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plastic [plastic 词源字典]: plastic: [16] Plastic is etymologically a ‘mouldable’ substance. The word comes via French plastique and Latin plasticus from Greek plastikós ‘fit for moulding’, a derivative of the verb plássein ‘mould’ (source also of English plasma [18] and plaster). Up until the 20th century its main use in English was as an adjective, meaning ‘pliable’. The first record of its use for a ‘synthetic material made from organic compounds’ comes from 1909. The trade-name Plasticine was coined from it in the 1890s.
=> plasma, plaster[plastic etymology, plastic origin, 英语词源]
lesbian (adj.): 1590s, "pertaining to the island of Lesbos," from Latin Lesbius, from Greek lesbios "of Lesbos," Greek island in northeastern Aegean Sea (the name originally may have meant "wooded"), home of Sappho, great lyric poet whose erotic and romantic verse embraced women as well as men, hence meaning "relating to homosexual relations between women" (1890; lesbianism in this sense is attested from 1870) and the noun, first recorded 1925. Her particular association in English with erotic love between women dates to at least 1825, though the words formed from it are later. Before this, the principal figurative use (common in 17c.) was lesbian rule (c. 1600) a mason's rule of lead, of a type used on Lesbos, which could be bent to fit the curves of a molding; hence, "pliant morality or judgment."
And this is the nature of the equitable, a correction of law where it is defective owing to its universality. ... For when the thing is indefinite the rule also is indefinite, like the leaden rule used in making the Lesbian moulding; the rule adapts itself to the shape of the stone and is not rigid, and so too the decree is adapted to the facts. [Aristotle, "Nicomachean Ethics"]
See also tribadism. Greek had a verb lesbiazein "to imitate the Lesbians," which implied "sexual initiative and shamelessness" among women, but not necessarily female homosexuality.
molding (n.): also moulding, early 14c., "act of kneading," from mold (n.1). Architectural sense is from mid-15c.; carpentry sense is from 1670s.
mould: chiefly British English spelling of mold in various senses. Related: Moulded; moulding.
swage (v.): "to shape or bend by use of a tool," 1831, from swage (n.), also swedge, "tool or die for bending cold metal" (1812), from French suage, according to Century Dictionary from suer "to sweat." Uncertain connection to swage "ornamental moulding" (late 14c.), from Old French souage (Modern French suage), which, according to Klein, is from soue "rope," from Vulgar Latin *soca, probably of Gaulish origin (compare Breton sug "cord").
off-bear: "To bear (something) off; specifically to carry (newly moulded bricks) away from the moulding machine or table; to carry (wood, etc.) away from a saw or machine. Also without object with passive meaning", Mid 19th cent. From off- + bear. Compare off-bearer.
moulage: "A cast or impression, especially of a person or a part of the body; the process of making a cast or taking an impression; the material used for this", Early 20th cent.; earliest use found in Encyclopaedia Britannica. From French moulage act of moulding something, action of taking an impression (of something) in order to create a mould, reproduction made by taking an impression from mouler + -age.
off-bearer: "A person who bears or carries off something; specifically a worker who moves newly moulded bricks away from a brickmaking machine or moulding table", Mid 19th cent. From off- + bearer. Compare off-bear.
rudenture: "A convex moulding or ornament in the form of a rope", Early 18th cent.; earliest use found in Ephraim Chambers (?1680–1740), encyclopaedist. From French rudenture from rudenté + -ure.
nebule (2): "A moulding of a wavy or serpentine form", Early 19th century; earliest use found in Peter Nicholson (1765–1844), architectural writer and mathematician. Apparently from French nébulé nebuly; however, compare French nébules (plural) architectural moulding of a wavy form.
astragalus: "another term for talus¹ (ankle bone)", Mid 16th century: via Latin from Greek astragalos 'ankle bone, moulding', also the name of a plant.