Gramer Girl here, I'm Minyon Fokrty and you can think of me as your friendly guide to

the English language. We talk about writing, history, rules, and cool stuff. Today, I have

a segment about why we talk about resting on your laurels and a segment about the origin

of the word Somarmi.

Highly accomplished people are often praised for their deeds. When you use the phrase

to rest on your laurels to describe a person's character, though, it implies that the

person is slacking off, relying on their good reputation or achievements as an excuse

to not put in the effort at their current task. What about resting on laurels implies

this type of laziness?

Let's start by defining what a laurel is. Laurel is a type of tree. Laura Snowbliece,

whose leaves are also known as sweet bay. Yes, the same as those bay leaves you use for

cooking. Besides their culinary or ornamental uses, the idea of a crown of laurels stems

from the Greek myth of Daphne and Apollo, ruler of the sun and god of music. When Apollo

wanted to woo the nymph Daphne, she turned into a laurel tree instead of returning his

affections. Though he was rejected, Apollo decided to dawn a crown of laurel leaves in

her honor. In ancient Greek tradition, these crowns were gifted to athletic champions

as seen as symbols of status and victory. This connotation of glory lives on in the word

laureate, first coined in the late 14th century, meaning crowned with laurels. The phrase

laureate poet then pops up in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales as part of the night's tale.

The modern translation of this reads, with laurel crowned as conqueror, there he lived in

joy and honor. The phrase switched to poet laureate when penned by Ben Johnson in the 16th

century. In 1668, England established the position of poet laureate and esteemed poet

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