英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

advice [advice 词源字典]: advice: [13] Like modern French avis, advice originally meant ‘opinion’, literally ‘what seems to one to be the case’. In Latin, ‘seem’ was usually expressed by the passive of the verb vidēre ‘see’; thus, vīsum est, ‘it seems’ (literally ‘it is seen’). With the addition of the dative first person pronoun, one could express the notion of opinion: mihi vīsum est, ‘it seems to me’.

It appears either that this was partially translated into Old French as ce m’est a vis, or that the past participle vīsum was nominalized in Latin, making possible such phrases as ad (meum) vīsum ‘in (my) view’; but either way it is certain that a(d)- became prefixed to vīs(um), producing a new word, a(d)vis, for ‘opinion’.

It was originally borrowed into English without the d, but learned influence had restored the Latin spelling by the end of the 15th century. As to its meaning, ‘opinion’ was obsolete by the mid 17th century, but already by the late 14th century the present sense of ‘counsel’ was developing. The verb advise [14] probably comes from Old French aviser, based on avis.
=> vision, visit[advice etymology, advice origin, 英语词源]
bound: bound: English has no fewer than four separate words bound. The only one which goes back to Old English is the adjective, meaning ‘obliged’ or ‘destined’, which comes from the past participle of bind (in Old English this was bunden, which survives partially in ‘bounden duty’). Next oldest is the adjective meaning ‘going or intending to go’ [13]. Originally meaning ‘ready’, this was borrowed from Old Norse búinn, the past participle of búa ‘prepare’, which derived from the same ultimate source (the Germanic base *bū- ‘dwell, cultivate’) as be, boor, booth, bower, build, burly, bye-law, and byre.

The final -d of bound, which appeared in the 16th century, is probably due to association with bound ‘obliged’. Virtually contemporary is the noun bound ‘border, limit’ [13]. It originally meant ‘landmark’, and came via Anglo-Norman bounde from early Old French bodne (source also of Old French borne, from which English got bourn, as in Hamlet’s ‘undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveller returns’).

Its ultimate source was medieval Latin bodina, perhaps from a prehistoric Gaulish *bodina. Boundary [17] seems to have been formed from the dialectal bounder, an agent noun derived from the verb bound ‘form the edge or limit of’. Finally, bound ‘leap’ [16] comes from Old French bondir. It originally meant ‘rebound’ in English (rebound [14] began as an Old French derivative of bondir), but this physical sense was a metaphorical transference from an earlier sense related to sound.

Old French bondir ‘resound’ came from Vulgar Latin *bombitīre ‘hum’, which itself was a derivative of Latin bombus ‘booming sound’ (source of English bomb).
=> band, bend, bind, bond, bundle; be, boor, booth, bower, build, burly, byre, neighbour; boundary, bourn; bomb, rebound
frantic: frantic: [14] Frantic comes via Old French frenetique and Latin phreneticus from late Greek phrenētikús, a derivative of phrenítis ‘delirium’. This in turn was based on Greek phrén ‘mind’ (source also of English phrenology ‘study of cranial bumps to determine intelligence, character, etc’ [19]). The Old French form split into two virtually distinct words once English got hold of it: in one, the French three-syllable form was preserved, and even partially remodelled on its Latin ancestor, to give what has become modern English phrenetic, while in the other it was reduced to frentik which, for reasons that have never been satisfactorily explained, subsequently became frantic.

The related noun frenzy [14] retains the original vowel.
=> frenzy, phrenology
narwhal: narwhal: [17] The narwhal, a small arctic whale with a long unicorn-like tusk, is whitish in colour, which evidently reminded Viking seafarers somewhat morbidly of a corpse, for they named it in Old Icelandic nāhvalr, literally ‘corpse whale’. In Danish and Norwegian this became narhval, and English took it over and partially anglicized it as narh whale. Over the centuries this has contracted to narwhal.
pink: pink: English has three distinct words pink. The colour term [18] appears to have come, by a bizarre series of twists, from an early Dutch word meaning ‘small’. This was pinck (source also of the colloquial English pinkie ‘little finger’ [19]). It was used in the phrase pinck oogen, literally ‘small eyes’, hence ‘half-closed eyes’, which was borrowed into English and partially translated as pink eyes.

It has been speculated that this was a name given to a plant of the species Dianthus, which first emerged in the abbreviated form pink in the 16th century. Many of these plants have pale red flowers, and so by the 18th century pink was being used for ‘pale red’. Pink ‘pierce’ [14], now preserved mainly in pinking shears, is probably of Low German origin (Low German has pinken ‘peck’).

