| Idiom | Needle in a Haystack |
|---|---|
| Example | Looking for your contact lens in this shaggy rug will be like looking for a needle in a haystack. |
| Meaning | something hard or impossible to find; anything hopeless (in a search) |
| Origin | Since the early 1500s there have been similar expressions to describe things difficult to find: "like finding a needle in a meadow of hay" and "like finding a pin's head in a cartload of hay." In the mid-1800s the expression became "needle in a haystack." Sayings like these are popular in other languages, too. Finding anything in a haystack is hard, but finding a needle in one is nearly impossible. |
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