Q&A: The origin of ‘skeletons in the closet’

Each week here at the Australian Writers’ Centre, we dissect and discuss, contort and retort, ask and gasp at the English language and all its rules, regulations and ridiculousness. It’s a celebration of language, masquerading as a passive-aggressive whinge about words and weirdness. This week, skeleton keys..

Q: Hi AWC, what’s a topic for today that can combine Halloween and the upcoming presidential election?

A: How about the origin of the term “skeletons in the closet”?

Q: Perfect!

A: Okay, so where do YOU think it comes from?

Q: Maybe those kids from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe got locked inside while visiting Narnia and ran out of oxygen?

A: Not quite. But one popular early theory comes from another story – that of Bluebeard.

Q: Sounds like a pirate.

A: It was actually a French folktale from more than 300 years ago, about a husband who kept murdering his wives only for them to eventually be discovered hanging in the walls!

Q: It was a simpler time…

A: Haha, indeed. The Brothers Grimm adapted this in their 1812-published The Robber Bridegroom story, and some variation of this tale has made its way through literature ever since.

Q: So when do we get the saying?

A: The idiom was first seen in print in 1816 in the UK monthly periodical The Eclectic Review – used figuratively in reference to keeping a hereditary disease a secret. Its definition was “a source of secret shame to a person or family”.

Q: They made no bones about it…

A: Indeed. There had also been more literal visual representations of the saying, such as a 1792 cartoon of the skeleton of France’s Louis XVI being discovered in a closet.

Q: But Google says he didn’t die till 1793.

A: Yes, but at the time, he and his cake-eating queen Marie Antoinette were hiding from the revolutionaries, so the cartoon was likely drawn due to speculation on where and how they might be found!

Q: It certainly is quite the mental image!

A: It sure is. Which is probably why it quickly became a popular idiom for authors such as Edgar Allen Poe and William Makepeace Thackeray to refer to something shameful and often linked in some way to a death or murder.

Q: So it was used in both Britain and America?

A: It was, although Britain also used “skeleton in the cupboard”, perhaps because they called toilets “water-closets” and didn’t want that being confused as the place you’d find skeletons!

Q: Any other theories around the saying?

A: One big one is related to a British law.

Q: Was it the “Don’t Keep Decaying Human Remains in Your House Act” of 1824?

A: Haha, well, you joke, but you’re quite close. 

Q: Seriously?

A: Yep. You see, there was a lot of progress being made during this time in the study of human anatomy – but British doctors were only allowed to study the dead bodies of criminals.

Q: Is that because they were baaaaad to the bone? Dun na na na nah!

A: Groan. Let’s just say that the supply couldn’t meet demand, so “body snatching” became a lucrative business, with fresh non-criminal corpses being sold to dodgy doctors. 

Q: I imagine every doctor back then was dodgy.

A: By today’s standards, sure. Anyway, after experimenting on these black market bods, doctors would hide them by literally hanging the skeletons in their cupboards. It only stopped when a law was passed in 1832 that removed the “criminal bodies only” restriction.

Q: Is all that really true?

A: Let’s just say it’s based on a true story, but it’s unlikely it was the sole origin of the idiom. One other theory involved a British philosopher named Jeremy Bentham who, upon his death, wished for his skeleton and mummified head to be dressed in clothes and posed in a glass cabinet at the University of London for all to see. As his death came long after 1816, it’s definitely not the source, but still an intriguing story.

Q: So to recap, “skeletons in the closet” likely emerged in the early 1800s – inspired by storytelling and maybe an actual body shortage, but soon became more figurative about shameful family secrets?

A: That’s it!

Q: Okay, so what about “coming out of the closet” – is that related in any way?

A: Great question! And it certainly is – a combo of “skeletons in the closet” and the classic debutante “coming-out” ball that young ladies used to endure when presented to society as eligible.

Q: Oh, like Bridgerton!

A: Precisely, dearest gentle reader.

Q: Haha. So, being gay was the family secret?

A: Yes – something that had to be hidden away. It was a different time.

Q: So when did the phrase come about in this context?

A: “Coming out” was actually in use in gay society in the early 1900s, but with a meaning that more closely resembled the debutante balls. Rather than coming out to a wider public, gay coming-out parties were about being accepted in these smaller circles only.

Q: So how long before the phrase, er, came out of the shadows?

A: In the 1950s, the term “coming out” re-emerged in universities across America. By the 1960s, it had been paired with “the closet” to indicate that so-called shameful secret.

Q: And I guess it has led to plenty of variations.

A: That’s right. In more recent times, if you haven’t made your sexuality public, you might be described simply as “closeted”. Or if you have, you might be “out”.  Being “outed” is when this detail is shared without the individual’s consent. And there is even the term for a widely known open secret about someone’s sexuality even if that person hasn’t made it public – the “glass closet”.

Q: Just like that Jeremy Bentham philosopher dude from earlier!

A: Well, he did have a glass cabinet. As for the evolution of the phrase (which today is once more usually shortened simply to “coming out”), it continues to define transgender, asexual and other identity milestones.

Q: It’s curious that historically by being freed from the “shameful” skeletons in the closet, we ended up with the literal opposite term – PRIDE.

A: A good point! 

Q: Thanks for the discussion – and I think that’s the end.

A: How do you know?

Q: I can feel it in my bones!

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