And pink (of an engine) ‘make knocking sounds’ [20] is presumably imitative in origin.
taunt: taunt: [16] The etymological notion underlying taunt is of giving someone tit for tat, of returning as much in reply as has been given. It comes from the French phrase tant pour tant ‘so much for so much’. This was borrowed into English in the early 16th century as taunt pour taunt or (partially anglicized) taunt for taunt, which was used for a ‘sarcastic rejoinder’. The first record of the use of taunt on its own (as a verb) dates from 1513.
A.D.: 1570s, from Latin Anno Domini "Year of the Lord." Put forth by Dionysius Exiguus in 527 or 533 C.E., but used at first only for Church business. Introduced in Italy in 7c., France (partially) in 8c. In England, first found in a charter of 680 C.E. Ordained for all ecclesiastical documents in England by the Council of Chelsea, July 27, 816.

The resistance to it in part might have come because Dionysius chose 754 A.U.C. as the birth year of Jesus, while many early Christians would have thought it was 750 A.U.C. (See John J. Bond, "Handy-Book of Rules and Tables for Verifying Dates With the Christian Era," 4th ed., London: George Bell & Sons, 1889.) A.C., for Anno Christi, also was common 17c.
astray (adv.): c. 1300, astraied "away from home; lost," borrowed and partially nativized from Old French estraie, past participle of estraier "astray, riderless (of a horse), lost," literally "on stray" (see stray (v.)).
avoid (v.): c. 1300, from Anglo-French avoider "to clear out, withdraw (oneself)," partially anglicized from Old French esvuidier "to empty out," from es- "out" (see ex-) + vuidier "to be empty," from voide "empty, vast, wide, hollow, waste" (see void (adj.)). Originally a law term; modern sense of "have nothing to do with" also was in Middle English and corresponds to Old French eviter with which it was perhaps confused. Meaning "escape, evade" first attested 1520s. Related: Avoided; avoiding.
cathedral (n.): 1580s, "church of a bishop," from phrase cathedral church (c. 1300), partially translating Late Latin ecclesia cathedralis "church of a bishop's seat," from Latin cathedra "an easy chair (principally used by ladies)," also metonymically, as in cathedrae molles "luxurious women;" also "a professor's chair;" from Greek kathedra "seat, bench," from kata "down" (see cata-) + hedra "seat, base, chair, face of a geometric solid," from PIE root *sed- (1) "to sit" (see sedentary).

It was born an adjective, and attempts to cobble further adjectivization onto it in 17c. yielded cathedraical (1670s), cathedratic (1660s), cathedratical (1660s), after which the effort seems to have been given up.
chad (n.3): "hanging flap or piece after a hole is punched in paper," a word unknown to most people until the 2000 U.S. presidential election (when the outcome hinged on partially punched paper ballots in some Florida counties), attested by 1930, of unknown origin.
conservation of energy: apparently coined in French by Leibnitz in 1692; attested in English from early 18c. as conservatio virum vivarum or partially nativized versions of it. The exact phrase is attested from 1853.
enclose (v.): early 14c., from en- (1) + close, and partially from Old French enclos, past participle of enclore "surround; confine; contain." Specific sense of "to fence in waste or common ground" for the purpose of cultivation or to give it to private owners is from c. 1500. Meaning "place a document with a letter for transmission" is from 1707. Related: Enclosed; enclosing.
equally (adv.): late 14c., "in equal shares," from equal (adj.) + -ly (2). Meaning "impartially" is from 1520s; that of "in an equal manner, uniformly" is from 1660s.
fairly (adv.): c. 1400, "handsomely," from fair (adj.) + -ly (2). Meaning "impartially, justly" is from 1670s. Sense of "somewhat" is from 1805, a curious contrast to the earlier, but still active, sense of "totally" (1590s). Old English had fægerlice "splendidly."
falchion (n.): "a broad sword, somewhat curved," c. 1300, fauchoun, from Old French fauchon "curved sword," from Vulgar Latin *falcionem, from diminutive of Latin falx "sickle" (see falcate). Partially re-Latinized in early Modern English.
god (n.): Old English god "supreme being, deity; the Christian God; image of a god; godlike person," from Proto-Germanic *guthan (cognates: Old Saxon, Old Frisian, Dutch god, Old High German got, German Gott, Old Norse guð, Gothic guþ), from PIE *ghut- "that which is invoked" (cognates: Old Church Slavonic zovo "to call," Sanskrit huta- "invoked," an epithet of Indra), from root *gheu(e)- "to call, invoke."

