why 'be loaded' ='be rich' I wached a moive,there is a scene:a girl is a waitress.She found her friend Raj is very rich by accident.Raj had supper in her restaurant one day.She gave the bill to Raj wh

Accedi

Yancey

why 'be loaded' ='be rich' I wached a moive,there is a scene:a girl is a waitress.She found her friend Raj is very rich by accident.Raj had supper in her restaurant one day.She gave the bill to Raj when he finished the supper,and she said to Raj:Don't cheap out on tip,we all know you are loaded now. Here is my queation:what is the meaning of be loaded. I suppose it means you are rich according to the context.But I think 'load' originally means putting something on a trunk or something else. So what is the connection between 'being rich' and 'be loaded'? Please answer my question.thank you.

25 mar 2012 14:20

Risposte · 9

This is an idiom, so it would not make sense to foreigners. Loaded does litterally mean something that is full or heavy because it is filled up. So somewhere in recent history, the terminology became a "saying" that means someone is loaded with money (his pockets or wallet?) and when someone is "loaded" we know it either means he has lots of money, or he is loaded with liquor.

25 marzo 2012

-- the pockets are loaded, probably not with handerkechiefs -- if the person has a load on him, and he does not get rid of it, the implication is that the load has some value! It is a kind of 'imaginary' use of a term, not really metaphorical, but once it has settled, the original depicted scene is forgotten and the term (loaded) acquires a new meaning. Moreover, a load can be easily divided among people, so the 'value' is not anything moral or related to knowledge (those are difficult to share or distribute even by a willing person), but must be related to possessions.

25 marzo 2012