/ˈkɒst ən ˈɑː(ɹ)m ənd ə ˈlɛɡ/
English idiom, informal. To cost a huge amount of money.
Draft Not yet checked by a native English speaker.
How do people use Cost an arm and a leg
?
Informal, and you’ll hear it everywhere, from moaning about rent to admiring a friend’s new car. Put the person who pays straight after “cost”: “it cost me an arm and a leg”, “that must have cost her an arm and a leg”. You can also pay, charge or spend an arm and a leg, so “they charge an arm and a leg for parking” works just as well.
Also said pay an arm and a leg, charge an arm and a leg
Cost an arm and a leg
in real sentences
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That diamond ring cost an arm and a leg.
Tatoeba, sentence by CM, CC BY 2.0 FR
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Our new TV cost us an arm and a leg.
Tatoeba, sentence by DJ_Saidez, CC BY 2.0 FR
Where does Cost an arm and a leg
come from?
Nobody knows exactly where it started. The oldest example English Wiktionary quotes is from the American magazine Commentary in 1954, and The New York Times used it in 1960, so it looks like a mid-20th-century Americanism. A story that gets passed around says portrait painters charged extra to paint a sitter’s arms and legs, but no record backs it up. The simplest reading is plain exaggeration: the price is so steep it feels like paying with your own body.
Mistakes learners make with Cost an arm and a leg
Learners say “it costs my arm and leg” or “an arm or a leg”. The phrase is fixed as “an arm and a leg”, with “an” and “a” in both places, and the payer goes before it as an object: “it cost me an arm and a leg”.
Other English idioms like Cost an arm and a leg
Spot a mistake in Cost an arm and a leg
?
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