pay dirt
8
7.5
- noun
- /peɪ dɜrt/
:
gran hallazgo
- Finally, after hours of staring at boring junk, she'd hit pay dirt.
- hit pay dirt
- strike pay dirt
- finally hit pay dirt
Examples
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After years of hard work, the startup finally found pay dirt with their innovative app.
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Looks like we hit pay dirt.
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I was so excited to open the box when I received it, and when I did, I thought I hit pay dirt!
Blog text (11) -
Two weeks of chasing every catering truck in the county and I hit pay dirt.
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Jane Stevens, who lives steps from the excavations and proudly flies the Cross of St. George flag, remembers the day Brian hit pay dirt.
Academic text (2006) -
She had just hit pay dirt with a camping-themed article and recipes for trail mix with cashews, dried kiwi, and orange-almond biscotti.
Fiction book (2002) -
The research team believes they have struck pay dirt with their latest experiment results.
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Her investment in the new technology company really hit pay dirt, yielding significant profits.
Synonyms
25
7.1
A time that brings a large unexpected amount of money or success
18
3.2
A rare chance to do something important
A business or product that makes a lot of money
Antonyms
How Profitable
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase links 'pay' (to yield profit) with 'dirt' (earth) via a metaphor from mining — literally earth that ‘pays’ because it contains valuable ore — so there is a recognisable relation to the constituents. However, this metaphorical, domain-specific sense and the noun formation are not fully predictable for a B1 learner who only knows the literal meanings, making comprehension partial rather than straightforward.
Etymology
Pay dirt comes from the mining image of finding earth that 'paid' you. Finding pay dirt meant the dirt gave miners money, so people now use pay dirt for any discovery that brings 'big profit' or 'success' after hard work.