But some trace it to PIE *ghu-to- "poured," from root *gheu- "to pour, pour a libation" (source of Greek khein "to pour," also in the phrase khute gaia "poured earth," referring to a burial mound; see found (v.2)). "Given the Greek facts, the Germanic form may have referred in the first instance to the spirit immanent in a burial mound" [Watkins]. See also Zeus. In either case, not related to good.
Popular etymology has long derived God from good; but a comparison of the forms ... shows this to be an error. Moreover, the notion of goodness is not conspicuous in the heathen conception of deity, and in good itself the ethical sense is comparatively late. [Century Dictionary, 1902]
Originally a neuter noun in Germanic, the gender shifted to masculine after the coming of Christianity. Old English god probably was closer in sense to Latin numen. A better word to translate deus might have been Proto-Germanic *ansuz, but this was used only of the highest deities in the Germanic religion, and not of foreign gods, and it was never used of the Christian God. It survives in English mainly in the personal names beginning in Os-.
I want my lawyer, my tailor, my servants, even my wife to believe in God, because it means that I shall be cheated and robbed and cuckolded less often. ... If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him. [Voltaire]
God bless you after someone sneezes is credited to St. Gregory the Great, but the pagan Romans (Absit omen) and Greeks had similar customs. God's gift to _____ is by 1938. God of the gaps means "God considered solely as an explanation for anything not otherwise explained by science;" the exact phrase is from 1949, but the words and the idea have been around since 1894. God-forbids was rhyming slang for kids ("children"). God squad "evangelical organization" is 1969 U.S. student slang. God's acre "burial ground" imitates or partially translates German Gottesacker, where the second element means "field;" the phrase dates to 1610s in English but was noted as a Germanism as late as Longfellow.
How poore, how narrow, how impious a measure of God, is this, that he must doe, as thou wouldest doe, if thou wert God. [John Donne, sermon preached in St. Paul's Jan. 30, 1624/5]
hurricane (n.): 1550s, a partially deformed adoptation from Spanish huracan (Gonzalo Fernandez de Oviedo y Valdés, "Historia General y Natural de las Indias," 1547-9), furacan (in the works of Pedro Mártir De Anghiera, chaplain to the court of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella and historian of Spanish explorations), from an Arawakan (W. Indies) word. In Portuguese, it became furacão. For confusion of initial -f- and -h- in Spanish, see hacienda. The word is first in English in Richard Eden's "Decades of the New World":
These tempestes of the ayer (which the Grecians caule Tiphones ...) they caule furacanes.
OED records 39 different spellings, mostly from the late 16c., including forcane, herrycano, harrycain, hurlecane. Modern form became frequent from 1650, established after 1688. Shakespeare uses hurricano ("King Lear," "Troilus and Cressida"), but in reference to waterspouts.
-ize: word-forming element used to make verbs, Middle English -isen, from Old French -iser, from Late Latin -izare, from Greek -izein.

