英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

hamster [hamster 词源字典]: hamster: [17] The hamster is a native of western Asia and southeastern Europe, and its English name is of Slavic origin. In Old Slavic it was called chomestoru, and it appears that at some point in the past an ancestor of this was borrowed into Germanic. Old High German had hamustro, which became modern German hamster, source of the English word. In the 18th century the animal was also called the German rat.
[hamster etymology, hamster origin, 英语词源]
ketchup: ketchup: [17] Ketchup is a Chinese word in origin. In the Amoy dialect of southeastern China, kôechiap means ‘brine of fish’. It was acquired by English, probably via Malay kichap, towards the end of the 17th century, when it was usually spelled catchup (the New Dictionary of the Canting Crew 1690 defines it as ‘a high East- India Sauce’). Shortly afterwards the spelling catsup came into vogue (Jonathan Swift is the first on record as using it, in 1730), and it remains the main form in American English. But in Britain ketchup has gradually established itself since the early 18th century.
orange: orange: [14] The name of the orange originated in northern India, as Sanskrit nāranga. This passed westwards via Persian nārang and Arabic nāranj to Spain. The Spanish form naranj filtered up to France, and became altered (perhaps under the influence of Orange, the name of a town in southeastern France which used to be a centre of the orange trade) to orenge, later orange – whence the English word.
Amoy: old name for the island of southeastern China, now known as Xiamen. From 1851 as the name of a dialect of Chinese.
bundling (n.): 1640s, "a gathering into a bundle," verbal noun from bundle (v.). Meaning "sharing a bed for the night, fully dressed, wrapped up with someone of the opposite sex" (1782) is a former local custom in New England (especially Connecticut and southeastern Massachusetts). It was noted there from about 1750s and often regarded by outsiders as grossly immoral, but New Englanders wrote defenses of it and claimed it was practiced elsewhere, too. It seems to have died out with the 18th century.
I am no advocate for temptation; yet must say, that bundling has prevailed 160 years in New England, and, I verily believe, with ten times more chastity than the sitting on a sofa. I had daughters, and speak from near forty years' experience. Bundling takes place only in cold seasons of the year--the sofa in summer is more dangerous than the bed in winter. [The Rev. Samuel Peters, "A general history of Connecticut," 1782]
cretaceous (adj.): 1670s, "chalky," from Latin cretaceus "chalk-like," from creta "chalk." As a geological period (with a capital C-), it was first used 1832. The extensive chalk beds of southeastern England were laid down during the Cretaceous.
croup (n.): "coughing illness," 1765, from obsolete verb croup "to cry hoarsely, croak" (1510s), probably echoic. This was the local name of the disease in southeastern Scotland, given wide currency by Dr. Francis Home (1719-1813) of Edinburgh in his 1765 article on it. Related: Croupy.
Geechee (n.): patois of coastal black communities in the southeastern U.S., from the Ogeechee River in Georgia. The name is perhaps from Muskogee and could mean "River of the Uchees," referring to a neighboring people.
Grenoble: city in southeastern France, from Roman Gratianopolis, named for 4c. roman emperor Flavius Gratianus. During the French Revolution the city was briefly renamed Grelibre, as if from noble.
hamster (n.): c. 1600, from German Hamster, from Middle High German hamastra "hamster," probably from Old Church Slavonic chomestoru "hamster" (the animal is native to southeastern Europe), which is perhaps a blend of Russian chomiak and Lithuanian staras, both meaning "hamster." The older English name for it was German rat.
lemur (n.): nocturnal Madagascar mammal, 1795, coined by Linnaeus, from Latin lemures (plural) "spirits of the dead" in Roman mythology.
The oldest usage of "lemur" for a primate that we are aware of is in Linnaeus's catalog of the Museum of King Adolf Frederick of Sweden (Tattersall, 1982); .... In this work, he explained his use of the name "lemur" thus: "Lemures dixi hos, quod noctu imprimis obambulant, hominibus quodanmodo similes, & lento passu vagantur [I call them lemurs, because they go around mainly by night, in a certain way similar to humans, and roam with a slow pace]" [Dunkel, Alexander R., et al., "Giant rabbits, marmosets, and British comedies: etymology of lemur names, part 1," in "Lemur News," vol. 16, 2011-2012, p.65]
Lemuria (1864) was the name given by English zoologist P.L. Sclater (1829-1913) to a hypothetical ancient continent connecting Africa and Southeastern Asia (and including Madagascar), which was hypothesized to explain phenomena now accounted for by continental drift. Earlier it was the name of the Roman feast of the Lemures.
maritime (adj.): 1540s, "of or pertaining to the sea," from Middle French maritime (16c.) or directly from Latin maritimus "of the sea, near the sea," from mare (genitive maris) "sea" (see mere (n.)) + Latin ending -timus, originally a superlative suffix (compare intimus "inmost," ultimus "last"), here denoting "close association with." Maritimes "seacoast regions of a country" is from 1590s; specifically of the southeasternmost provinces of Canada by 1926.
Rhone: river in southeastern France, from a pre-Indo-European element *rod- meaning "to flow."
Savoy: region in southeastern France (before 1800 part of the Kingdom of Sardinia), French Savoie, from Roman Sapaudia, of unknown origin. Related: Savoyard.
southeast (adv.): Old English suðeast; see south + east. Related: Southeasterly; southeastern.
steppe (n.): vast treeless plain of southeastern Europe and of Asia, 1670s, from German steppe and directly from Russian step', of unknown origin. Introduced in Western Europe by Humboldt.
Swahili: name of a Bantu people inhabiting the coast of southeastern Africa, 1814, literally "coast-dwellers," from Arabic sawahil, plural of sahil "coast" + ethnic suffix -i.
vanilla (n.): 1660s, "pod of the vanilla plant," from Spanish vainilla "vanilla plant," literally "little pod," diminutive of vaina "sheath," from Latin vagina "sheath of an ear of grain, hull of a plant" (see vagina). So called from the shape of the pods. European discovery 1521 by Hernando Cortes' soldiers on reconnaissance in southeastern Mexico. Meaning "flavoring extracted from the vanilla bean" is attested by 1728. Meaning "conventional, of ordinary sexual preferences" is 1970s, from notion of whiteness and the common choice of vanilla ice cream.
Walloon (adj.): 1520s, of a people of what is now souther and southeastern Belgium, also of their language, from Middle French Wallon, literally "foreigner," of Germanic origin (compare Old High German walh "foreigner"). The people are of Gaulish origin and speak a French dialect. The name is a form of the common appellation of Germanic peoples to Romanic-speaking neighbors. See Vlach, also Welsh. As a noun from 1560s; as a language name from 1640s.
Waterford: city in southeastern Ireland; 1783 in reference to a type of glassware manufactured there.