What is the origin of the phrase you'd complain if you were hung with a new rope?

Answer 1

My mom used to say this a lot in the 60's. I thought it must be because new ropes would be scratchy on your neck - a problem that wouldn't be worth complaining about for very long.

My father used to use the phrase as early as the 1950s. I have the impression that it is older than that. I also have the impression that it may come from the Great Depresssion and was a reference to profligately using new material when old would serve. Of course, one being hanged could not reasonably worry about such things.

My mother said the same and I couldn't figure it out until I stumbled upon it in a book. According to some medievil law, every man had the right to be hanged with a new rope. Cloister and the Hearth by Charles Reade takes place in the 15th century where the new rope law was in effect in a certain village. A problem arose when a woman murdered a man. She was released without punishment because the punishment for murder was hanging by a new rope. She was freed because as a woman she was worth less than a new rope.

A new rope would be a strong rope and the objective of hanging as a punishment was death and not torture. A good strong rope meant that when the weight of the body was released, it would snap the neck instantly. Thus, the expression essentially means you'd be complaining even after you were dead. An old rope would have some give to it and might not produce instant death, but rather a slow, painful, lingering death. Hence the medieval 'right' to a new rope. The condemned wanted to die quickly.

i herd it was because a new rope was less prone to breaking. if you got hung with an old rope, the rope might break, instead of your neck. i see it as youd complain and argue, even down to things so trivial, such as the slimmest chance of an older rope breaking vs the chance of a new one breaking

Actually, from the explanation given me as a child, the previous answers simply don't quite explain the expression in full.

New hemp rope is rougher and scratchier against the skin than older or used rope. This property is the key to the saying.

My parents always told me that the saying is just a cute or satirical way of chastising people who tend to always complain about even the most trivial things---regardless of the situation--thus the irony of complaining about the roughness of new rope against the skin when one should be really worrying about the much more important matter of being executed.

Answer 2

The actual phrase should be "You would kick if you were hung with a new rope", and the joke is that kick means complain(or it used to) and its also what people that get hanged do - they kick.