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The term raining cats and dogs derives from Victorian times when household pets, like cats and dogs, slept during the night on the eaves of houses. When it rained heavily, the water from the roof washed them off the eaves, and they came down with the torrent of water from the roofs of houses.
The idiom "it is raining cats and dogs" originated in England. Historically, cats and dogs were common pets, and during heavy rainfall, people would exclaim, "It is raining; get the cats and dogs inside."
LanguageExpressionEnglish TranslationWaaqatu baqaqethe sky got torndit reën ou meide /vrouens/anties met ...it's raining old tribal women/women/aunts ...dit reën paddas en platannasit's raining frogs and toadspo bie litarë-litarë[rain] is falling like ropes- Related Websites
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Online Etymology Dictionary External - A free online dictionary of word origins.World Wide Words External - The English language is forever changing: World Wide Words tries to record at least a part of this shifting wordscape by featuring new words, word histories, words in th...Ammer, Christine. Cool cats, top dogs, and other beastly expressions.Boston, Houghton Mifflin, c1999. 266 p.Brewer’s dictionary of phrase and fable. 17th ed. Rev. by John Ayto. New York, Collins, 2...Franza, Jackie. It’s raining cats and dogs: making sense of animal phrases.Illustrated by Steve Gray. Irvine, CA, BowTie Press, c2005. 64 p. (Juvenile)Hendrickson, Robert. The Henry Holt encyclopedia of word and phrase origins.1st Owl Book ed. New York, Holt, 1990. 581 p.Klingel, Cynthia Fitterer. It’s as clear as a bell! (and other curious things we say).Illustrated by Mernie Gallagher-Cole. Mankato, MN, The Child’s World, c2010. 24 p. (Juvenile)What's the meaning of the phrase 'Raining cats and dogs'? Raining very heavily. Origin – the short version. No one knows the precise source of the 17th century expression ‘raining cats and dogs’, but we can be sure that it didn’t originate because animals fell from the sky. Origin – the full story.
Dec 7, 2019 · There is something about the expression ‘it’s raining cats and dogs’ that is decidedly British: it is a distinctly British idiom, although most languages have a similar phrase – not involving cats and dogs, but using somewhat extreme imagery to convey the forcefulness and heaviness of the rainfall.
Jun 23, 2016 · First recorded circa 1629 as ‘to rain dogs and cats’, this phrase is based on a cat-and-dog fight as a metaphor for a storm or hard rain; the theory that Jonathan Swift coined the phrase is ludicrous.
May 21, 2021 · Raining Cats and Dogs Meaning. The phrase raining cats and dogs means that it is raining very hard. It is an idiom used to indicate that there is a torrential rainstorm going on. One would use this expression when it is raining very hard and heavily over an extended period of time.
