/ · 1894 Brewer’s · B · Botley Assizes
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
The joke is to ask a Botley man, “When the assizes are coming on?” and an innuendo is supposed to be implied to the tradition that the men of Botley once hanged a man because he could not drink so deep as his neighbours.
· ·
Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.