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And some folks say you can't learn anything on these ref discussion boards!!!!! ;-)
From the Word Detective:
"I don't give a tinker's damn" means that the speaker does not care at all, "tinker's damn" being a very old slang synonym for something "utterly inconsequential." There are two theories about "tinker's damn," but before we get to them, a little discourse on Medieval cookware.
Before the advent of mass-produced kitchen implements, pots and pans were quite expensive, and handed down for generations. Thus, a hole in the stewpot was a calamity, and repair, not replacement, was called for. This was the job of a "tinker" (possibly from the "tinkling" sound of pots clinking together, but more likely from the Middle English "tinnkere," tin worker). Tinkers were itinerant handymen who made their living mending pots and pans and generally fixing household items.
Though tinkers were performing a useful service, they were held in low esteem, and "tinker" was for several centuries also a synonym for "vagrant," "rogue" and even "thief." Tinkers probably used earthy language, probably with abandon, and thus the first theory. Tinkers swore so often, it is said, that their oaths lost the power to shock, and "not worth a tinker's damn" came to mean "worthless."
The second theory maintains that the phrase should be "tinker's dam," not "damn." A tinker's "dam," goes this theory, was a small piece of dough, clay or paper used to block the hole in a pot while solder was applied. When the job was done, the "dam" was discarded, and thus "tinker's dam" came to mean something utterly inconsequential.
And now, the envelope, please. Theory number one is almost certainly correct, and "tinker's damn," which appeared around 1839, is probably simply a variant on "not worth a damn," which also means "something utterly worthless." Theory number two, which was first proposed in 1877, was probably a prissy Victorian attempt to sanitize the "damn" into "dam" with a cute but baseless story.
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