從這個狂歡游戲不難看出brass ring 如何衍生出這個比喻意。Brass ring在這里用來比喻游戲參與者人人都可能實現的目標，只要他努力伸手去夠并且有好運氣。
對brass ring一詞出現的時間，不同的字典有不同的說法。Merriam-Webste 10th Collegiate詞典說brass ring出現在二十世紀五十年代，而Christine Ammer's 編撰的The American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms則認為19世紀晚期就出現了這個短語。兩種說法相去甚遠。
據目前我們掌握的材料來看，這個比喻用法在1959年首次出現， "'I guess I never got with it,' he told himself aloud, 'and the only times I saw the brass ring it was going so fast I couldn't grab it'"（《星期六晚報》），brass ring并沒用引號圈起來，說明它可能是新造的詞。
THE GREAT FRENCH CAROUSEL ORGANS (RCA ). The plaintive melodies and the sounds of fife and drum are transformed into a joyous cascade by the pipes of the mechanical organ. No instrument could be less solemn. It's not so much the sounds of Rossini's "Thieving Magpie Overture" or a swinging "Valencia" we hear as those of children's laughter when the world was young and the brass ring there for the grabbing.
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