Going on from Walt's etymology, in my Shorter Oxford English Dictionary
(OED) there is: "HEEL ... to add a heel to 1605; esp. to arm (a
game-cock) with a spur 1755; hence (U.S. slang) to furnish (a person)
with something, esp. a revolver 1755; ..."
I had always thought that it came from the state of a person's heels as
well ;-)
Chris
On Friday, Oct 24, 2003, at 07:04 Europe/London, Winsor Crosby wrote:
On Thursday, October 23, 2003, at 09:15 PM, Walt Wayman wrote:
Or maybe it means this (which comes from World Wide Words):
"Well-heeled never had anything to do with people being well shod
(so it has no link with down at heel). The original expression
came from cock-fighting, and meant to provide one’s bird with
good, sharp spurs (considered, it would seem, as a kind of
artificial heel) that would inflict the most damage. It was taken
over into American usage in frontier days to mean that one was
likewise carrying a weapon, but in the more modern sense of a gun
(the first recorded use is from a story of Mark Twain’s dated
1866). Only later did it transfer its meaning to being armed with
a more powerful weapon still: money."
Walt
__
After this I had to look around and it looks as if you may be right
though my dictionary which does not give its origins said that it came
into use 1895-1900. I found it online. Interestingly it is not in my
compact OED. Very American.
Winsor
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