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Tick a lock

Put it in the vault.

Dear Word Detective: While we watching a rerun (obviously) of “The Andy Griffith Show,” one of the characters used the phrase “tick a lock.” While its meaning is fairly clear, with the inclusion of the hand gesture imitating the use of a key to turn a lock, I was wondering where the term came from. — Brenda Chastain.

Well, there you go. This is why I don’t get anything done. I just spent a half-hour reading all the Wikipedia pages associated with that show and learned all sorts of interesting things I’ll forget later this afternoon. I wasn’t a huge fan of the show as a kid (liked Barney Fife, wanted to strangle Gomer Pyle), but I’m not surprised that reruns of it are enduringly popular. The denizens of Mayberry are so deeply rooted in America’s subconscious that when a White House official resigned in 2001 and derided his former colleagues as “Mayberry Machiavellis,” some people may have been unclear on just who Machiavelli was, but Mayberry was instantly understood as the archetypal American small town. (And yes, Niccolo Machiavelli, like Victor Frankenstein, is unfairly tarred, as an eponym, with the sins of his creation.)

There are, it’s safe to say, a lot of “ticks” in English. The oldest is the bloodsucking arachnid known as the “tick,” the modern form of the Old English “ticca,” which has close relatives in many other Germanic languages. Next up (dating from the 15th century) is “tick” meaning “pillow-case” or “mattress cover,” ultimately from the Latin “teka” and better known in the form “ticking,” meaning the sort of durable cloth from which such “ticks” were originally made. There’s also a “tick” that first appeared in the mid-17th century meaning “credit” or “trust,” most often in phrases such as “on tick” meaning “on credit” (“When he had no funds he went on tick,” Thackeray, 1848). That “tick” is probably just a shortening of “ticket” in the sense of “IOU.”

That brings us to the “tick” that appeared in the mid-15th century meaning “a light tap or pat” or, a bit later, in the 17th century, “a quick, light, clicking sound” of the sort made by a watch or clock. This “tick” has relatives in several other languages (e.g., Norwegian “tikke,” to touch lightly), and the whole family of “ticks” was almost certainly formed “echoically,” in imitation of the action or sound of a light, quick pat or touch.

This “tick,” as both a noun and a verb, went on to develop a dizzying range (I’m dizzy just writing this) of meanings both literal and figurative, from “tick” meaning “a single moment” (from the tick of a clock) to “mark next to an item on a list” (“to tick someone off” originally meant “to reject or dismiss,” probably from being crossed off a list).

One meaning of “tick” the verb that developed in the early 20th century was “to operate with a light, quick effort or action,” as one might “tick out” a message with a telegraph key, and this brings us back to Mayberry.  “Tick a lock,” judging by the entry for the phrase in the Dictionary of American Regional English (DARE), was used a number of times by characters in the show, especially Andy’s Aunt Bee. The phrase was also a favorite of Archie Bunker in All in the Family, and it’s apparently still popular throughout the American South and South Midlands. DARE notes that the expression is usually accompanied by a gesture of turning a key in a lock, but the lock is a metaphorical one, a lock on your lips. “Tick a lock” (sometimes “tick-a-lock” or “tickalock”) means “to keep quiet” or “to keep a secret” (the equivalent of “zip it” or “put it in the vault” on Seinfeld). “Tick a lock” can thus be either a command (as Aunt Bee usually used it) or a promise not to tell a secret or say something unpleasant (“I’m Mr. Sunshine for the rest of the year, y’all. If I can’t say something good about a person or topic, I’ll just zip it. Tickalock, OK?” AR Times (Little Rock) 2006). “Tick a lock” is also used in some children’s games to declare a time out, claim immunity, or designate another player as being “in jail” and temporarily out of the game.

23 comments to Tick a lock

  • Recently had a discussion with old friends about some of the words we used as kids in the 1950’s growing up in New Zealand. “Tick a lock” came up and our use of it as 5-8 year olds was a promise not to cheat in “hide and seek”, you know, start searching for the others before the counting finished or “tag” somebody before they had a chance to get away in a game of, well, tag!
    As New Zealand was a very “English” country, I can only assume that these terms came from England, where most of the people who settled there, came from.
    Another word we used at the time in these games was “paxed”. This word meant, using a modern term, “time out” or “I’m not playing at the moment, pick some one else”.
    Thank you for providing an interesting web site. I hope my thoughts on these old words helps somebody.

  • Bevan

    “Paxed” is cool. IIRC it comes from the old habit of forcing young schoolchildren to learn Latin, in which “Pax” (see also “Pax Romana”) means “Peace” in the sense of “Cessation of Hostilities”.

    It was in print in this sense at least as far back as Kipling’s “Stalky & Co.”, where the children would call out “Pax! Pax! Make it Pax!” while being tortured or otherwise put upon.

