The expression to have someone's guts for garters is very old, from a time when it might well have been derived from a literal usage. But there is no clear evidence about it as suggested by the Phrae Finder. Probably, as suggested by World Wide Words, the use of alliteration and the use of similar phrases helped the saying become more popular in recent decades

• The oldest example I can track down is from The Bride of Lammermoor, by Sir Walter Scott, published in 1819: “He that would not pledge me, I would make his guts garter his stockings”.
• But, according to Paul Beale’s update of Eric Partridge’s A Dictionary of Catch Phrases, it has been around in various forms since the eighteenth century, was at one time Cockney low slang or the cant of racecourse toughs, and was a common reprimand or threat by NCOs in the services during World War Two and afterwards. As that book notes, it has since risen somewhat in the social scale to become a macho phrase among some middle managers.
• When it first came into use two hundred years ago, it must have been a serious warning, implying disembowelling, but in modern times it is merely figurative, implying that one will take some unspecified action in reprisal for unacceptable behaviour. The persistence of the expression surely owes a lot to the alliteration of guts and garters, but also to the existence of similar phrases such as to hate somebody’s guts. The fact that modern British men rarely wear garters, and that when they do they tend to call them sock suspenders, has not affected the popularity of the phrase!

The expression to have someone's guts for garters is very old, "and it may well have had a literal meaning as it originated in the Middle Ages, when disembowelment was used in the UK for torture and execution" as suggested by the Phrase Finder. Probably, as suggested by the World Wide Words, the use of alliteration and the use of similar phrases helped the saying become more popular in recent decades

• The oldest example I can track down is from The Bride of Lammermoor, by Sir Walter Scott, published in 1819: “He that would not pledge me, I would make his guts garter his stockings”.
• But, according to Paul Beale’s update of Eric Partridge’s A Dictionary of Catch Phrases, it has been around in various forms since the eighteenth century, was at one time Cockney low slang or the cant of racecourse toughs, and was a common reprimand or threat by NCOs in the services during World War Two and afterwards. As that book notes, it has since risen somewhat in the social scale to become a macho phrase among some middle managers.
• When it first came into use two hundred years ago, it must have been a serious warning, implying disembowelling, but in modern times it is merely figurative, implying that one will take some unspecified action in reprisal for unacceptable behaviour. The persistence of the expression surely owes a lot to the alliteration of guts and garters, but also to the existence of similar phrases such as to hate somebody’s guts. The fact that modern British men rarely wear garters, and that when they do they tend to call them sock suspenders, has not affected the popularity of the phrase!

The expression to have someone's guts for garters is very old, from a time when it might well have been derived from a literal usage. But there is no clear evidence about it as suggested by the Phrae Finder:

originated in Britain. Despite being a long-lived expression there, aided no doubt by the rhythmic alliteration, uses of it aren't found in any great numbers in other countries. It may well have had a literal meaning as it originated in the Middle Ages, when disembowelment was used in the UK for torture and execution. In these more enlightened times the expression is limited to figurative examples like, "I don't want to tell Dad that I've scraped the car - he'll have my guts for garters".

A printed reference to 'guts for garters' appears in Robert Greene's The Scottish Historie of James the Fourth, circa 1592. -

• Ile make garters of thy guttes, Thou villaine.

Whether that was a literal threat and whether people did actually make garters of the guts of their enemies is open to question. I can find no direct evidence of a documented example of such a practice, but it is certainly quite plausible. Worse things happened; the punishment of 'hanged, drawn and quartered' was on the statue book in England until as late as 1790.

There are several other instances in the 16th/17th centuries of allusions to the use of someone's guts being made into garters - "Sir, I will garter my hose with your guttes" etc. The earliest use of the actual wording 'guts for garters' that I can find comes quite a long time later, in from a piece by William Curry, in The Dublin University Magazine, 1843:

The expression to have someone's guts for garters is very old, from a time when it might well have been derived from a literal usage. But there is no clear evidence about it as suggested by the Phrae Finder. Probably, as suggested by World Wide Words, the use of alliteration and the use of similar phrases helped the saying become more popular in recent decades

• The oldest example I can track down is from The Bride of Lammermoor, by Sir Walter Scott, published in 1819: “He that would not pledge me, I would make his guts garter his stockings”.
• But, according to Paul Beale’s update of Eric Partridge’s A Dictionary of Catch Phrases, it has been around in various forms since the eighteenth century, was at one time Cockney low slang or the cant of racecourse toughs, and was a common reprimand or threat by NCOs in the services during World War Two and afterwards. As that book notes, it has since risen somewhat in the social scale to become a macho phrase among some middle managers.
• When it first came into use two hundred years ago, it must have been a serious warning, implying disembowelling, but in modern times it is merely figurative, implying that one will take some unspecified action in reprisal for unacceptable behaviour. The persistence of the expression surely owes a lot to the alliteration of guts and garters, but also to the existence of similar phrases such as to hate somebody’s guts. The fact that modern British men rarely wear garters, and that when they do they tend to call them sock suspenders, has not affected the popularity of the phrase!