Meaning
What does Spring Chicken mean?
The term Spring Chicken refers to a young a naive person who is often a woman. The phrase can also describe an older person, and in that case it would be “no spring chicken”.
Both of the phrases are mainly used to mock or offend someone. A young woman who is provocatively dressed and doesn’t have manners can also be called a “spring Chicken” .
Origin
What's the origin of Spring Chicken?
The origin of the term actually comes from its literal meaning. “Spring chicken” and “No spring chicken” dates back to the early 1700s.
Farmers quickly found out that the chickens that were born in spring brought better prices than the older ones that had gone through winter as well.
The earliest known appearance in print of the term in its figurative meaning was in 1906.
Spread & Usage
How did Spring Chicken spread?
On the term multiple definitions were written on different platforms like Cambridge and Oxford Dictionary, Urban Dictionary and many more places since “Spring Chicken” is a popular slang.
Also, various memes were made captioned with the term, and even postcards and birthday card were made with photographs of chickens followed by funny captions like “I may not be a Spring Chicken anymore, but at least I’m still kickin’ “.
External resources
- Urban Dictionary – spring chicken