Coals to Newcastle
Selling, carrying, bringing or taking coal(s) to Newcastle is an idiom of English origin describing a pointless action.[1] It refers to the fact that, historically, the economy of Newcastle upon Tyne, in North East England, was a great centre of coal shipments from nearby mines; therefore any attempt to sell coal to Newcastle would be foolhardy, as supply would be greater there than anywhere else in Britain.[1]
Similarly, Newcastle in New South Wales, which is named after the English city, has after abundant coal deposits and one of the largest coal ports in the world; hence it would also be meaningless to ship coal there.
History
[edit]
In 1661–62, John Graunt, in his work on the Bills of Mortality for London,[a] uses the phrase in his introductory expression of gratitude to Lord Robartes, the Lord Privy Seal: "...I should (according to our English Proverb) thereby carry Coals to Newcastle..." The phrase predates the 1854 great fire of Newcastle and Gateshead by nearly two centuries and is thus not morbid humour in response to the fire.
The phrase is first documented in North America in 1679 in William Fitzhugh's letters: "But relating farther to you would be carrying Coals to new Castle."[2] It appears first in a printed title in Labour in Vain: Or Coals to Newcastle: A Sermon to the People of Queen-Hith, 1709.
Timothy Dexter, an American entrepreneur, purportedly succeeded in defying the idiom in the 18th century by shipping coal to Newcastle. Renowned for his eccentricity and regarded as a buffoon, he was persuaded to sail a shipment of coal to Newcastle by rival merchants plotting to ruin him. He wrote that he instead got a large profit after his cargo arrived during a miners' strike, which had crippled local production.[3][4]
More prosaically, the American National Coal Association asserted that the United States sold coal profitably to Newcastle in the early 1990s;[5] 70,000 tonnes (69,000 long tons; 77,000 short tons) of low-sulphur coal was imported by Alcan from Russia in 2004 for their local aluminium smelting plant.
Although the coal industry of Newcastle upon Tyne is now practically non-existent, the expression can still be used today with a degree of literal accuracy. At the harbour of Newcastle, in Australia, coal deposits were discovered there and exploited by early European settlers[6] has succeeded its English namesake by becoming the largest exporter of coal in the modern world.[7]
Contemporary use
[edit]With the increasing onset of globalisation, parallels in other industries occur; the idiom is now frequently used by the media when reporting business ventures whose success may initially appear just as unlikely. It has been referred to in coverage of:
- The export to India of saffron from Saudi Arabia and chicken tikka masala from the United Kingdom[8][9]
- The sale of Scottish pizzas to Italy,[10]
- The production of manga versions of William Shakespeare from Cambridge to Japan.[11]
Even though its original geographic origin may have been displaced, this cliché continues to be used.[12]
See also
[edit]- Owls to Athens
- Pizza effect
- Samovar - a similar proverb for the Russian language from playwright Anton Chekhov.
Notes
[edit]- ↑ Published by the Royal Society in 1665.
References
[edit]- 1 2 "Newcastle upon Tyne", Encyclopædia Britannica
- ↑ Bartlett, Jere Whiting; Early American Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases; (1977) page 76 "To carry Coals to Newcastle 1679 Fitzhugh Letters 67: 1768 Habersham Letters 68: [He] asked, if I wanted to carry Coals"
- ↑ Knapp, Samuel L. (1858). Life of Lord Timothy Dexter. Boston, US: J.E. Tilton and Company. Archived from the original on 2 December 2007.
- ↑ Nash, Jay Robert (1982). Zanies, The World's Greatest Eccentrics. New Century Publishers. ISBN 08-3290-123-7.
- ↑ "U.S. Beats the Price of Coal in Newcastle", William Flannery, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 10 May 1990
- ↑ "Newcastle". The Sydney Morning Herald. 8 February 2004. Retrieved 24 September 2008.
- ↑ "New Trade Record for Newcastle Port" (PDF). Minister for Ports and Waterways; Minister for Regulatory Reform; and Minister for Small Business (Press release). Newcastle Port Corporation. 6 August 2008. Retrieved 1 November 2008.
- ↑ "The Next Asian Journey: Shadows of Old Araby", Time, vol.158, no.7/8, 20 August 2001
- ↑ "Chicken tikka masala: Spice and easy does it", BBC News, 20 April 2001
- ↑ "Selling coals to Newcastle? How about pizzas to Italy? Cosmo Pasta Co. to sell gluten-free pizzas in Italy". Nation's Restaurant News. 37 (27). 7 July 2003. Archived from the original on 18 August 2004 – via FindArticles.
- ↑ "Putting the art in the wherefore art", Cambridge Evening News, 2 May 2007
- ↑ Quinion, Michael. "Coals to Newcastle". World Wide Words. Goodreads. Retrieved 20 October 2013.
External links
[edit]
The dictionary definition of sell ice to Eskimos at Wiktionary- The dictionary definition of bring owls to Athens at Wiktionary