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banish [banish 词源字典]: banish: see bandit
[banish etymology, banish origin, 英语词源]
banister: banister: see baluster
banjo: banjo: [18] The origins of banjo are uncertain, but its likeliest source seems to be bandore, the name of a 16th-century stringed instrument similar to the lute. It has been argued that in the speech of Southern US blacks, amongst whom the banjo originated, bandore became banjo, perhaps under the influence of mbanza, a term for a similar instrument in the Kimbundu language of Northern Angola (although it might be more plausible to suggest that mbanza is the immediate source, altered by English-speakers more familiar with bandore). Bandore itself appears to be a variant of pandore or pandora, which comes from Greek pandoura ‘three-stringed lute’.

A more farreaching modification produced mandore, likewise a term for a lutelike instrument. The Italian version of the word, mandola, is familiar in English from its diminutive form, which has given us mandolin [18].
=> mandolin
bank: bank: [12] The various disparate meanings of modern English bank all come ultimately from the same source, Germanic *bangk-, but they have taken different routes to reach us. Earliest to arrive was ‘ridge, mound, bordering slope’, which came via a hypothetical Old Norse *banki. Then came ‘bench’ [13] (now obsolete except in the sense ‘series of rows or tiers’ – as in a typewriter’s bank of keys); this arrived from Old French banc, which was originally borrowed from Germanic *bangk- (also the source of English bench).

Finally came ‘moneylender’s counter’ [15], whose source was either French banque or Italian banca – both in any case deriving ultimately once again from Germanic *bangk-. The current sense, ‘place where money is kept’, developed in the 17th century. The derived bankrupt [16] comes originally from Italian banca rotta, literally ‘broken counter’ (rotta is related to English bereave and rupture); in early times a broken counter or bench was symbolic of an insolvent moneylender.

The diminutive of Old French banc was banquet ‘little bench’ (perhaps modelled on Italian banchetto), from which English gets banquet [15]. It has undergone a complete reversal in meaning over the centuries; originally it signified a ‘small snack eaten while seated on a bench (rather than at table)’.
=> bench
banner: banner: [13] Banner is of Germanic origin, but it reached English via Latin. Early forms which show its Germanic antecedents are Gothic bandwo ‘sign’ and the related Old Norse benda ‘give a sign’, but at some stage it was acquired by Latin, as bandum ‘standard’. This passed via Vulgar Latin *bandāria into various Romance languages, in some of which the influence of derivatives of Germanic *bann- (source of English ban) led to the elimination of the d. Hence Old French baniere and Anglo-Norman banere, source of English banner.
=> ban
bantam: bantam: [18] When these diminutive chickens were first imported into Europe in the middle of the 18th century, it was thought that they had originated in a village called Bantam in Java, now in Indonesia, and they were named accordingly. This version of their history has never been firmly established, but the name stuck. Bantamweight as a category of boxing weights dates from the 1880s.
banyan: banyan: [17] Banyan originally meant ‘Hindu trader’. It is an arabization of Gujarati vāniyān ‘traders’, which comes ultimately from Sanskrit vanija ‘merchant’ (the Portuguese version, banian, produced an alternative English spelling). When European travellers first visited Bandar Abbas, a port on the Persian Gulf, they found there a pagoda which the banyans had built in the shade of a large Indian fig tree. They immediately applied the name banyan to this particular tree, and the term later widened to include all such trees.
baptize: baptize: [13] The underlying notion of baptize is of ‘dipping’, as those baptized were originally (and sometimes still are) immersed in water. It comes from Greek báptein ‘dip’, whose derivative baptízein ‘baptize’ passed via Latin baptizāre and Old French baptiser into English. Old Norse kafa ‘dive’ is a Germanic relative.
bar: bar: [12] The history of bar cannot be traced back very far. Forms in various Romance languages, such as French barre (source of the English verb) and Italian and Spanish barra, point to a Vulgar Latin *barra, but beyond that nothing is known. The original sense of a ‘rail’ or ‘barrier’ has developed various figurative applications over the centuries: in the 14th century to the ‘rail in a court before which a prisoner was arraigned’ (as in ‘prisoner at the bar’); in the 16th century to a ‘partition separating qualified from unqualified lawyers in hall’ (as in ‘call to the bar’); and also in the 16th century to a ‘counter at which drink is served’.

Related nouns include barrage [19], originally an ‘artificial obstruction in a waterway’, and barrier [14], from Anglo- Norman barrere.
=> barrage, barrel, barrier, barrister, embargo
barb: barb: see beard
barbarous: barbarous: [15] Originally, a barbarous person was a ‘foreigner’, anyone who did not speak your own language. Greek bárbaros meant ‘foreign, ignorant’, and it has been speculated that its ultimate signification was ‘unable to speak intelligibly’ (the related Sanskrit barbaras meant ‘stammering’). English acquired the word from Latin barbarus, a modified Vulgar Latin version of which, *brabus, produced Italian bravo and hence, via French, English brave.
=> brave
barbecue: barbecue: [17] Barbecue originated in the language of the now extinct Taino people of the West Indies. It first emerges in the Haitian creole term barbacoa, which meant simply ‘wooden framework’ (used for other purposes than roasting meat – for example, as a bed). American Spanish adopted the word, and passed it on to English. Compare BUCCANEER.
barbel: barbel: see beard
barber: barber: see beard
bard: bard: [14] Bard is of Celtic origin. A prehistoric Old Celtic *bardos produced Scottish and Irish Gaelic bárd and Welsh bardd, which meant ‘poet-singer’. It appears to have been the Scottish form which introduced the word into English, in the sense ‘strolling minstrel’. The modern, more elevated meaning ‘poet’ is 17thcentury.
bare: bare: [OE] Bare is an ancient word, traceable back to an Indo-European *bhosos. Descendants of this in non-Germanic languages include Lithuanian basas ‘barefoot’, but for the most part it is the Germanic languages that have adopted the word. Germanic *bazaz produced German and Swedish bar, Dutch baar, and, via Old English bær, modern English bare.
bargain: bargain: [14] Bargain appears to be distantly related to borrow. Its immediate source was Old French bargaignier ‘haggle’, but this was probably borrowed from Germanic *borganjan, a derivative of *borgun (from which ultimately we get borrow). The sense development may have been as follows: originally ‘look after, protect’ (the related Germanic *burg- produced English borough, which to begin with meant ‘fortress’, and bury); then ‘take on loan, borrow’; then ‘take or give’; and hence ‘trade, haggle, bargain’.
=> belfrey, borough, borrow, bury
barge: barge: [13] Barge comes in the first instance from Old French barge, but speculation has pushed it further back to medieval Latin *barica, which would have derived from báris, a Greek word for an Egyptian boat. This hypothetical *barica would have been a by-form of late Latin barca, which came into English via Old French as barque, also spelled bark, ‘sailing vessel’ [15] (source of embark). The metaphorical use of the verb barge, ‘move clumsily or rudely’, is barely a hundred years old; it comes from the ponderous progress made by barges.
=> bark, barque, embark
baritone: baritone: see gravity
barium: barium: see gravity