Meaning
Calm, composed and unflustered, especially in situations that would rattle most people. It describes a person's manner under pressure rather than low temperature, and it is informal and approving in tone. As a simile it usually appears in the full form with 'as'. Informal and approving; said of people who keep their composure under pressure. Regional use: General English.
Origin
First recorded in the early 1730s: The Phrase Finder gives John Gay's poem 'New Song on New Similes' (1732), containing the line 'Cool as a cucumber could see the rest of womankind', as the earliest known print use. Wiktionary's citation trail turns up slightly earlier appearances, in a 1722 Robinson Crusoe translation ('Still he had all his wits about him, and was as cool as a cucumber') and in Swift and Pope's 1731 Miscellanies, so the 1730s is a conventional dating rather than a hard floor. The image rests on the fact that a cucumber, being mostly water, feels cool to the touch. Because Gay's poem strings together stock similes of the day, it has been inferred that the comparison was already circulating in speech before he wrote it down, but there is no documentary proof of earlier use, and no rival origin story competes with the cucumber's literal coolness.
Research Sources
References used to check this entry’s meaning, history, or documented forms.
Variants
- as cool as a cucumber
- calm as a cucumber
Usage Examples
- Nadia was cool as a cucumber during the live broadcast, correcting the error without a moment's hesitation.
- The goalkeeper stayed cool as a cucumber while the penalty taker ran up.
- You would never guess it was his first court appearance; he seemed cool as a cucumber from the very first question.