Name: English Tutor Nick P Word Origins (88) Big Wig
Uploaded: 2019-12-09T03:24:30.000Z
Duration: 3 min 44 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Word Origins 88. The word origin today is

"bigwig. " Okay. Let's take a look at the note here. If we say that someone is a

big wig,  it means that he or she is a very important person of power or

authority,  especially somebody in a company or an organization. So we say

somebody is a big wig. Okay. Let's continue.

Sometimes this term is used in a disparaging way. Like maybe sometimes we

don't like this person. We're kind of annoyed by them. Sometimes when we call

them a bigwig ... in a  disparaging way to show you don't like them or look upon

them unfavorably. All right. Let's continue.  The origin of this term goes back to the

1600s. The first wigs seem to have taken off in France. Remember here we say take

off means became very popular in France.  King Louis the XIII started to go

bald prematurely. So you know,  at a young age and started wearing a wig. So you could

kind of say he set it off. Maybe he was a little bit of a trendsetter. Soon after

it became almost mandatory for anyone of royalty,  nobility or high standing in

society to wear them. Okay. Basically anyone who was anyone or anyone of

importance or significance needed to wear one. Wigs were very expensive and

only the rich powerful and wealthy could afford such an extravagance. Okay. Over

time,  the bigger and the higher one could wear a wig , the more the more status it

would be a symbol of. Thus the term big wig was born. So that's why they said

they must be a big wig some person of high importance basically.

Okay. Good. And lawyers were also expected to wear them. That's why even in

today ... Today even in England we still see that some lawyers still wear them  from this

very old tradition. And it must be hot and we know even today those that wear

them in England they are very expensive those wigs. Okay let's continue. The

earliest use appears in the late 1700s.  Well here the earliest use means the

earliest use of the term big wig. The wigs probably started in like around the

1600s but you know,  by the 1700 so we could find the term in use. Okay. And we

just have a couple of examples to cover this. You need to make sure everything

appears in order. Some of the big wigs from headquarters are visiting our

factory today. So if anything looked out of order you know , somebody at the

factory ...  the managers at the factory might get in trouble or they might have some

problems. They might have something said to them. So when they know they're coming,

they try to make everything look good before they get there. Some big wigs are

coming and you got to make sure ... no mess,  no nothing around. Okay. Number two. Some big

wigs in the State Department decided to cut our benefits. This is another way

that you are  kind of like annoyed at them.  This would be a typical way that we

might use it. Okay. Anyway,  I hope you got it. I hope it was clear. I hope it was informative.