humble pie

noun

1. humility forced upon someone, often under embarrassing conditions; humiliation.
2. Obsolete. a pie made of the viscera and other inferior parts of deer or the like.

humble pie

noun

1. (formerly) a pie made from the heart, entrails, etc, of a deer
2. eat humble pie
   to behave or be forced to behave humbly; be humiliated

Word History and Origins

Origin of humble pie¹

1640–50; earlier phrase an umble pie, erroneous for a numble pie; numbles

Word History and Origins

Origin of humble pie¹

C17: earlier an umble pie, by mistaken word division from a numble pie, from numbles offal of a deer, from Old French nombles, ultimately from Latin lumbulus a little loin, from lumbus loin

Idioms and Phrases

Idioms

1. eat humble pie, to be forced to apologize humbly; suffer humiliation:

   He had to eat humble pie and publicly admit his error.

Example Sentences

And in the spirit of full disclosure, and before the reminders arrive and large portions of humble pie are thrown in this direction, one of the biggest doubters is right here and must admit to being wrong after witnessing Raya's finest night since arriving at Arsenal.

From BBC

Brown told the BBC: "I wasn't just emotionally and physically abused, there was all the financial abuse too. I didn't realise that I didn't have as much money as I thought I had. So I literally had to eat humble pie, live with my mum."

From BBC

He even tried a little humble pie.

From Seattle Times

Such a slice of humble pie coming from a chief executive is rare and a strong indication of Licht’s cloudy future at the network.

From Los Angeles Times

The term humble pie, for example, comes from pies made with umbles, or scraps of meat and offal that fed peasants who were seated far away from royalty at banquets.

From Seattle Times