英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

sebaceous [sebaceous 词源字典]: sebaceous: see suet
[sebaceous etymology, sebaceous origin, 英语词源]
secateurs: secateurs: see section
second: second: [13] Latin secundus originally meant ‘following’ – it was derived from sequī ‘follow’, source of English sequence – and only secondarily came to be used as the ordinal version of ‘two’. English acquired it via Old French second, employing it to take over part of the role of other, which until then had denoted ‘second’ as well as ‘other’.

Its noun use for ‘sixtieth of a minute’, first recorded in English in the 14th century, comes from medieval Latin secunda minuta, literally ‘second minute’ – a minute was a ‘sixtieth part’, and so a ‘second minute’ was a ‘sixtieth of a sixtieth’. Latin secundus was also used for ‘favourable’, and in this sense the verb secundāre was formed from it, meaning ‘favour’.

English acquired it via French seconder as second ‘support’ [16]. (The differently pronounced second ‘transfer to a different job’ [19] comes from the French phrase en second ‘in second rank’.)
=> sect, sequal, sequence, sue, suit
secret: secret: [14] Etymologically, something that is secret is ‘separated’ from others, hence put out of the way, hidden. The word comes via Old French secret from Latin sēcrētus, an adjectival use of the past participle of sēcernere ‘separate’. This was a compound verb formed from the prefix sē- ‘apart’ and cernere ‘separate’ (source also of English certain, discern, excrement, etc).

From the 16th to the 18th centuries, secret was used as a verb, meaning ‘hide’, but it was then altered to secrete, on the model of Latin sēcrētus. (The other verb secrete, ‘produce fluids or other substances’ [18], is a back-formation from secretion [17], which goes back to Latin sēcrētiō ‘separation’, a derivative of sēcernere.) A secretary is etymologically a ‘secret’ or confidential helper.
=> certain, decree, discern, excrement, secretary
secretary: secretary: [14] A secretary was originally a ‘person in someone else’s confidence, sharing secret or private matters with them’ (‘[Christ] taking with him his three special secretaries, that is to say Peter and James and John’, Nicholas Love, Mirror of the life of Jesus Christ 1400). The word was adapted from late Latin sēcrētārius ‘confidential aide’, a derivative of Latin sēcrētus ‘secret’. The notion of writing letters and performing other clerical duties developed in the Latin word, and first emerged in English in the 15th century.
=> secret
sect: sect: [14] Despite its similarity to section and sector, sect has nothing to do with ‘cutting’. It comes via Old French secte from Latin secta, which denoted literally a ‘following’, hence a ‘faction of supporters’ (it was a noun use of sectus, an archaic past participle of sequī ‘follow’, from which English gets sequence, sue, etc). Set ‘group’ is ultimately the same word as sect.
=> second, sequel, sequence, set, sue, suit
section: section: [16] Section is one of a wide range of English words that go back to Latin secāre ‘cut’. Others include bisect [17], dissect [17], insect, intersect [17], secateurs [19], sector [16], and segment [16]. It goes back ultimately to the Indo- European base *sek- ‘cut’, which also produced English saw, scythe, sedge, and sickle. The immediate source of section itself was the Latin derivative sectiō ‘cutting’.
=> bisect, dissect, insect, saw, scythe, secateurs, sedge, segment, sickle
secular: secular: [13] Latin saeculum, a word of uncertain origin, meant ‘generation, age’. It was used in early Christian texts for the ‘temporal world’ (as opposed to the ‘spiritual world’), and that was the sense in which its derived adjective saeculāris passed via Old French seculer into English. The more familiar modern English meaning ‘non-religious’ emerged in the 16th century.
secure: secure: [16] Something that is secure is etymologically ‘carefree’. The word was borrowed from Latin sēcūrus, a compound adjective formed from the prefix sē- ‘without’ and cūra ‘care’ (source of English curate, cure, etc). The metaphorical extension from ‘free from care’ to ‘free from danger, safe’ took place in post-Augustan Latin. Sure is in effect a telescoped version of secure.
=> curate, cure, sure
sedentary: sedentary: see session
sedge: sedge: [OE] The sedge is etymologically the plant with ‘cutting’ leaves. The word goes back to a prehistoric Germanic *sagjaz, which was descended from the Indo-European base *sek- ‘cut’ (source also of English saw, section, segment, sickle, etc).
=> section, segment
sediment: sediment: see session
see: see: English has two words see. The older is the verb, ‘perceive visually’ [OE]. Like its Germanic cousins, German sehen, Dutch zien, and Swedish and Danish se, it goes back to a prehistoric *sekhwan, which was descended from an Indo-European base *seq-. This may have been the same *seq- that produced Latin sequī ‘follow’ (source of English sequence, sue, etc), in which case see would denote etymologically ‘follow with the eyes’. See ‘diocese’ [13] originally signified ‘bishop’s throne’.

It came via Anglo-Norman se from Vulgar Latin *sedem ‘seat’, descendant of classical Latin sēdem, the accusative case of sēdes ‘seat’. This in turn went back to the Indo- European base *sed- ‘sit’, which also produced English sit.
=> sight; seat, sit
seed: seed: [OE] Seed is a general Germanic word, related to German saat, Dutch zaad, Swedish söd, and Danish sæd. Their common ancestor was Germanic *sǣthiz. This was formed from the base *sǣ-, which produced English sow and went back ultimately to Indo-European *sē-, source of English disseminate [17], season, semen [18], and seminar [19].
=> disseminate, season, semen, seminar
seek: seek: [OE] Seek has several Germanic relatives – German suchen, Swedish söka, Danish søge, etc – which point back to a prehistoric Germanic ancestor *sōkjan. The base from which this was derived, *sōk-, went back to an Indo-European *sāg-, which also produced (via Latin) English presage [14] and sagacious [17]. If Old English sēcan had developed in the ordinary way, it would have become modern English seech, not seek. For various reasons it did not, but we can see how it would have been in its derivative beseech [12].
=> beseech, presage, sagacious, sake
seem: seem: [12] Originally, seem meant ‘be suitable’ (a meaning preserved in the derived seemly [13]). It was borrowed from the Old Norse verb soema ‘conform to, honour’. This was derived from the adjective soemr ‘fitting’, a descendant of the prehistoric base *sōm- (to which English same is distantly related). The sense ‘appear to be’ emerged in the early 13th century.
=> same, seemly, soft
seethe: seethe: [OE] Seethe was once the standard word for ‘boil’, until it began to be overtaken by the French import boil in the Middle English period. In the 16th century a new meaning, ‘soak’, emerged, now preserved only in the past participle sodden. And the modern metaphorical ‘be violently agitated’ came on the scene in the 17th century. The word goes back to a prehistoric Germanic *seuth-, which also produced German sieden and Dutch zieden ‘boil’. English suds probably comes from a variant of the same base.
=> sodden
segment: segment: see section
segregate: segregate: [16] The etymological idea underlying segregate is of ‘removal from a flock’. The word comes from Latin sēgregāre, a compound verb formed from the prefix sē- ‘apart’ and grex ‘flock’ (source also of English aggregate, congregation, egregious [16], and gregarious [17]).
=> aggregate, congregation, egregious, gregarious
seigneur: seigneur: see sir