quword 趣词
Word Origins Dictionary
- district[district 词源字典]
- district: [17] District started life as the past participle of the verb which gave English distrain [13] and strain. It came via French district from medieval Latin districtus; this meant literally ‘seized, compelled’, and hence was used as a noun in the sense ‘seizure of offenders’, and hence ‘exercise of justice’, and finally ‘area in which justice is so exercised (in the feudal system)’.
This was the word’s meaning when it was first borrowed into English, and it was not really until the early 18th century that its much more general modern application developed. Districtus was the past participle of Latin distringere, a compound verb formed from the prefix dis- ‘apart’ and stringere ‘pull tight’ (source of English strain, strict, stringent, stress, etc).
In classical times it meant ‘draw apart, detain, hinder’, but by the Middle Ages this had moved on to ‘seize, compel’, which were the main senses in which it entered English as distrain (via Old French destreindre). Latin districtus was also the source of a Vulgar Latin noun *districtia ‘narrowness’, which passed via Old French destresse into English as distress [13].
=> distrain, distress, strain, stress, strict, stringent[district etymology, district origin, 英语词源] - fry
- fry: Fry ‘cook in fat’ [13] and fry ‘young fish’ [14] are quite distinct words. The former comes via Old French frire from Latin frīgere, a cooking term which covered what we would now distinguish as ‘roasting’ and ‘frying’. It goes back ultimately to Indo-European *bhreu-, which also produced Latin fervēre ‘boil’ (source of English fervent).
Its past participle frictus formed the basis of Vulgar Latin *frīctūra, from which, via Old French, English gets fritter [14]; and the past participial stem of the French verb, fris-, may lie behind English frizz [17]. Fry ‘small fish’ may come from Anglo-Norman frie, a derivative of Old French freier ‘rub, spawn’, which in turn goes back to Latin frīgere ‘rub’.
=> fervent, fritter, frizz - strait
- strait: [12] Strait was originally an adjective and adverb, meaning ‘narrow’ or ‘tight’. It reached English via Old French estreit ‘narrow, tight’ from Latin strictus (source of English strict). Its use as a noun, ‘narrow waterway’, emerged in the 14th century, and the metaphorical straits ‘difficulties’ is a 16th-century development.
=> strict - strict
- strict: [16] Strict was acquired direct from strictus, the past participle of Latin stringere ‘pull tight, tighten’ (source also of English prestige, strain, and stringent). The original literal sense ‘tight’ survived into English (‘She wildly breaketh from their strict embrace’, Shakespeare, Venus and Adonis 1592), but it has since given way to various metaphorical extensions.
Routed via Old French, strictus has given English strait, and English is also indebted to it for stress [14] (via the Vulgar Latin derivative *strictia) and stricture [14], not to mention prefixed forms such as constrain, constrict [18], distrain, distress, district, restrain, and restrict [16].
=> constrain, constrict, distrain, distress, district, prestige, restrain, restrict, strain, stress, stricture, stringent - constraint (n.)
- late 14c., "distress, oppression," from Old French constreinte "binding, constraint, compulsion" (Modern French contrainte), fem. noun from constreint, past participle of constreindre, from Vulgar Latin *constrinctus, from Latin constrictus (see constrain). Meaning "coercion, compulsion" is from 1530s.
- constrict (v.)
- early 15c., from Latin constrictus, past participle of constringere "compress" (see constrain). A direct borrowing from Latin of the same word which, via French, became constrain. Related: Constricted; constricting.
- constrictive (adj.)
- c. 1400, from Late Latin constrictivus, from Latin constrictus (see constrict).
- Detroit
- city in Michigan, U.S., from French détroit, literally "straits," from Old French destreit (12c.), from Latin districtum, neuter of districtus. French fort built there 1701. By 1918 the city name was synonymous with "U.S. automobile manufacturing."
- distress (n.)
- late 13c., "circumstance that causes anxiety or hardship," from Old French destresse, from Vulgar Latin *districtia "restraint, affliction, narrowness, distress," from Latin districtus, past participle of distringere "draw apart, hinder," also, in Medieval Latin "compel, coerce," from dis- "apart" (see dis-) + stringere "draw tight, press together" (see strain (v.)). Meaning "anguish, suffering; grief" is from c. 1300.
- district (n.)
- 1610s, "territory under the jurisdiction of a lord or officer," from French district (16c.), from Medieval Latin districtus "restraining of offenders, jurisdiction," then under the feudal system "area of jurisdiction," noun use of past participle of Latin distringere "hinder, detain" (see distress). Used vaguely of "any tract of land" from 1712. District attorney attested by 1789, American English.
- restrict (v.)
- 1530s, from Latin restrictus, past participle of restringere (see restriction). Regarded 18c. as a Scottishism. Related: Restricted; restricting.
- strait (adj.)
- "narrow, strict" (late 13c.), from Old French estreit, estrait "tight, close-fitting, constricted, narrow" (Modern French étroit), from Latin strictus, past participle of stringere (2) "bind or draw tight" (see strain (v.)). More or less confused with unrelated straight (adj.). Related: Straightly.
- stress (n.)
- c. 1300, "hardship, adversity, force, pressure," in part a shortening of Middle English distress (n.); in part from Old French estrece "narrowness, oppression," from Vulgar Latin *strictia, from Latin strictus "tight, compressed, drawn together," past participle of stringere "draw tight" (see strain (v.)). Meaning "physical strain on a material object" is from mid-15c. As an abstract force in mechanics from 1855. The purely psychological sense is attested from 1955.
- strict (adj.)
- early 15c., "narrow, drawn in, small," from Latin strictus "drawn together, close, tight," past participle of stringere (2) "to draw or bind tight" (see strain (v.)). The sense of "stringent and rigorous" (of law) is first found in 1570s; of qualities or conditions generally, 1590s.