英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

detest [detest 词源字典]: detest: [16] Latin dētestārī, source of detest, meant ‘denounce’. It was a compound verb formed from the pejorative prefix dē- and testārī ‘bear witness’. This in turn was a derivative of testis ‘witness’, source of English testify, testimony, and testicle. It retained its original sense of ‘cursing’ or ‘execration’ when first borrowed into English, but by the 18th century this had weakened from open denunciation to internal ‘loathing’.
=> testicle, testify, testimony[detest etymology, detest origin, 英语词源]
charm (n.): c. 1300, "incantation, magic charm," from Old French charme (12c.) "magic charm, magic, spell; incantation, song, lamentation," from Latin carmen "song, verse, enchantment, religious formula," from canere "to sing" (see chant (v.)), with dissimilation of -n- to -r- before -m- in intermediate form *canmen (for a similar evolution, see Latin germen "germ," from *genmen). The notion is of chanting or reciting verses of magical power.
A yet stronger power than that of herb or stone lies in the spoken word, and all nations use it both for blessing and cursing. But these, to be effective, must be choice, well knit, rhythmic words (verba concepta), must have lilt and tune; hence all that is strong in the speech wielded by priest, physician, magician, is allied to the forms of poetry. [Jacob Grimm, "Teutonic Mythology" (transl. Stallybrass), 1883]
Sense of "pleasing quality" evolved 17c. Meaning "small trinket fastened to a watch-chain, etc." first recorded 1865. Quantum physics sense is from 1964. To work like a charm (figuratively) is recorded by 1824.
curse (v.): Old English cursian, from the source of curse (n.). Meaning "to swear profanely" is from early 13c. Related: Cursed; cursing.
execration (n.): late 14c., "cursing, act of laying under a curse," from Latin execrationem (nominative execratio) "malediction, curse," noun of action from past participle stem of execrari "to hate, curse," from ex- "out" (see ex-) + sacrare "to devote to holiness or to destruction, consecrate," from sacer "sacred" (see sacred). From 1560s as "an uttered curse."
imprecation (n.): mid-15c., "a curse, cursing," from Latin imprecationem (nominative imprecatio), from past participle stem of imprecari "invoke, pray, call down upon," from assimilated form of in- "into, in, within" (see in- (2)) + precari "to pray, ask, beg, request" (see pray). "Current limited sense is characteristic of human nature." [Weekley]
journalism (n.): 1821, regarded as a French word at first, from French journalisme (1781), from journal (see journal).
Journalism will kill you, but it will keep you alive while you're at it. [Horace Greely (1811-1872), U.S. journalist]
Journalese "language typical of newspaper articles or headlines" is from 1882.
Where men are insulated they are easily oppressed; when roads become good, and intercourse is easy, their force is increased more than a hundred fold: when, without personal communication, their opinions can be interchanged, and the people thus become one mass, breathing one breath and one spirit, their might increases in a ratio of which it is difficult to find the measure or the limit. Journalism does this office .... ["New Monthly Magazine," London, 1831]

[Géo] London was in western France covering the trial of a parricide that began in mid-afternoon. Because he had an early deadline, he telephoned a story that he was certain would take place: an angry crowd cursing the accused as he was marched to the courthouse from his holding cell at the police station. London then relaxed over lunch until he saw with dismay the guards and the prisoner coming but "not even the shadow of a gawker." His reputation at stake, he stalked to the door, cried out, "Kill him!" and returned to his table. [Benjamin F. Martin, "France in 1938"]