beyond the pale

The story

From beyond + the + pale (“wooden stake, picket; fence made from wooden stakes, palisade; limit, boundary”). The phrase is often connected either to the Pale of Settlement, the part of the Russian Empire where Jews were permitted to settle, or to the English Pale, the part of Ireland that was directly subject to the English Crown in the Late Middle Ages. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, however, there is no evidence for either of these theories. The phrase is first attested in 1720, after the English Pale had ceased to exist and before the Pale of Settlement had been established.