英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

bereft (adj.)[bereft 词源字典]: late 14c., past participle adjective from bereave (v.).[bereft etymology, bereft origin, 英语词源]
Berenice: fem. proper name, from Latin Berenice, from Macedonian Greek Berenike (classical Greek Pherenike), literally "bringer of victory," from pherein "to bring" (see infer) + nike "victory." The constellation Berenice's hair is from the story of the pilfered locks of the wife of Ptolemy Euergetes, king of Egypt, c. 248 B.C.E., which the queen cut off as an offering to Venus. The constellation features a dim but visible star cluster. But the earliest use of the phrase in astronomy in English was as a name for the star Canopus (1601).
beret (n.): also berret, 1827, from French béret, 19c., from dialect of Béarn, from Old Gascon berret "cap," from Medieval Latin birretum, diminutive of Late Latin birrus "a large hooded cloak," perhaps of Gaulish origin. The round, flat cap originally was worn by Basque peasants.
Beretta (n.): Italian firearms manufacturer, business attested from 1520s, founded by gunsmith Bartolomeo Beretta (1498-1565) of Lombardy.
berg (n.): short for iceberg, attested from 1823.
bergamot (n.): type of citrus tree, also its fruit, both similar to bitter orange, and the essence prepared from the oil of the rind of the fruit, 1690s, from French bergamote (17c.), from Italian bergamotta, named for Bergamo, town in Italy. The name is Roman Bergamum, from a Celtic or Ligurian berg "mountain," cognate with the identical Germanic word.

Earlier (1610s) as a kind of pear deemed especially luscious, in this sense ultimately a Romanic folk-etymologization from Turkish beg-armudi "prince's pear" or "prince of pears," influenced in form by the other word, but probably not from it (the town is on the opposite end of the peninsula from where the pear grows). Also used of garden plants of the mint order with a smell like that of oil of bergamot.
beriberi (n.): also beri-beri, paralytic disease prevalent in much of India, 1703, literally "great weakness," intensifying reduplication of Sinhalese beri "weakness."
Bering: strait and sea between Alaska and Siberia, named for Danish explorer Vitus Bering (1681-1741), who worked for Peter the Great and led the first European expedition to sight Alaska, in 1741.
berk (n.): "fool," 1936, abbreviation of Berkshire Hunt (or Berkeley Hunt), rhyming slang for cunt but typically applied only to contemptible persons, not to the body part.
This is not an objective, anatomical term, neither does it imply coitus. It connects with that extension of meaning of the unprintable, a fool, or a person whom one does not like. ["Dictionary of Rhyming Slang," 1960]
Berkshire: Old English Bearrocscir (893), from an ancient Celtic name meaning "hilly place" + Old English scir "shire, district."
Berlin: city in Brandenburg, capital of Germany, traditionally by folk-etymology from German Bär "bear," but likely from a Slavic source, compare Old Polabian berl-, birl- "swamp," in reference to the old city's location on low, marshy ground along the River Spree. A flashpoint city in the Cold War, the Berlin airlift ran from June 28, 1948 to May 12, 1949. The Berlin Wall began to be built Aug. 15, 1961, and was effective until Nov. 9, 1989.
berlin (n.): old type of four-wheeled covered carriage, 1690s, so called because it was introduced in Brandenburg, c. 1670; see Berlin. Hence berline (from the French form) "automobile with a glass partition behind the driver's seat." In reference to a type of wool and the popular patterns made for it, from 1841.
berm (n.): "narrow ledge," 1729, from French berme (17c.), from Old Dutch baerm "edge of a dike," probably related to brim (q.v.). In U.S., 19c., also the name for the bank of a canal opposite the tow path.
Bermuda: Atlantic island, named for Spanish explorer Juan de Bermudez (d.1570), who discovered it c. 1515. Bermuda shorts first attested 1946 (in "The Princeton Alumni Weekly"), from the type of garb worn by U.S. tourists there. Bermuda triangle in the supernatural sense was popular from 1972. As the adjective form, Bermudian (1777) holds seniority over Bermudan (1895).
Bern: Swiss capital, probably originally from PIE root *ber- "marshy place," but by folk etymology from German Bär "bear" (compare Berlin). Related: Bernese.
Bernard: masc. proper name, from German Bernhard, literally "bold as a bear," from Old High German bero "bear" (see bear (n.)) + harti "hard, bold, strong" (see hard (adj.)).
Bernicia: Anglo-Saxon kingdom in northernmost England, founded by mid-6c., eventually merged into Northumbria; the name evidently is a survival of a pre-invasion Celtic name, perhaps that represented by Welsh Bryneich.
Bernoulli's principle: named for Dutch mathematician Daniel Bernoulli (1700-1782), who published it in 1738.
berry (n.): Old English berie, from Proto-Germanic *basjom (cognates: Old Norse ber, Middle Dutch bere, German Beere "berry;" Old Saxon winber, Gothic weinabasi "grape"), which is of unknown origin. This and apple are the only native fruit names.
berserk (adj.): 1844, from berserk (n.) "Norse warrior," by 1835, an alternative form of berserker (1822), a word which was introduced by Sir Walter Scott, from Old Norse berserkr (n.) "raging warrior of superhuman strength;" probably from *ber- "bear" + serkr "shirt," thus literally "a warrior clothed in bearskin." Thus not from Old Norse berr "bare, naked."
Thorkelin, in the essay on the Berserkir, appended to his edition of the Krisini Saga, tells that an old name of the Berserk frenzy was hamremmi, i.e., strength acquired from another strange body, because it was anciently believed that the persons who were liable to this frenzy were mysteriously endowed, during its accesses, with a strange body of unearthly strength. If, however, the Berserk was called on by his own name, he lost his mysterious form, and his ordinary strength alone remained. ["Notes and Queries," Dec. 28, 1850]
The adjectival use probably is from such phrases as berserk frenzy, or as a title (Arngrim the Berserk).