egg on

Idioms and Phrases

Incite, urge ahead, provoke, as in Jack is always egging me on to drive faster , or Seemingly quiet, Margo actually eggs on Donald to quarrel with his staff . This expression has nothing to do with hen's eggs but comes from an Old Norse word, eggja , “to edge.” Both edge on and egg on were used interchangeably, but today the latter is preferred. [c. 1200]