horses for courses
horses for courses (idiom)
/ˈhɔː.sɪz fə ˈkɔː.sɪz/ (UK)
/ˈhɔr.səz fər ˈkɔr.səz/ (US)
Meanings
- Different people are suited to different tasks.
- Choose the right person or tool for the job.
- (Literal) A racehorse performs best on a track suited to it.
Synonyms: suitability; aptitude; competence; fitness.
Example Sentences
- The manager said horses for courses when assigning tasks to team members based on their strengths.
- The company hired a marketing specialist because horses for courses—an accountant wouldn’t do that job.
- The trainer kept the horse only on turf races, proving it’s horses for courses. (literal)
Origin and History
The most direct account of the phrase holds that it arose within the practical language of horse racing: trainers and bettors observed that particular racehorses performed better on some tracks than on others, and this pragmatic observation was expressed succinctly in the racetrack vernacular. Over time that observation migrated from specialized racing talk into wider figurative use, where it came to signify that different people, methods, or tools suit different circumstances.
Country of Origin
Historical evidence consistently places the emergence of the phrase within British racing culture. The expression entered printed English through materials produced in Britain’s turf-writing and racing press before it appeared more widely in general prose and reference files.
Earliest Printed Attestation
The earliest traceable printed occurrence of the exact wording appears in late-nineteenth-century racing writing by A. E. T. Watson; the material circulated in racing periodical form in the early 1890s and was later collected in a trade edition in the 1890s, so bibliographic records cluster the first printed attestations in that decade. The periodical appearance is usually cited as the earliest point at which the phrase entered print, and the passage shows the wording already functioning as an established maxim within racing commentary.
“A familiar phrase on the turf is ‘horses for courses’.”
Dating and Bibliographic Ambiguity
A small but notable bibliographic ambiguity attends the early record: the phrase is recorded in periodical material dated to the early 1890s, while collected or trade editions that print the same material carry an imprint from the later 1890s. This produces two nearby dates in the surviving record (commonly cited as c.1891 for the periodical use and a later 1890s imprint for the book form). The discrepancy reflects the normal difference between initial publication in periodicals and later inclusion in collected volumes rather than evidence of competing origins.
Etymology and Semantic Development
Linguistically the phrase is transparently compositional: “horses” in the literal sense of racehorses and “courses” in the sense of racecourses or tracks. The two nouns join to express a practical racing truth; the semantic broadening from this literal sense to a general piece of practical advice (match person/method to task) follows a familiar pattern by which occupational jargon is reinterpreted as a common proverb or idiom.
Comparative Precedents and Conceptual Lineage
Although the exact wording “horses for courses” is late nineteenth century in its first printed appearances, the core idea it expresses—that different people or tools are suited to different tasks—is much older and widely attested in proverbial material across cultures. The phrase therefore represents a late-formulated verbal token for a longstanding practical maxim rather than the invention of a novel conceptual claim.
Historiographical Assessment
A cautious scholarly conclusion is that the phrase originated within British turf discourse and entered the broader language through racing commentary in the 1890s; the earliest printed traces come from A. E. T. Watson’s racing writing (periodical appearance c. 1891, later printed in a collected edition in the 1890s). The documentary record is robust enough to support this origin story while also leaving room for the usual bibliographic uncertainties that arise when periodical and book dates do not coincide.
Other Synonyms and Variants
- courses for horses
- different horses for different courses
- each to their own
- different strokes for different folks
- to each his own
- right man for the job
- one size doesn’t fit all.
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