snake eyes
2
7.5
- noun
- /sneɪk aɪz/
- Informal
:
dobles
- If you haven't heard the news, I hate to be the one who breaks it to you, but once again the Blue Jackets' luck has come up snake eyes.
- rolled snake eyes
- came up snake eyes
Examples
-
I rolled snake eyes.
Fiction book (1996) -
The last roll of the dice and it comes up snake eyes.
-
Everyone else came up snake eyes but us?
-
Those dice got snake eyes, you know.
-
What if you rolled snake eyes again?
Fiction book (1997) -
First, the orchestrator of the game rolls two dice, and they must come up snake eyes (double ones, a one in thirty-six chance).
Blog text (29) -
When I rolled the dice, I was disappointed to see it showed snake eyes.
-
In the game of craps, rolling snake eyes can lead to an unfortunate loss.
-
Everyone groaned when they realized the final outcome was snake eyes.
Surface Forms
Morphology
snake + eyes
The meaning 'two ones on a pair of dice' cannot be derived from the literal meanings of 'snake' and 'eyes'; the expression is conventional gambling jargon with a culturally specific referent. Any tenuous visual association (two small pips like eyes) is obscure and not reliably predictable for a B1 learner who knows the component words.
Etymology
The phrase snake eyes may come from old dice games where a roll of two ones shows two small dots that look like a snake's eyes. Because that roll is the worst possible score in those games, snake eyes came to mean 'unlucky' or the 'lowest result'.