English picked up the French form, but partially reverted to the correct Greek -z- spelling from late 16c. In Britain, despite the opposition (at least formerly) of OED, Encyclopaedia Britannica, the "Times of London," and Fowler, -ise remains dominant. Fowler thinks this is to avoid the difficulty of remembering the short list of common words not from Greek which must be spelled with an -s- (such as advertise, devise, surprise).
it (pron.): Old English hit, neuter nominative and accusative of third person singular pronoun, from Proto-Germanic demonstrative base *khi- (cognates: Old Frisian hit, Dutch het, Gothic hita "it"), from PIE *ko- "this" (see he). Used in place of any neuter noun, hence, as gender faded in Middle English, it took on the meaning "thing or animal spoken about before."
Whether the charmer sinner it or saint it,
If the folly grow romantic, I must paint it.
[Pope, "Moral Essays," 1735]
The h- was lost due to being in an unemphasized position, as in modern speech the h- in "give it to him," "ask her," "is only heard in the careful speech of the partially educated" [Weekley]. It "the sex act" is from 1610s; meaning "sex appeal (especially in a woman)" first attested 1904 in works of Rudyard Kipling, popularized 1927 as title of a book by Elinor Glyn, and by application of It Girl to silent-film star Clara Bow (1905-1965). In children's games, meaning "the one who must tag the others" is attested from 1842.
kindergarten (n.): 1852, from German, literally "children's garden," from Kinder "children" (plural of Kind "child;" see kin (n.)) + Garten "garden" (see yard (n.1)). Coined 1840 by German educator Friedrich Fröbel (1782-1852) in reference to his method of developing intelligence in young children.
Kindergarten means a garden of children, and Froebel, the inventor of it, or rather, as he would prefer to express it, the discoverer of the method of Nature, meant to symbolize by the name the spirit and plan of treatment. How does the gardener treat his plants? He studies their individual natures, and puts them into such circumstances of soil and atmosphere as enable them to grow, flower, and bring forth fruit,-- also to renew their manifestation year after year. [Mann, Horace, and Elizabeth P. Peabody, "Moral Culture of Infancy and Kindergarten Guide," Boston, 1863]
The first one in England was established 1850 by Johannes Ronge, German Catholic priest; in America, 1868, by Elizabeth Peabody of Boston, Mass. Taken into English untranslated, whereas other nations that borrowed the institution nativized the name (Danish börnehave, Modern Hebrew gan yeladim, literally "garden of children"). Sometimes partially anglicized as kindergarden (attested by 1879).
multiverse (n.): 1895, William James's coinage, an alternative to universe meant to convey absence of order and unity.
But those times are past; and we of the nineteenth century, with our evolutionary theories and our mechanical philosophies, already know nature too impartially and too well to worship unreservedly any god of whose character she can be an adequate expression. Truly all we know of good and beauty proceeds from nature, but none the less so all we know of evil. Visible nature is all plasticity and indifference, a moral multiverse, as one might call it, and not a moral universe. [William James, "Is Life Worth Living?" address to the Young Men's Christian Association of Harvard University, May 1895]
overlap (v.): "to partially extend over," 1726, over- + lap (v.). Related: Overlapped; overlapping.
parboil (v.): late 14c., "to boil partially;" mid-15c., "to boil thoroughly," from Old French parboillir "to boil thoroughly," from Medieval Latin perbullire "to boil thoroughly," from Latin per "through, thoroughly" + bullire "to boil" (see boil (v.)). Main modern meaning "boil partially" is by mistaken association of the prefix with part. Related: Parboiled; parboiling.
partial (adj.): early 15c., "one-sided, biased," from Old French parcial (14c., Modern French partial), from Medieval Latin partialis "divisible, solitary, partial," from Latin pars (genitive partis) "part" (see part (n.)). Sense of "not whole, incomplete" is attested from late 14c. Related: Partially (mid-15c. as "incompletely").
purblind (adj.): c. 1300, pur blind "entirely blind," as a noun, "a blind person," later "partially blind, blind in one eye" (late 14c.), the main modern sense, from blind (adj.). The first element is sometimes explained as pure (adj.), or as the Anglo-French perfective prefix pur- (see pur-). Sense of "dull" first recorded 1530s.
rest (v.2): "to be left, remain," mid-15c., from Old French rester "to remain," from Latin restare "stand back, be left," from re- "back" (see re-) + stare "to stand," from PIE root *sta- "to stand, set down, make or be firm" (see stet). Partially confused and merged with the other verb rest. Sense of "to continue to be" is in rest assured. Transitive sense of "to keep, cause to continue to remain" was common in 16c.-17c., "used with a predicate adjective following and qualifying the object" [Century Dictionary], hence phrase rest you merry (1540s); God rest you merry, gentlemen, often is mis-punctuated.
rhyme (n.): "agreement in terminal sounds," 1560s, partially restored spelling, from Middle English ryme, rime (c. 1200) "measure, meter, rhythm," later "rhymed verse" (mid-13c.), from Old French rime (fem.), related to Old Provençal rim (masc.), earlier *ritme, from Latin rithmus, from Greek rhythmos "measured motion, time, proportion" (see rhythm).

In Medieval Latin, rithmus was used for accentual, as opposed to quantitative, verse, and accentual verse usually was rhymed, hence the sense shift. Persistence of older form is due to popular association with Old English rim "number," from PIE root *re(i)- "to reason, count" (see read (v.)). Phrase rhyme or reason "good sense" (chiefly used in the negative) is from late 15c. (see reason (n.)). Rhyme scheme is attested from 1931. Rhyme royal (1841) is a stanza of seven 10-syllable lines rhymed a-b-a-b-b-c-c.
rule (n.): c. 1200, "principle or maxim governing conduct, formula to which conduct must be conformed" from Old French riule, Norman reule "rule, custom, (religious) order" (in Modern French partially re-Latinized as règle), from Vulgar Latin *regula, from Latin regula "straight stick, bar, ruler;" figuratively "a pattern, a model," related to regere "to rule, straighten, guide" (see regal). Replaced Old English wealdan.

