like to 'sow their wild oats' can be traced back to a quote from 1576, 'blushing brides' were referred to in the 18th century and 'lie back and think of England' comes from a Lady's diary from the late 1800s.

Slightly more modern, 'did the earth move for you?' is adapted from 'did thee feel the earth move?' in a sex scene from Ernest Hemingway's 1940 novel of the Spanish Civil War, For Whom the Bell Tolls.

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Mad for it: Liam and Noel Gallagher didn't coin the phrase - it has been dated back to 1670

The phrase 'Kiss and Tell' was found in a book published in 1675 meaning exactly the same as it does now. And Shakespeare also takes the credit for many of today's popular expressions including beggars' belief, the unkindest cut, salad days, to the manner born, murder most foul, cruel to be kind and others.

The Cat's Pyjamas: The Penguin Book of Cliches by Julia Cresswell, published by Penguin, November 15th, £8.99 (paperback original).