英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

awe [awe 词源字典]: awe: [13] Old English had the word ege, meaning ‘awe’, but modern English awe is a Scandinavian borrowing; the related Old Norse agi steadily infiltrated the language from the northeast southwards during the Middle Ages. Agi came, like ege, from a hypothetical Germanic form *agon, which in turn goes back to an Indo-European base *agh- (whence also Greek ákhos ‘pain’). The guttural g sound of the 13th-century English word (technically a voiced velar spirant) was changed to w during the Middle English period. This was a general change, but it is not always reflected in spelling – as in owe and ought, for instance, which were originally the same word.
[awe etymology, awe origin, 英语词源]
breast: breast: [OE] Breast can be traced back via prehistoric Germanic *breustam to an Indo- European base *bhrus- or *bhreus-, whose other descendants, including Old Saxon brustian ‘bud’, Middle High German briustern ‘swell’, and Irish brú ‘abdomen, womb’, suggest that the underlying reference contained in the word may be to the growth and swelling of the female breasts. By the time it reached Old English, as brēost, it had already developed a more general, non-sex-specific sense ‘chest’, but the meaning element ‘mammary gland’ has remained throughout, and indeed over the past two hundred years ‘chest’ has grown steadily more archaic.
ought: ought: [OE] Ought began life as the past tense of owe, but the two have diverged widely over the centuries. The Old English ancestor of owe was āgan, and its past form was āhte. This originally shared all the meanings of its parent verb, of course, and continued to do so well into the 17th century (‘He said this other day, you ought him a thousand pound’, Shakespeare, 1 Henry IV 1596). Indeed, it survived dialectally until comparatively recently. But steadily since the 1600s its role as a quasi-modal auxiliary verb, denoting ‘obligation’, has come to the fore.
=> owe
wallop: wallop: [14] Wallop and gallop are doublets – that is to say, they began life as the same word, but have gradually drifted apart. Their ultimate common source was Frankish *walahlaupan ‘jump well’. This was a compound verb formed from *wala ‘well’ and *hlaupan ‘jump’, a relative of English leap. This was borrowed into Old French as galoper, which gave English gallop.

But the northern dialect of Old French took it over as waloper, which is where English wallop comes from. This was originally used for ‘gallop’ (‘Came there king Charlemagne, as fast as his horse might wallop’. William Caxton, Four Sons of Aymon 1489), but after the acquisition of gallop it began to go steadily downhill semantically, helped on its way perhaps by its sound, suggestive of hitting.
=> gallop
wave: wave: English has two words wave, distinct in origin, which have grown to resemble each other over the centuries. The verb, ‘move to and fro’ [OE], goes back to a prehistoric Germanic base *wab-, which also produced English waver [14] (borrowed from Old Norse vafra ‘move unsteadily’) and wobble [17]. The noun wave ‘movement of the sea’ [16] seems to be an alteration (under the influence of the verb wave) of an earlier wawe ‘wave’. This in turn probably went back to Old English wǣg ‘motion, wave’, a derivative of the verb which produced modern English wag.
=> waver, wobble; wag
admiration (n.): early 15c., "wonder," from Middle French admiration (14c.) or directly from Latin admirationem (nominative admiratio) "a wondering at, admiration," noun of state from past participle stem of admirari "admire," from ad- "at" (see ad-) + mirari "to wonder," from mirus "wonderful" (see miracle). The sense has weakened steadily since 16c.
cracker (n.2): Southern U.S. derogatory term for "poor, white trash" (1766), probably an agent noun from crack (v.) in the sense "to boast" (as in not what it's cracked up to be). Compare Latin crepare "to rattle, crack, creak," with a secondary figurative sense of "boast of, prattle, make ado about."
I should explain to your Lordship what is meant by crackers; a name they have got from being great boasters; they are a lawless set of rascalls on the frontiers of Virginia, Maryland, the Carolinas and Georgia, who often change their places of abode. [1766, G. Cochrane]
But DARE compares corn-cracker "poor white farmer" (1835, U.S. Midwest colloquial). Especially of Georgians by 1808, though often extended to residents of northern Florida. Another name in mid-19c. use was sand-hiller "poor white in Georgia or South Carolina."
Not very essentially different is the condition of a class of people living in the pine-barrens nearest the coast [of South Carolina], as described to me by a rice-planter. They seldom have any meat, he said, except they steal hogs, which belong to the planters, or their negroes, and their chief diet is rice and milk. "They are small, gaunt, and cadaverous, and their skin is just the color of the sand-hills they live on. They are quite incapable of applying themselves steadily to any labor, and their habits are very much like those of the old Indians." [Frederick Law Olmsted, "A Journey in the Seaboard Slave States," 1856]
dawdle (v.): 1650s, perhaps a variant of daddle "to walk unsteadily." Perhaps influenced by daw, because the bird was regarded as sluggish and silly. Not in general use until c. 1775. Related: Dawdled; dawdling.
gaze (v.): late 14c., gasen, gazen, "to stare, look steadily and intently," probably of Scandinavian origin (compare Norwegian, Swedish dialectal gasa "to gape"), perhaps related somehow to Old Norse ga "heed" (see gawk). Related: Gazed; gazing; gazer; gazee; gazeful; gazement.
halt (v.2): "to walk unsteadily, move with a limping gait," early 14c., from Old English haltian (Anglian), healtian (West Saxon), "to limp, be lame; to hesitate," from Proto-Germanic *halton (cognates: Old Saxon halton, Middle Dutch halten, Old High German halzen), derivative verb from the source of halt (adj.). Figurative use from early 15c. Related: Halted; halting.
idle (v.): late 15c., "make vain or worthless," from idle (adj.). Meaning "spend or waste (time)" is from 1650s. Meaning "cause to be idle" is from 1789. Sense of "running slowly and steadily without transmitting power" (as a motor) first recorded 1916. Related: Idled; idling.
mull (v.1): "ponder," 1873, perhaps from a figurative use of Middle English mullyn "grind to powder, pulverize," from molle "dust, ashes, rubbish" (c. 1300), probably from Middle Dutch mul "grit, loose earth," related to mill (n.1). But Webster's (1879) defined it as "to work steadily without accomplishing much," which may connect it to earlier identical word in athletics sense of "to botch, muff" (1862). Related: Mulled; mulling.
shamble (v.): "to walk with a shuffling gait, walk awkwardly and unsteadily," 1680s, from an adjective meaning "ungainly, awkward" (c. 1600), from shamble (n.) "table, bench" (see shambles), perhaps on the notion of the splayed legs of bench, or the way a worker sits astride it. Compare French bancal "bow-legged, wobbly" (of furniture), properly "bench-legged," from banc "bench." The noun meaning "a shambling gait" is from 1828. Related: Shambled; shambling.
stagger (v.): mid-15c., "walk unsteadily, reel" (intransitive), altered from stakeren (early 14c.), from a Scandinavian source (compare Old Danish stagra, Old Norse stakra "to push, shove, cause to reel," also "to stumble, stagger," perhaps literally "hit with a stick," from Proto-Germanic *stakon- "a stake," from PIE *steg- (1) "pole, stick." Cognate with Dutch staggelen "to stagger," German staggeln "to stammer." Transitive sense of "bewilder, amaze" first recorded 1550s; that of "arrange in a zig-zag pattern" is from 1856. Related: Staggered; staggering.
stat (n.): "instrument that keeps something stationary," before 1970, shortened form of Latin statim (adv.) "steadily, regularly; at once, immediately," from status (see state (n.1)). Perhaps originally "to a standstill." As an abbreviation of statistic, from 1961. Related: Stats.
steady (adj.): 1520s, "firmly fixed in place or station" (replacing earlier steadfast), from stead + adjectival suffix -y (2), perhaps on model of Middle Dutch, Middle Low German stadig. Old English had stæððig "grave, serious," and stedig "barren," but neither seems to be the direct source of the modern word. Old Norse cognate stoðugr "steady, stable" was closer in sense. As an adverb from c. 1600.

