Word.ws English Dictionary

after the Lord Mayor's show

after the Lord Mayor's show prepositional phrase: said of a disappointing or mundane event occurring straight after an exciting, magnificent, or triumphal event.

Prepositional phrase

  1. (idiomatic) Said of a disappointing or mundane event occurring straight after an exciting, magnificent, or triumphal event.
    • as is usual on all such occasions, after gaiety comes squalor; or, as we observe in respect to the annual pageant of the City of London that "after the Lord Mayor's Show comes a,—donkey-cart,1864, George Waters, Indian gleanings and thoughts of the past, G.H. Windeyer, Chatham, page 154
    • The All Whites came into this match hotfoot from their stunning victory over Castres last Tuesday which took them into the semi-final of the prototype European Cup. ... For a while it looked as if it might be a case of after the Lord Mayor's show as Swansea struggled with one of their dozy moods...1995 December 10, Clem Thomas, “White hot Swansea”, in The Independent (UK)

Examples of after the Lord Mayor's show in a sentence

  • For a while it looked as if it might be a case of after the Lord Mayor's show as Swansea struggled with one of their dozy moods, against Treorchy.1995 December 10, Clem Thomas, “White hot Swansea”, in The Independent (UK):
  • "After the Lord Mayor's Show." Freddy looked up from reading Punch.2006, Jeremy Carrad, Running on Empty, Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie, →ISBN, page 40:

Origin of after the Lord Mayor's show

From the proverb "After the Lord Mayor's show comes the dust-cart" (or "donkey-cart", or "shit-cart"). Bringing up the rear of the Lord Mayor's Show is a team to clean the manure of the pageant's horses.

Questions about after the Lord Mayor's show

What does after the Lord Mayor's show mean?
After the Lord Mayor's show means said of a disappointing or mundane event occurring straight after an exciting, magnificent, or triumphal event.
How do you use after the Lord Mayor's show in a sentence?
For a while it looked as if it might be a case of after the Lord Mayor's show as Swansea struggled with one of their dozy moods, against Treorchy.
What part of speech is after the Lord Mayor's show?
After the Lord Mayor's show is a prepositional phrase.

Words near after the Lord Mayor's show in the dictionary

  1. after school specials
  2. after taste
  3. after tastes
  4. after the fact
  5. after the jump
  6. after the Lord Mayor's show
  7. after us the deluge
  8. after you
  9. after you, Alphonse
  10. after't
  11. after-

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: after the Lord Mayor's show (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-after the Lord Mayor's show.ogg.

Cite this entry: “after the Lord Mayor's show.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/after_the_lord_mayor%27s_show. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.