Where words and phrases come from is a fascinating subject, full of folklore and historical lessons. (Today, we continue with phrases beginning with I)

In limbo - in a state of being lost, forgotten, deserted or unwanted.

Origin - Originally it was a term in medieval Roman Catholic theology. It is a form of the Latin limbus (border, edge), as found in limbus infantum (the abode of children who died before baptism) and limbus partum (the abode of the just who died before Christ, thus lacking redemption). From meaning a region on the border, limbo came to acquire its modern meaning.

In one’s black books - out of favour

Origin - The earliest Black Books were official documents; the adjective seems to have had no other significance than to indicate the colour of the binding. For example, there were the Black Books of the Exchequer (about 1175), listing royal revenues, and the Black Books of the Admiralty, containing rules compiled in the reign of Edward III. A Black Book of the 1530s, during the reign of Henry VIII, lists abuses in the monasteries, and it is from about this time that a black book became specifically associated with censure or punishment, as it still is.

From this sense emerged blacklist, denoting people considered disloyal, untrustworthy or deserving of punishment

In purdah - isolated from others (often by disgrace)

Origin - In the original Urdu and Persian a purdah was a curtain, especially one to screen women to prevent their being seen by men. It came to be the name for the whole custom of secluding women in some Muslim and Hindu communities, but the modern metaphorical use in English has a far more general application.

In the cart - in trouble

Origin - This most likely refers to the cart in which condemned people used to be taken to public execution or from which they were hanged, the noose being placed around their necks as they stood in the cart, which was then driven off.

In the doghouse - in disgrace

Origin - Doghouse is an old English word superseded by ‘kennel’, but finally returned to Britain in this colloquial phrase. One commentator has said that on slave-ships the passengers were chained in the hold and the seamen slept in rough shelters on deck, known as doghouses because they were bare and uncomfortable. Another suggests that the expression originated with Peter Pan (1904) in which Mr. Darling lives in the doghouse as a penance for his poor treatment of the dog, as a result of which the children run away. The first recorded date of the expression (1932) rules out the first of these explanations (the shelters may have been called doghouses but they had nothing to do with disgrace) and the American origin of the expression makes the second likely.

In the doldrums - depressed, in low spirits

Origin - The origin of the form of the word doldrums is thought to lie in the Old English word dol, meaning ‘dull’. Early in the 19th Century, in the doldrums was used as a synonym for ‘in the dumps, depressed’. Later sailors borrowed the phrase to describe the region of sultry calms and baffling winds within a few degrees of the Equator where the northeast and southeast trade winds converge. Here the progress of sailing ships would be greatly delayed for many days, their crews becoming frustrated through inactivity. Hence, their feelings provided the name for the area.