Go the whole hog

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Meaning

Do something completely or as fully as possible, without holding back or stopping at a partial measure.

Origin

Whole hog is documented in American English from the 1820s: Merriam-Webster dates the noun to 1825 and the adjective to 1829. Its ultimate origin has not been settled. William Cowper's 1782 satire about disputed religious rules on eating pork has often been proposed as an influence, but the poem does not use the idiom and no clear line of transmission has been demonstrated. A literal explanation based on buying or using an entire pig is also only a conjecture. The evidence supports an early-nineteenth-century American expression meaning the whole extent, not a confident story about butchers.

Research Sources

  1. Whole-hog Merriam-Webster
  2. Idiomatic pigs and hogs Oxford University Press

Variants

  • Go whole hog

Usage Examples

  • Once they decided to renovate the kitchen, they went the whole hog and replaced the plumbing too.
  • We could make a few repairs, or go whole hog and restore the building properly.
  • For her fiftieth birthday she went the whole hog, hiring a band and booking the hall for the weekend.

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