Sweet FA

Q. Sweet what

A. The full phrase is 'Sweet Fanny Adams', shortened to 'Sweet FA' or 'SFA', and it means 'nothing at all' in the sense that 'I got Sweet FA for my trouble.'

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Q. Why Fanny Adams

A. It's a grim tale. Fanny Adams was an 8-year-old girl who was raped, murdered and her body dismembered in a hop garden in Alton, Hampshire, in 1867. The murderer was a 21-year-old solicitor's clerk named Frederick Baker, who was later hanged at Winchester.

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In a phenomenal example of bad taste - or graveyard humour, depending on your perspective - Fanny Adams, the 'sweet' little girl whose murder was a sensation at the time, became a slang term for the tinned mutton - no need to explain why - issued to the Royal Navy in 19th century.

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As a result Sweet Fanny Adams became a byword for anything worthless and, by extension, for nothing.

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Q. Canned food in the 1860s

A. The principal of tinning food was exploited as early as 1810, when a Brit named Nicholas Appert heated food in sealed jars until any bacteria was killed and a vacuum formed. Later, one Brian Donkin, also British, adapted the principal using metal tins with soldered-down lids. Large tins of meat of 2lb to 4lb in weight were used by the forces and on polar expeditions. By all accounts they were pretty questionable culinary experiences, although rather better than weevil-infested ships' biscuits.

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Q. What else is sweet

A.

Sweet spot: a beneficial circumstance; also the spot on a tennis racket that, when the ball is hit from this point, reputedly sends the ball off at the highest velocity, though its existence has apparently been disproved

To be sweet on: to fancy

To have a sweet tooth: a liking for sweet foods

Keep someone sweet: to ingratiate oneself

Sweet william: an English garden flower, dianthus barbatus, a member of the pink family

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Q. So, it's not Sweet F***-all

A. It can be if you wish, but this is a more recent interpretation.

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For more on Phrases & Sayings click here

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By Simon Smith