“The last straw” is an idiom referring to the final event in a series that causes a person to no longer tolerate a situation. It doesn’t have to be a significant event, but in combination with previous ones, it can lead to a loss of patience. The origin is attributed to an ancient Arabic proverb about a camel overloaded with straw. The phrase first appeared in print in 1816 and has been used in literature by authors such as Charles Dickens and Mark Twain.
The last straw is an English and American idiom for the latest instance in a series of events that can no longer be tolerated. Some sort of reflexive action inevitably occurs as a direct result of this added insult, situation, or burden. Crucial to grasping the full meaning of this sentence is understanding that the last straw doesn’t have to be a huge change or a particularly daunting task. In fact, it is more likely to be mundane in nature. It is, however, this last instance, in combination with all similar ones that have preceded it, which causes the subsequent failure of tolerance, patience, civilization or understanding.
One could say that many accidents in everyday life are the ‘last straw’. As noted above, the important aspect of the crash is that it is not necessarily worse than the chain of similar events that preceded it. To take a concrete example, a man might say it’s “the last straw” when his neighbor’s son takes a shortcut through his garden for the tenth time, after he repeatedly warned him not to. When this last happens, the man may decide to call the authorities on his neighbor as his tolerance has been exhausted.
At least two independent sources attribute this idiom to an ancient Arabic proverb in which a camel is loaded beyond its ability to stand and carry its load of sheaves of straw. The “last straw” is the tipping point, the one little addition that makes the load too much to bear. The story itself or even a condensed narrative, however, has not been quoted and cannot be located. Other variations on this idiom involve feathers or melons instead of straw, and horses, donkeys and even monkeys as the animals being loaded, but the meaning remains the same.
Despite its presumably ancient origins, there is no use of the term “last straw” in the Christian Bible. A British website dedicated to the historical use of idioms identifies the first published appearance of “the last straw” in a May 1816 edition of The Edinburgh Advertiser. The phrase later appeared in Thomas Fuller’s Gnomology. In October 1843, the expression crossed the Atlantic and appeared in The Southport American, albeit using feathers instead of straw. Charles Dickens used the idiom in Dombey and Son and Mark Twain used a similar one involving feathers in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
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