Meaning
To have complete control over a household, group, or organization; to be the dominant person whose decisions prevail. It is informal, usually said of family life or small-group dynamics, and often carries a slightly humorous or affectionate tone rather than a sinister one. Informal and conversational, often affectionately mocking; neutral to humorous rather than hostile. Regional use: General English.
Origin
The documented history is counterintuitive: the familiar roost version is the newcomer. The original expression was 'rule the roast', recorded around 1500 in the anonymous Middle English poem The Debate of the Carpenter's Tools ('My mayster yet schall reule the roste'). Through the 16th and 17th centuries it appears in works such as James Bell's An aunswere apologeticall (1581) and John Earle's Micro-cosmographie (1628), referring to whoever commanded the kitchen or the feast, the person in charge of the roast. 'Rule the roost', with its image of the dominant cockerel on the perch, is a folk-etymological alteration first found in the mid-18th century; the first edition of the OED (1914) still listed only 'rule the roast'. The roost form eventually displaced the original. The popular henhouse picture is therefore genuine imagery but not the phrase's source.
Research Sources
References used to check this entry’s meaning, history, or documented forms.
Variants
- rule the roast (earlier form)
- rules the roost
- ruling the roost
- run the roost
Usage Examples
- Everyone assumed the new director would take charge, but it is still her assistant who rules the roost.
- In that house the toddler rules the roost, and bedtime happens whenever she decides it does.
- After decades of finishing second, the club finally rules the roost in the regional league.