Tabishland

Tim, you must have been channeling this word last week with the Ninth Grade Dance post. Coincidences don't just happen after all...

Wordsmith.Org : The magic of words with Anu Garg

dark horse

(dark hors)

Someone little-known who ends up winning a contest unexpectedly.

From the idea of a relatively unknown horse winning a race. The term is also used for a person who unexpectedly wins a party's nomination for a political contest, often as a compromise candidate. The OED shows the first citation of the term from the novel The Young Duke by the British prime minister Benjamin Disraeli.

"John King thinks he, RPB and Sheldon Hope, all from De Big Show, are the three front-runners, with Adrian Clarke as the dark horse."
Yvette Best and Carlos Atwell; Oval Awaits First Monarch; Nation News (Barbados); Jul 31, 2008.

Tomatoes and oregano make it Italian; wine and tarragon make it French. Sour cream makes it Russian; lemon and cinnamon make it Greek. Soy sauce makes it Chinese; garlic makes it good. -Alice May Brock, author (b. 1941)