257: swansong Aug 22, 2015

Swans don't happen to sing, despite the myth of the swan singing one beautiful song before it dies. References in English of a swansong date back to as early as Chaucer, but only in the 1830's did the term 'swansong' appear in Thomas Carlyle's Sartor Resartus, in which he most likely based the word from the German, 'Schwanengesang' or 'Schwanenlied'