Where did the saying "Spit spot" come from?

Ask and you shall receive (I googled it!):
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=spit-spot

I’ve never heard it outside of the Mary Poppins movie.

@bythebay – you do not need to tell me what I already know. It was not originally formed there contrary to common/ urban dictionary belief. My Great-grand mother used to use the phrase long before Marry Poppins ever existed. So I am trying to figure out the true roots of it, and why the phrase is used as such.

@Trance24: How in the world am I supposed to guess at what you already know? Nowhere in your question did you mention that you had heard it PRIOR to the movie. Did your Great-Grandmother carry a magic carpet bag and slide down banisters, too? Sorry for offending your sensibilities.

Excuse me if I came off rude bythebay that was no my intention. Your retaliation in insulting my great-grand mother however was kind of uncalled for.

fwiw i was going to say mary poppins too eek

Old time British nannies would use rhyming phrases when giving orders to the children. The idea: the rhyme captured the child’s attention. For example, they would say, ‘Apples and pears, up the stairs’ to tell the child to go upstairs. Over time, the phrase was shortened and the rhyme dropped. The nanny would just say ‘Apples and pears now’ instead to say it is time go upstairs.

Using this reasoning, and I am just speculating, the original rhyming phrase may have been ‘Spit spot, on the dot’ instead of saying ‘hurry up, do it now’. Over time, the phrase was shortened and the rhyme dropped.

I was once told that as a child, if your mother sent you to run an errand, she would spit on the floor…if the spit had dried out by the time you got back, you would get in trouble…