# What does ‘bite the bullet’ mean?

To “bite the bullet” means to endure something painful with courage. Brewer's notes the practice among 19th-century military surgeons of giving a wounded soldier a bullet or leather strap to bite during surgery before anaesthesia was common; the phrase entered popular English from that battlefield use.

## What it means

- Brewer's notes the practice among 19th-century military surgeons of giving a wounded soldier a bullet or leather strap to bite during surgery before anaesthesia was common; the phrase entered popular English from that battlefield use.

## Action steps

1. Used when accepting an unavoidable ordeal.
2. Example: I hate the dentist, but I'll bite the bullet and go.

## Sources

- [Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898) — Internet Archive scan](https://archive.org/details/brewers-dictionary-of-phrase-and-fable)

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