Russian phraseological units often surprise with their seeming illogicality. It is sometimes said about a drinker that he “put it behind the collar,” but it’s not clear where the collar is and why it’s laid for it. To find out the meaning of this expression, you need to delve deeply into history.
The most common myth
Very often, the origin of the expression is explained by the legend, according to which in Peter's times, shipbuilders were entitled to free drink, and the stamp on the neck was evidence of this right. Allegedly, this is where the expression "to put on the collar" came from, since the brand was located just behind the collar, and a characteristic gesture denoting a drink - a snap of a finger on the neck.
The story is original, but it's just a myth. Drunkenness in the time of Peter I among the artisans was not only discouraged, but also severely punished. There was a severe penalty for drunkenness - the offender had to wear a cast-iron medal "For drunkenness" on a heavy chain for several days in a row, such a "reward" weighed about 10 kg. As a result of punishment, drunkards got bruises on their necks, at the sight of which the innkeepers recognized their regular customers in advance. By the way, the custom to call drinkers "bruise" also came from there. As for the phrase “to put on the collar” - it has nothing to do with Peter the Great and his time.
Research by V. V. Vinogradov
The catchphrase “to put on the collar” appeared relatively recently, at the end of the 18th century. At first, it had the form of “pawning for a tie”, “pouring for a tie”, “missing for a tie”, sometimes, in a vulgar style, even “fucking for a tie”. The expression came from the military environment, this is indirectly indicated by the word "lay" (they usually lay a shell, mine or something like that). According to the records of Prince P. A. Vyazemsky, a certain guards colonel named Raevsky became the author of the phraseological unit. He was distinguished by a sharp language and a certain penchant for linguistics, so that thanks to him, many new words and expressions appeared in the guards language. He just invented the phrase "skip the tie", which meant "drink too much."
From the military officer slang, the expression "to lay by the tie" gradually migrated into general colloquial speech. True, unlike military drinkers, not all civilian drunks wore ties, so the phrase was somewhat transformed. They began to "lay" them "behind the collar", since there was something, and absolutely everyone wore collars. Thus, the expression "to lay by the collar" in some way has its own inventor - his surname is known and even the approximate time when he created this linguistic creation. From the military environment, the phrase passed to the people, and there it was already adapted to a wider audience.
