英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

earring (n.)[earring 词源字典]: also ear-ring, Old English earhring, from ear (n.1) + hring (see ring (n.)). Another Old English word was earspinl. Now including any sort of ornament in the ear; the pendant sort originally were ear-drops (1720). Worn by Romanized Britons and Anglo-Saxons alike; their use declined in the Middle Ages and was reintroduced in England 16c., but after 17c. were worn there almost exclusively by women.
The two groups which had formerly a near monopoly on male earrings were Gypsies and sailors. Both has the usual traditions about eyesight, but it was also said that sailors' earrings would save them from drowning, while others argued that should a sailor be drowned and washed up on some foreign shore, his gold earrings would pay for a proper Christian burial. ["Dictionary of English Folklore"]
[earring etymology, earring origin, 英语词源]
flamenco (n.): 1882, from Spanish flamenco, first used of Gypsy dancing in Andalusia. The word in Spanish meant "a Fleming, native of Flanders" (Dutch Vlaming) and also "flamingo." Speculation are varied and colorful about the connection between the bird, the people, and the gypsy dance of Andalusia.

Spain ruled Flanders for many years in 16c., and King Carlos I brought with him to Madrid an entire Flemish court. One etymology suggests the dance was so called from the bright costumes and energetic movements, which the Spanish associated with Flanders; another is that Spaniards, especially Andalusians, like to name things by their opposites, and because the Flemish were tall and blond and the gypsies short and dark, the gypsies were called "Flemish;" others hold that flamenco was the general Spanish word for all foreigners, gypsies included; or that Flemish noblemen, bored with court life, took to slumming among the gypsies. Compare Gypsy.
gibberish (n.): "rapid and inarticulate speech; talk in no known language," 1550s, imitative of the sound of chatter, probably influenced by jabber. Used early 17c. of the language of rogues and gypsies.
ragga: "A style of dance music originating in Jamaica and derived from reggae, in which a DJ improvises lyrics over a sampled or electronic backing track", 1990s: from ragamuffin, because of the style of clothing worn by its followers. More rag from Middle English:A Scandinavian word for ‘tufted’ probably lies behind rag. In lose your rag (early 20th century) ‘to lose your temper’, rag is probably an old slang term for the tongue—the phrase was originally get your rag out. This sense of rag may well be behind the student rag or prank, found from the early 19th century, and the dated verb meaning ‘to tease, play a joke on’. From rags to riches describes someone's rise from a state of extreme poverty to great wealth, as in a fairytale like Cinderella. The concept is ancient, but the phrase was not recorded until the late 19th century, when a play called From Rags to Riches was mentioned in a US newspaper. A group of people regarded as disreputable or undesirable may be described as ragtag and bobtail. Bobtail (early 17th century) was an established term for a horse or dog with a docked tail, but rag and tag (LME of unknown origin) were separate words conveying the same meaning of ‘tattered or ragged clothes’. Putting them together gives you the literal sense of ‘people in ragged clothes together with their dogs and horses’. In one traditional folk song a lady leaves her house, land, and ‘new-wedded lord’ to run away with ‘the raggle-taggle gypsies’. Raggle-taggle (late 19th century) here is an elaboration of ragtag. Similarly ragamuffin is probably an elaboration of rag. The word is found once c.1400 as the name of a devil, but then not until 1586. The 1990s term ragga for a style of dance music is taken from ragamuffin, because of the style of clothing worn by its fans. Rug (mid 16th century), once a name for a type of coarse woollen cloth, is probably from the same root. The sense ‘small carpet’ dates from the early 19th century. So too is rugged (Middle English). ‘Shaggy’ was an early sense of rugged as was ‘rough-coated’ (in descriptions of horses).