Where did the term “kick the bucket” come from, why a bucket?
Idioms: kick the bucket Die, as in All of my goldfish kicked the bucket while we were on vacation. This moderately impolite usage has a disputed origin. Some say it refers to committing suicide by hanging, in which one stands on a bucket, fastens a rope around one’s neck, and kicks the bucket away. A more likely origin is the use of bucket in the sense of “a beam from which something may be suspended” because pigs were suspended by their heels from such beams after being slaughtered, the term kick the bucket came to mean “to die.” [Colloquial; late 1700s] http://www.answers.com/topic/kick-the-bu… There are many theories as to where this idiom comes from, but the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) discusses the following: * A person standing on a pail or bucket with their head in a slip noose would kick the bucket so as to commit suicide. The OED, however, says this is mainly speculative; * The OED describes as more
