"Blown to smithereens."

Meaning

Disintegrated into small fragments, by a sudden impact or explosion.

Origin

Smithereens is an Irish word. It derives from, or is possibly the
source of, the modern Irish 'smidirín', which means 'small fragments'.
There is a town near Baltimore, close to the south-west coast of
Ireland, called Skibbereen. The name means 'little boat harbour' and
it is tempting to imagine sailing ships arriving there from the wild
Atlantic by being 'blown to Skibbereen'. The more recent 'Troubles'
also bring up images of property/people being dynamited and 'blown to
Skibbereen' from all over Ireland. There's no record of any such
phrase however, and the similarity between the words Skibbereen and
smithereens seems to be no more than co-incidence.

Another enticing notion as to the source of smithereens is that it
refers to the shards of metal formed when iron is forged and hammered
in a smithy. Again, there's nothing but wishful thinking to support
that idea. The actual origin is more prosaic. 'Smiodar' means
fragments in Irish. 'Een' is a commonplace diminutive ending, as in
colleen (girl), i.e. Caile (country woman) + een. Similarly, smiodar +
een lead us to smithereen. As with many words that are inherited from
other languages, it took some time for the English spelling to become
stable. Both 'smiddereens' and 'shivereens' are recorded in the mid
19th century.

The notion of things being 'broken/smashed/blown to smithereens' dates
from at least the turn of the 19th century. Francis Plowden, in The
History of Ireland, 1801, records a threat made against a Mr. Pounden
by a group of Orangemen:


"If you don't be off directly, by the ghost of William, our deliverer,
and by the orange we wear, we will break your carriage in smithereens,
and hough your cattle and burn your house."

['Hough' is a variant of 'hock' - to disable by cutting the tendons]

Smithereens is one of those unusual nouns that, like suds and
secateurs, never venture out by themselves - the word is always
plural.