go by the board

English

Pronunciation

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Verb

go by the board (third-person singular simple present goes by the board, present participle going by the board, simple past went by the board, past participle gone by the board)

1. (idiomatic, nautical) To fall or to go overboard; to be cast over the side of a ship.
2. (idiomatic) To be superseded, rejected, or obliterated; to pass by with little consequence; to amount to nothing.
   • 1849 May – 1850 November, Charles Dickens, The Personal History of David Copperfield, London: Bradbury & Evans, […], published 1850, →OCLC:

     How many cups of tea I drank, because Dora made it, I don’t know. But, I perfectly remember that I sat swilling tea until my whole nervous system, if I had had any in those days, must have gone by the board.

References

• “go by the board”, in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present.
• “go by the board”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
• Oxford English Dictionary, second edition (1989) (see "board, n.")