top of the morning

A working-class phrase once popular throughout the British Isles, possibly in reference to cream rising in milk. Revived into popular consciousness, and associated with Irishmen, by the 1959 film Darby O'Gill and the Little People.

A jovial leprechaun, stereotypically linked with the phrase "top of the morning!".

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

top of the morning

1. (Ireland, New England, idiomatic, archaic, sometimes humorous) A generic, cheerful greeting said to someone in the morning.

This term should be considered apocryphal of Irish speech and is a stereotype. While popularly used in the United States when imitating Irish people, or when celebrating one's Irish heritage (e.g. on St. Patrick's Day), latter-day native Hiberno-English speakers would be unlikely ever to use this phrase. See Hollywood Irish.

• top of the hour