English

Alternative forms

• coals to Newcastle

Verb

carry coals to Newcastle

1. (idiomatic) To do something that is unneeded or redundant.
   • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick, Chapter 81:

     However curious it may seem for an oil-ship to be borrowing oil on the whale-ground, and however much it may invertedly contradict the old proverb about carrying coals to Newcastle, yet sometimes such a thing really happens; and in the present case Captain Derick De Deer did indubitably conduct a lamp-feeder as Flask did declare.

   • 1960, P. G. Wodehouse, Jeeves in the Offing, chapter II:

     He's the fellow who likes to let off stink bombs in night clubs, which rather falls under the head of carrying coals to Newcastle [...]

Translations

See also

• bring owls to Athens