go to pot

English

Etymology

Figuratively be cut up and tossed into a pot like meat.

Verb

go to pot (third-person singular simple present goes to pot, present participle going to pot, simple past went to pot, past participle gone to pot)

1. (figuratively) To come to ruin, especially to decline or deteriorate.

   They haven't been maintaining it, and the downtown area has really gone to pot over the past 20 years.

   • 1593, anonymous author, The Life and Death of Iacke Straw […], Act I:

     Iacke Straw. […] I haue his wife and children pledges, for his ſpeedie returne from the King, to whom he is gone with our meſſage.
     Tom Miller. Let him take heede hee bring a wiſe anſwere to our worships, or els his pledges goes to the pot.

2. (archaic) Go to hell. (an angry dismissal)
   • 1837 September 20, William Cullen Bryant, Calhoun’s Diminished Stature:

     At this moment the rabbit sprang from his arms and disappeared among the brush wood. "Go to pot," said the man, "you are a good-for-nothing dry-meated beast, to make the best of you."

Synonyms

• (decline or deteriorate): go to shit (vulgar); go to the dogs, go downhill; see also Thesaurus:worsen

Translations

grow worse

• Finnish: rapistua
• German: auf dem absteigenden Ast sein (de)
• Romanian: se duce naibii, se duce dracului, se duce pe apa sâmbetei
• Russian: приходить в упадок (prixoditʹ v upadok)
• Swedish: gå åt skogen (sv)