shake a leg
shake a leg (idiom)
/ʃeɪk ə ˈlɛɡ/
Meanings
- Hurry up or move quickly; to act with urgency.
- Start dancing or move rhythmically to music (archaic/colloquial).
- Make a start; rouse oneself to action.
Synonyms: hurry up; get a move on; hustle; step on it; get cracking; dance; boogie; rouse oneself.
Example Sentences
- We’re late for school, so shake a leg and grab your bag! (hurry up)
- The music started and everyone rushed to shake a leg on the dance floor. (dance)
- Stop daydreaming and shake a leg—we have work to do! (make a start / rouse oneself)
Origin and History
“Shake a leg” has traveled through English with two enduring senses—”start dancing” and “hurry up.” The historical record shows an older British nursery-rhyme footprint for the collocation “shake a leg,” then a U.S. rise of the brisk imperative “Shake a leg!” as a call to get moving, with later popular confusion between this and the Royal Navy rouse-up cry “show a leg.” Put together, the evidence points to a British phrase that predates an American idiom meaning “hurry.”
The Dance-Invitation Strand
One explanation treats “shake a leg” as a jocular invitation to dance; idioms like this commonly extend from literal body-movement phrasing. This strand is visible in mid-19th-century American journalism where the phrase accompanies fiddle-music and dancing—strong evidence that speakers already heard it as “get on the floor and dance.” Secondary compendia trace such citations to U.S. newspapers of the 1860s (e.g., ball notices and local items), supporting a dance sense well before the 20th century.
Earliest U.S. Dance Citation
The earliest verifiable American example appears in the Dubuque Democratic Herald (Iowa), October 20, 1863, p. 3, col. 2:
“Nearly every man in town able to shake a leg has purchased a ticket.”
This usage refers explicitly to dancing, implying that those capable of participating in the ball had secured tickets. While some dictionaries suggest colloquial usage in the first half of the 1800s, no earlier specific U.S. print citation has been firmly documented. Other scattered examples from the 1860s and 1870s repeat this association with social dances and music. (Example reports cite Daily Patriot and Union [Harrisburg, PA], 1863 as well.)
The American “Hurry Up!” Strand
A second, later strand treats “Shake a leg!” as a brusque imperative meaning “move quickly.” Lexicographers of slang classify this as American, with late-19th-century military and shipboard contexts showing the command shouted during reveille, mess, and deck clearing. Contemporary narrative evidence from the Spanish-American War (1898) records sailors and petty officers barking “Shake a leg there!”—plainly in the “hurry” sense.
The Royal-Navy “Show a Leg” Myth
A persistent belief says “shake a leg” is the Royal Navy’s wake-up cry addressed to sailors in hammocks, sometimes embroidered with stories about women aboard being allowed to stay abed if they “showed a (female) leg.” The historical rouse-up formula in British seamanship is “show a leg”, documented in 19th-century naval dictionaries and memoirs; the embellished tale is not supported by early sources. The idiom “shake a leg” is distinct and later, and its “hurry” sense takes off in American, not British, print.
Nursery-Rhyme Grounding
Another clue to everyday speech is the nursery tradition. “Shake a leg” appears in printed children’s rhyme well before its U.S. idiomatic imperative career, showing the collocation was familiar in Britain early in the 19th century (and likely earlier in oral tradition). This doesn’t yet mean “hurry”; rather, it shows the phrasing was culturally available to be adapted to new senses later.
Where It First Appeared
If we ask where the phrase “shake a leg” first surfaces in print, the earliest securely verifiable footprint is Britain, in nursery-rhyme collections. If we ask where the idiomatic imperative “Shake a leg!” meaning “hurry up” takes hold in print, the evidence points to the United States in the late 1800s, especially in naval and work settings.
Earliest Printed Record of the Phrase (UK)
The Nursery Rhymes of England (ed. James Orchard Halliwell), London: J. R. Smith, 1846.
Citation (p. 93):
“Shake a leg, wag a leg, when will you gang? / At midsummer, mother, when the days are lang.”
This is a printed collection (noted antiquarian editor, London imprint) that furnishes a clear, datable example of the phrase in British rhyme. (The same rhyme is catalogued in earlier 19th-century collections such as Songs for the Nursery [Darton], with entries pointing to an 1812 London edition, but Halliwell 1846 is the earliest easily verifiable scan.)
Earliest Printed “Hurry Up” Imperative (US)
A Gunner Aboard the “Yankee”: From the Diary of Number Five of the After Port Gun (Russell Doubleday; ed. H. H. Lewis), New York: Doubleday & McClure, 1898.
Citation (ch. I)
“‘Seven turns, no more, no less,’ bawled the master-at-arms… ‘If you can’t pass your hammock through a foot ring, you’ll go on the report. Shake a leg there!‘”
The same command recurs at mess: “‘Shake a leg there, we want to get this deck cleared for quarters.’” These are unambiguous “get moving” uses in a U.S. naval setting. (The book bears the year 1898; a precise day is not printed in the volume.)
Sense Split in the Dictionaries
Major dictionaries and phrase resources split the entry into “dance” and “hurry” senses, with the latter especially flagged as American in origin. Slang lexicographers record the “hurry” imperative in the U.S. by the 1890s, while phrase dictionaries that tie “shake a leg” directly to the Navy wake-up call often conflate it with the older British “show a leg.” The balance of evidence supports two strands that later overlap in popular usage.
Origin Conclusion
The historical picture is layered. A British nursery-rhyme phrase “shake a leg” is in print by the mid-1800s (and likely in London by 1812), showing a long-standing collocation around leg-shaking and movement. In the United States, by the 1860s, it already meant “dance” (e.g., the Dubuque ad of 1863). By the 1890s, the formula hardens into a workplace and shipboard imperative—”Shake a leg!”—meaning “hurry up,” a usage then generalized to everyday speech. Folk etymologies that make it the Royal Navy’s original rouse-up call are best treated as conflations with “show a leg.”
Variants
- start shaking a leg
- shakes a leg
- shaking a leg
- better shake a leg
- don’t shake a leg
Similar Idioms
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