Meaning "regulation governing play of a game, etc." is from 1690s. Phrase rule of thumb first attested 1690s. Rule of law "supremacy of impartial and well-defined laws to any individual's power" is from 1883. Meaning "strip used for making straight lines or measuring" is recorded from mid-14c. Typography sense is attested from 1680s.
sacrosanct (adj.): "superlatively sacred or inviolable," c. 1600, from Latin sacrosanctus "protected by religious sanction, consecrated with religious ceremonies," from sacro, ablative of sacrum "religious sanction" (from neuter singular of sacer "sacred") + sanctus, past participle of sancire "make sacred" (for both, see sacred). Earlier in partially anglicized form sacro-seint (c. 1500).
stall (n.1): "place in a stable for animals," Old English steall "standing place, position, state; place where cattle are kept, fishing ground," from Proto-Germanic *stalla- (cognates: Old Norse stallr "pedestal for idols, altar; crib, manger," Old Frisian stal, Old High German stall "stand, place, stable, stall," German Stall "stable," Stelle "place"), from PIE root *stel- "to put, stand," with derivatives referring to a standing object or place (cognates: Greek stele "standing block, slab," stellein "to set in order, arrange, array, equip, make ready;" Latin stolidus "insensible, dull, brutish," properly "unmovable").

Meaning "partially enclosed seat in a choir" is attested from c. 1400; that of "urinal in a men's room" is from 1967. Several meanings, including that of "a stand for selling" (mid-13c., implied in stallage), probably are from (or influenced by) Anglo-French and Old French estal "station, position; stall of a stable; stall in a market; a standing still; a standing firm" (12c., Modern French étal "butcher's stall"). This, along with Italian stallo "place," stalla "stable" is a borrowing from a Germanic source from the same root as the native English word.
stub (n.): Old English stybb "stump of a tree," from Proto-Germanic *stubjaz (cognates: Middle Dutch stubbe, Old Norse stubbr), from PIE root *(s)teu- (1) "to push, stick, knock, beat" (see steep (adj.)). Extended 14c. to other short, thick, protruding things. Meaning "remaining part of something partially consumed" is from 1520s.
subtle (adj.): c. 1300 (mid-13c. as a surname), sotil, "penetrating; ingenious; refined" (of the mind); "sophisticated, intricate, abstruse" (of arguments), from Old French sotil, soutil, subtil "adept, adroit; cunning, wise; detailed; well-crafted" (12c., Modern French subtil), from Latin subtilis "fine, thin, delicate, finely woven;" figuratively "precise, exact, accurate," in taste or judgment, "fine, keen," of style, "plain, simple, direct," from sub "under" (see sub-) + -tilis, from tela "web, net, warp of a fabric" (see texture (n.)).

From early 14c. in reference to things, "of thin consistency;" in reference to craftsmen, "cunning, skilled, clever;" Depreciative sense "insidious, treacherously cunning; deceitful" is from mid-14c. Material senses of "not dense or viscous, light; pure; delicate, thin, slender; fine, consisting of small particles" are from late 14c. sotil wares were goods sold in powdered form or finely ground. Partially re-Latinized in spelling, and also by confusion with subtile.
town (n.): Old English tun "enclosure, garden, field, yard; farm, manor; homestead, dwelling house, mansion;" later "group of houses, village, farm," from Proto-Germanic *tunaz, *tunan "fortified place" (cognates: Old Saxon, Old Norse, Old Frisian tun "fence, hedge," Middle Dutch tuun "fence," Dutch tuin "garden," Old High German zun, German Zaun "fence, hedge"), an early borrowing from Celtic *dunon "hill, hill-fort" (cognates: Old Irish dun, Welsh din "fortress, fortified place, camp," dinas "city," Gaulish-Latin -dunum in place names), from PIE *dhu-no- "enclosed, fortified place, hill-fort," from root *dheue- "to close, finish, come full circle" (see down (n.2)).

Meaning "inhabited place larger than a village" (mid-12c.) arose after the Norman conquest from the use of this word to correspond to French ville. The modern word is partially a generic term, applicable to cities of great size as well as places intermediate between a city and a village; such use is unusual, the only parallel is perhaps Latin oppidium, which occasionally was applied even to Rome or Athens (each of which was more properly an urbs).

First record of town hall is from late 15c. Town ball, version of baseball, is recorded from 1852. Town car (1907) originally was a motor car with an enclosed passenger compartment and open driver's seat. On the town "living the high life" is from 1712. Go to town "do (something) energetically" is first recorded 1933. Man about town "one constantly seen at public and private functions" is attested from 1734.
cremaster: "The muscle of the spermatic cord, by which the testicle can be partially raised", Late 17th century: from Greek kremastēr, from krema- 'hang'.
mesosaprobic: "Designating, relating to, or characteristic of running water which is partially polluted", 1920s. From meso- + saprobic, after German Mesosaprob.