Where does the phrase *Fill your boots* originate from?

[MickyMacgraw]

I've heard this phrase crop up just over the last year or so and was perplexed to where it's origins come from. Any ideas?

[marval]

Here are some suggestions

http://www.funtrivia....ft/Question72214.html

[Quizmonster]

The idea of ‘filling your boots' quite possibly dates back to the days when a victorious army would plunder the places they had recently attacked and defeated. Obviously, the soldiers would stuff their pockets, saddle-bags or whatever and then - so as not to miss anything - even their boots with booty...if you'll forgive the choice of word! Soldiers - particularly cavalrymen - in past times often wore wide thigh-length boots which were quite roomy! That's why we have the modern sense of "take full advantage" when we use the saying.

We see a more modern version of the same idea in the word ‘bootleg', coined in America to describe illicit goods, ie things you would have to hide from the authorities - especially alcohol - in the legging part of your boot. This meaning relates to concealment rather than taking advantage.

[scotman]

This from OED

boot, n.2 Obs. Also 6_7 boote.
[App. an application of the prec., influenced by the already-existing booty; perhaps due to the phrase to make boot of, _to make profit of' (cf. boot n.1 3, quot. 1606), being taken as _to make booty of'.]
Booty; spoil; plunder.

1598 Chapman Iliad xi. 585 We foraged, as proclaimed foes, a wondrous wealthy boot_our prey was rich and great.

1618 Sylvester Job Triumph. iii. 119 Rising be_times for Boot like Free-booters.

1623 Bingham Xenophon 119 It was decreed, that_all boot taken in priuate should be deliuered vp to the vse of the generalitie.

b. esp. in phr. to make boot.

1593 Shakes. 2 Hen. VI, iv. i. 13 Thou that art his Mate, make boote of this.

1599 ---- Hen. V, i. ii. 194 Others [Bees] like Souldiers_Make boote vpon the Summers Veluet buddes: Which pillage, they_bring home.

1596 Spenser F.Q. vii. vii. 38 Harvests riches, which he made his boot.

1641 Heywood Reader, Here you'l, &c. 5 They make Boote Of every thing we wear from head to foote.

1885 Child Ballads iii. _61. 57/2 Stopping only long enough to make boot of Hjelmer's gold.

[ann_h]

Well, that's me bamboozled...
I always took the phrase to mean something like "pull your weight" ie take on the responsibilities for which you are getting the rewards.
"Boots" in this case being nothing to do with booty, but used in the same sense as "shoes" ...(if I were in your shoes / in dead man's shoes etc)