India, June 21 -- Take a horse to water, horse-trading, hold your horses. given the interdependence we once had with these majestic beasts, it is no surprise that ourlanguage embraced them too.

There are, in fact, horses hidden in a number of phrases where one wouldn't expect them to be.

Let's start with a simple one. Riding and the age of chivalry (roughly the medieval period, from the 12th to 15th centuries) gave us "full tilt". Tilting was an early name for jousting while on horseback. The aim was not so much to pierce the opponent's armour as to spook his horse so that he would be unsaddled.

Knights would joust "at full tilt" when their honour, or the honour of a woman in their circle, had been questioned. They would also joust in ...