pop the question

pop the question

To ask someone to marry one. I'm planning on popping the question just before the fireworks start. He popped the question in a text message? That's the worst proposal I've ever heard of.

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Farlex Dictionary of Idioms. © 2024 Farlex, Inc, all rights reserved.

pop the question

[for a man] to ask a woman to marry him. (Could also be used by a woman asking a man.) She waited for years for him to pop the question. Finally she popped the question.

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McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs. © 2002 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

pop the question

Propose marriage, as in He picked Valentine's Day to pop the question. [Early 1700s]

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The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Copyright © 2003, 1997 by The Christine Ammer 1992 Trust. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

pop the question

INFORMAL

If you pop the question, you ask someone to marry you. Stuart got serious quickly and popped the question six months later.

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Collins COBUILD Idioms Dictionary, 3rd ed. © HarperCollins Publishers 2012

pop the question

propose marriage. British informal

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Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017

pop the ˈquestion

(informal) ask somebody to marry you: Where were you when he popped the question?

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Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017

pop the question

tv. [for a man] to ask a woman to marry him. (Could also be used by a woman asking a man.) She waited for years for him to pop the question.

See also: pop, question

McGraw-Hill's Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions Copyright © 2006 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.

pop the question

Informal

To propose marriage.

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American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

pop the question, to

To propose marriage. The transfer of pop, meaning “to explode,” to the idea of blurting out a proposal, seems like a slangy modernism but actually dates from the eighteenth century. Samuel Richardson used it in his novel Sir Charles Grandison (1753): “Afraid he would now, and now and now, pop the question; which he had not the courage to put.”

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The Dictionary of Clichés by Christine Ammer Copyright © 2013 by Christine Ammer