  • Never heard tick a lock before!! and I have been a locksmith for over 20 years! Even googled it. Google’s first result was “shut your mouth”?? Guess that is not the meaning you are looking for.
    “pick a lock” is very common. But that refers to opening it without a key.
    Thanks for making me research hahaha :)

  • Angela

    My grandmother told me it was like a time out or a safe place you go to in hide and seek so you were not ‘it’. Glad I am not the only one who heard of it. Yes, we live in the south.

  • d'Arci

    i’ve only heard it on t.v; we don’t use it in the north eastern u.s.
    aunt bee didn’t say it often, though …. BARNEY did :^)

  • Minx

    I agree with d’Arci. I just finished watching all the episodes of Andy Griffith on Netflix, and I only remember Aunt Bee saying it once. Barney said it all the time.

  • Missy

    I found this website after watching The Andy Griffith show because I got curious about the origin of the saying. I also noticed that the subtitles stated “take a lock,” when Barney Fife said it. I guess that was just a mistake by the subtitle company. I’d always heard it was tic a lock as well. Thanks for the info.

  • I’ve only heard the term, “tick a lock”, on the Andy Griffith Show, used by Don Knot’s character, Barney Fife! I don’t recall ever hearing “Aunt Bea’s”, or any other, use the term in that, or any other show!

  • Randall

    I watch The Andy Griffith show at least 5 days a week, and I rarely here Aunt B say this phrase; I always here Barney Fife using it when he wants Andy to keep something a secret or undisclosed cause he is embarrassed or whatever. I have recently considered using it regularly in my repertoire of phrases. Haha -=80)

  • Tavie Allan

    Just came across the same episode and did a web search, finding your 3 year old article – as helpful today as it was then! LOL – thanks so much for the info!!!

  • David Franks

    My mother used to say “tickalock’ in the sense of “time out”, often in relating an anecdote about somebody getting a reprieve, and to my recollection in asking for a time out herself. She usually augmented it with “King’s X”.

  • Cathy

    Growing up in Australia in the 50s and 60s we said it all the time in our games. If we were being chased and we made it home safely we would mime shutting the door and turning the ley while saying “ticalock” to show that the bad guys were locked out. Interestingly we never locked our real doors. The town where we grew up was so safe that it wasn’t necessary.

  • Lincoln Karim

    The phrase is ‘TAKE A Lock’ not TICK

  • My mom always told me to put a tickalock on so I would lock my lips and then swallow the key. lol My mouth was already locked. lol My grandma was German and my grandpa was English. My nickname was mouth so I wore a lot of tickalocks.

  • Rachelle Knapp

    diArci….Aunt B used it quite a bit…lol I watch the show on Netflix.. All day everyday. It’s my show off choice. I’ve seen EVERY episode a dozen times or more lol…A few months ago it was Everybody Loves Raymond…. Know that series word by word too! LoL

  • Sarah

    I grew up using a version, tickalocks/tickalox, as a way to save a seat if you have to get up. Such as watching a movie on the couch and you need to go to the bathroom real quick, you say tickalocks and no one can get your spot while you’re gone.

  • Louise

    Played a hide and seek type game in the south. Tick-a-lock protected a player who found himself in jeopardy of being discovered. “Tick a lock, tick a lock all around” kept the player safe even if he was in plain view. Wow, we had fun !!! Aunt Bea uttered these words when she promised Andy she would not reveal his whereabouts on a much needed camping trip to the mountains.

  • Linda Turner

    My mom grew up in Kansas. She always used ticalock to mean stop talking about this and change the subject. It was usually applied in a senseless argument.

  • bill simpson

    I remember as a kid in the fifties hearing WNEW disk jockey Jim Lowe use the phrase “tick a lock, king’s x” during his broadcast. For some reason I never forgot it all these years. Perhaps because I never figured out what it meant and it intrigued me. My eyes opened wide when I saw David Franks’ reply about his mother using it.

  • MARY NELSON

    Aunt Bea said “Mum’s my name, silence is my game, tick a lock!”

  • Cynthia Neal

    Otis uses the phrase “tick a lock” too. In the episode where he buys a car, he tells Andy & Barney to wake him at 8:00 a.m. The next day, Barney wants to wake him but Andy just thought it was something Otis said while he was drunk. Barney wakes him anyway. To their surprise, he really wants them to wake him because he’s saved up money to buy something he’s always wanted. They keep trying to get him to tell them what it is but finally Otis says, “Tick a lock” & leaves. He uses the hand motion in front of his mouth to mimic turning a key in a lock. Aunt Bee uses the phrase & Barney does too. I can tell you anything about that show. I’ve won Mayberry trivia bets. LOL

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