give the time of day

According to some, the expression originally literally referred to greeting someone with the obsolete greeting "good time of day", or other greeting appropriate to the time of day (e.g., good morning, good afternoon, good evening), and only later acquired an association with telling someone the time, along with its idiomatic sense.

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

give the time of day (third-person singular simple present gives the time of day, present participle giving the time of day, simple past gave the time of day, past participle given the time of day)

1. (idiomatic) To acknowledge someone; to give someone respect or attention; to tip one's hat.

   If you're lucky, she might give you the time of day.

   • 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene i], page 130, column 2:

     But meet him now, and be it in the Morne, / When euery one will giue the time of day, / He knits his Brow and ſhewes an angry Eye, / And paſſeth by with ſtiffe vnbowed Knee, / Diſdaining dutie that to vs belongs.

2. (idiomatic, in the negative) To not acknowledge someone; to snub someone; to disrespect someone; to ignore someone.

   He won't give the time of day to someone like you or me.

   I tried to say "hi", but she wouldn't give me the time of day.

   • 2005, Carole Dillane Krajeski, 99% of the Time‎^[1], →ISBN, page 270:

     "Daddy, please," Leanne laughed, "Give Linds a little credit. She wouldn't give the time of day to someone like Connor."

3. (literally, dated) To tell someone the time of day by looking at one's wristwatch, etc.