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You are here: Home / Language / Where does the expression “to turn a new leaf” come from and What does it mean?

Where does the expression “to turn a new leaf” come from and What does it mean?

April 7, 2020 by Karen Hill

The expression “to turn a new leaf” means to amend one’s conduct; begin a new life; go straight; reform.

The leaf that one turns is not that of a tree, but that of a book, a book of lessons or of precepts, the book on which our sins of omission and commission are recorded.

And we have been doing that, or at least using that expression for something over four hundred years.

Though not the earliest example, we find the expression in Raphael Holinshed’s Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande (1577), “He must tume the leafe, and take out a new lesson, by changing his former trade of liuing into better.”

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Filed Under: Language

About Karen Hill

Karen Hill is a freelance writer, editor, and columnist. Born in New York, her work has appeared in the Examiner, Yahoo News, Buzzfeed, among others.

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