To run the gauntlet means to go through a frightening, difficult, or dangerous series of challenges or confrontations.
This modern meaning is a metaphor, based on an old military tradition, in which a soldier runs between two lines of men who beat him with sticks or ropes (for example). This could be a form of punishment or a form of initiation. This tradition has also been used to initiate new members of college fraternities and some other men’s groups; however, in these cases, the beating is usually symbolic or playful, using “less harmful” items and tactics.
In modern times, the phrase is normally used metaphorically, for a series of frightening challenges or confrontations with unfriendly individuals or other dangers. With this idea, the phrase is often used humorously. For example:
I do not look forward to running the gauntlet at the DMV to get my new driver’s license.
In this example, ‘the gauntlet’ might include unfriendly civil servants, paperwork, a vision-test, and a driving test. For another example, a person might say:
In order to get funding, you will need to run the gauntlet of the funding committee.
In this case, ‘the gauntlet’ is a series of people asking you difficult questions about why you need money. Other modern ‘gauntlets’ include shopping at busy stores and interviewing for jobs.
This phrase came from a mistake. It was originally the Swedish word, gantlopp, or in English spelling, gantelope. Gantlopp means “run a path” in Swedish—the name of the Swedish military tradition. English military personnel learned it from the Swedish during The Thirty Years War (1618-1648). Since English speakers did not know the word gantelope/gantlopp, they heard the closest English word that made any sense—gauntlet. Gauntlet is an English, originally French, word for an armored glove—the kind of glove worn by knights in armor. The English speakers who created the phrase run the gauntlet perhaps imagined that a person running the gauntlet would be hit by iron gloves—or maybe they simply connected armor with violence. In any case, this is the only phrase in which gauntlet means “a series of painful challenges;” otherwise, it means an armored glove.
More Examples of “to run the gauntlet” in a Sentence
- It requires fitness and strength, as well as nerve and stamina to run the gauntlet of the tide.
- The naval punishment of running the gauntlet was abolished by Admiralty Order in 1806.
- Going to school was like running the gauntlet.
- Kate did not enjoy running the gauntlet, and she looked cowed as she walked into work with her head down.
- How many women have no choice but to run the gauntlet of walking past a group of men, only to receive unwanted comments or catcalls?