Originally of things; of persons or minds from c. 1600. Meaning "working at an even rate" is first recorded in 1540s. Steady progress is etymologically a contradiction in terms. Steady state first attested 1885; as a cosmological theory (propounded by Bondi, Gold, and Hoyle), it is attested from 1948. Related: Steadily.
swag (v.): "to move heavily or unsteadily," 1520s, probably from a Scandinavian source akin to Old Norse sveggja "to swing, sway," from the same source as Old English swingan "to swing" (see swing (v.)). Related: Swagged; swagging.
swim (v.): Old English swimman "to move in or on the water, float" (class III strong verb; past tense swamm, past participle swummen), from Proto-Germanic *swimjan (cognates: Old Saxon and Old High German swimman, Old Norse svimma, Dutch zwemmen, German schwimmen), from PIE root *swem- "to be in motion."

The root is sometimes said to be restricted to Germanic, but according to OED possible cognates are Welsh chwyf "motion," Old Irish do-sennaim "I hunt," Lithuanian sundyti "to chase." For the usual Indo-European word, see natatorium. Transitive sense of "cross by swimming" is from 1590s. Sense of "reel or move unsteadily" first recorded 1670s; of the head or brain, from 1702. Figurative phrase sink or swim is attested from mid-15c., in early use often with reference to ordeals of suspected witches.
teeter (v.): 1843, "to seesaw," alteration of Middle English titter "move unsteadily," probably from a Scandinavian source akin to Old Norse titra "to shake, shiver, totter, tremble," from Proto-Germanic *ti-tra- (cognates: German zittern "to tremble"). Meaning "move unsteadily, be on the edge of imbalance" is from 1844. Noun teeter-totter "see-saw" is attested from 1905 (earlier simply teeter, 1855, and titter-totter in same sense is from 1520s). Totter (n.) "board swing" is recorded from late 14c.; see totter (v.).
unsteady (adj.): 1590s, "not firm or secure in position," from un- (1) "not" + steady (adj.). Similar formation in Old Frisian unstadich, German unstätig, Middle Dutch onstadich. Meaning "marked by irregularity" is from 1680s. Related: Unsteadily (1550s).
vacillate (v.): 1590s, "to sway unsteadily," from Latin vacillatus, past participle of vacillare "sway to and fro; hesitate" (see vacillation). Meaning "to waver between two opinions or courses" is recorded from 1620s. Related: Vacillated; vacillates; vacillating.
wobble (v.): 1650s, wabble, probably from Low German wabbeln "to wobble;" cognate with Old Norse vafla "hover about, totter," related to vafra "move unsteadily," from Proto-Germanic *wab- "to move back and forth," perhaps from PIE *webh- "to weave" (see waver). Form with -o- is from 1851. Related: Wobbled; wobbling. The noun is attested from 1690s.
trade wind: "A wind blowing steadily towards the equator from the north-east in the northern hemisphere or the south-east in the southern hemisphere, especially at sea. Two belts of trade winds encircle the earth, blowing from the tropical high-pressure belts to the low-pressure zone at the equator", Mid 17th century: from the phrase blow trade 'blow steadily in the same direction'. Because of the importance of these winds to navigation, 18th-century etymologists were led erroneously to connect the word trade with ‘commerce’.