What's the origin of the expression "Them's the breaks", meaning "that's how the cookie crumbles"?
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1Maybe generalized from the expression "Them's the rules", which seems to have been around decades earlier.– Peter ShorDec 28, 2012 at 5:27
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@PeterShor oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/…– KrisDec 28, 2012 at 6:12
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There is phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/42/messages/839.html but I don't believe we should be repeating unbounded conjecture as an answer, so I won't.– Andrew Leach ♦Dec 28, 2012 at 7:17
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@Kris: I was talking about the "them's the" part. From Google Ngrams, it appears that both "that's the breaks" and "them's the rules" have been around for much longer than "them's the breaks".– Peter ShorDec 28, 2012 at 13:47
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1 Answer
It is of American origin and comes from the game of pool.
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If it's from pool, why is "breaks" plural? It's always singular in pool. Dec 28, 2012 at 13:47
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6Google Books shows Them's the breaks emerging from That's the breaks [of the game] (1929-present) in a 1958 story by Robert Sheckley in Galaxy. Breaks of the game goes back at least to Billiards: Game, 500 Up (1846), where the game described appears to my ignorance to be what is now called 'English Billiards'. Dec 28, 2012 at 15:47