He that's cooled with an APPLE and heated with an egg, over me shall never spread his leg

Meaning & Analysis

A man who is so easily affected—cooled by something as mild as an apple and heated by something as simple as an egg—is deemed too feeble or temperamental to be a suitable sexual partner.

Insights

Mockery of Weak Constitution

The proverb ridicules a man perceived as overly sensitive or lacking in physical stamina, suggesting that such frailty renders him unfit for intimacy or partnership.

Sexual Competence and Robustness

It uses food imagery to allude to sexual readiness and endurance, implying that only a person of physical vigor and stable temperament is worthy of sexual or romantic union.

Choice and Disdain

The speaker asserts agency in rejecting a partner deemed weak or unsuitable, turning dietary metaphors into a vehicle for personal and possibly feminist autonomy.

Bawdy Folk Humor

The rhyme reflects early modern English humor, where food and bodily metaphors frequently carried sexual innuendo. It embodies the earthy, performative wit found in rural proverbs and tavern culture.

Temperament Theory

References to being 'heated' and 'cooled' draw from humoral theory—dominant in early medicine—where foods like apples (cooling) and eggs (heating) were believed to influence one’s emotional and sexual state. The proverb mocks those whose constitutions are too delicately swayed by such influences.

Assertion of Female Discretion

The closing line—'over me shall never spread his leg'—is a bold, humorous assertion of sexual discernment. It implies that the speaker has standards, particularly concerning masculine vigor and reliability.

Rhetorical Devices

Rhymed Couplet

The proverb’s rhyme ('egg' / 'leg') enhances its musicality and memorability, reinforcing its place in oral tradition and bawdy vernacular exchange.

Euphemism and Innuendo

Sexual activity is implied rather than explicitly stated through humorous innuendo, typical of folk proverbs that veil risqué meaning in domestic or culinary imagery.

Contrast Imagery

The juxtaposition of cooling and heating—apple and egg—underscores the proverb's mockery through ironic contradiction, amplifying the sense of instability or imbalance in the subject.

sexualitytemperamenthumorrejectionfolkbody

Analyzed with gpt-4o on July 10, 2025

Transcription

Quotations

— c1640, SMYTH, 7, p. 27.

Related Proverbs

A336 ARTHUR could not tame woman's tongue 92.0%L133 Leave her on a LEA¹ and let the devil flit her 91.2%P564 The PRESBYTER's wife had rather see her husband in his shirt than in his surplice 90.9%A107 The nappy strong ALE of Southwark keeps many a gossip from the kirk 90.6%O57 ONE of the four and twenty qualities of a knave is to stay long at his errand 90.4%L377 If you would not LIVE to be old you must be hanged when you are young 90.1%J36 If JANUARY's calends be summerly gay it will be winterly weather till the calends of May 90.0%F789 She simpers like a FURMITY-KETTLE 90.0%C375 Mark the CHRONICLES aright, when Oxford scholars fall to fight, before many months expired England will with war be fired 89.9%D304 Up with it if it be but a DEVIL of two years old 89.9%F95 Your FATHER was no glazier 89.8%D235 The DEVIL gets up to the belfry by the vicar's skirts 89.8%G203 GOD keep me from four houses: a usurer's, a tavern, a spittle, and a prison 89.8%P369 It is PITY to part three things: the lawyer and his client, the physician and his patient, and a pot of good ale and a toast 89.7%K134 One false KNAVE accuses (disdains) another 89.6%K132 An old KNAVE is no babe (child) 89.5%S62 If it rain on SAINT SWITHIN's DAY¹ expect 'twill do so forty days after more or less 89.5%R58 To give one a RECUMBENTIBUS 89.4%A216 Ye eat ALL and dryts¹ all and harles² the barrow at your arse 89.4%A102 Fair cheve good ALE, it makes many folks speak as they think 89.4%

These connections are generated using word-embeddings. Learn more.