英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

meld (v.)[meld 词源字典]: "to blend together, merge, unite" (intransitive), by 1910, of uncertain origin. OED suggests "perh. a blend of MELT v.1 and WELD v." Said elsewhere to be a verb use of melled "mingled, blended," past participle of dialectal mell "to mingle, mix, combine, blend."
[T]he biplane grew smaller and smaller, the stacatto clatter of the motor became once more a drone which imperceptibly became melded with the waning murmur of country sounds .... ["Aircraft" magazine, October 1910]
But it is perhaps an image from card-playing, where the verb meld is attested by 1907 in a sense of "combine two cards for a score:"
Upon winning a trick, and before drawing from the stock, the player can "meld" certain combinations of cards. [rules for two-hand pinochle in "Hoyle's Games," 1907]
The rise of the general sense of the word in English coincides with the craze for canasta, in which melding figures. The card-playing sense is said to be "apparently" from German melden "make known, announce," from Old High German meldon, from Proto-Germanic *meldojan (source of Old English meldian "to declare, tell, display, proclaim"), and the notion is of "declaring" the combination of cards. Related: Melded; melding.[meld etymology, meld origin, 英语词源]
melee (n.): 1640s, from French mêlée, from Old French meslee "brawl, confused fight; mixture, blend" (12c.), noun use of fem. past participle of mesler "to mix, mingle" (see meddle). See also medley. Borrowed in Middle English as melle but lost and then reborrowed 17c.
meliorate (v.): 1550s, "to make better," back-formation from melioration or else from Late Latin melioratus, past participle of Latin meliorare "improve," from melior "better," used as comparative of bonus "good," but probably originally meaning "stronger," from PIE root *mel- "strong, great, numerous" (see multi-). Related: Meliorated; meliorating; melioration; meliorative.
melioration (n.): c. 1400, "improvement," from Late Latin meliorationem (nominative melioratio), noun of action from past participle stem of Latin meliorare (see meliorate).
meliorism (n.): "belief that the world tends to become better," 1868, from Latin melior (see meliorate) + -ism. Related: Meliorist (1835).
melisma (n.): 1837, from Greek melisma "a song, an air, a tune, melody," from melos "music, song, melody; musical phrase or member," literally "limb," from PIE *mel- "a limb." Related: Melismatic.
Melissa: fem. proper name, from Latin, from Greek (Ionic) melissa (Attic melitta) "honeybee," also "one of the priestesses of Delphi," from PIE *melit-ya, suffixed form of *melit- "honey" (cognates: Greek meli, Latin mel "honey; sweetness;" Albanian mjal' "honey;" Old Irish mil "honey," Irish milis "sweet;" Old English mildeaw "nectar," milisc "honeyed, sweet;" Old High German milsken "to sweeten;" Gothic miliþ "honey").
mell (v.): "to mix, meddle," c. 1300, mellen, from Old French meller, variant of mesler (see meddle). Related: Melled; melling.
mellifluent (adj.): c. 1600, from Middle French mellifluent and directly from Late Latin mellifluentem (nominative mellifluens), related to mellifluus (see mellifluous).
mellifluous (adj.): early 15c., "sweet, pleasing" (of an odor, a style of speaking or writing, etc.), from Late Latin mellifluus "flowing with (or as if with) honey," from Latin mel (genitive mellis) "honey" (related to Greek meli "honey;" see Melissa) + -fluus "flowing," from fluere "to flow" (see fluent). Related: Melifluously; melifluousness.
Mellotron (n.): type of electronic musical instrument, 1963, from mello(w) + (elec)tron(ic).
mellow (adj.): mid-15c., melwe "soft, sweet, juicy" (of ripe fruit), perhaps related to melowe, variant of mele "ground grain" (see meal (2)), influenced by Middle English merow "soft, tender," from Old English mearu. Meaning "slightly drunk" is from 1680s. Mellow yellow "banana peel smoked in an effort to get high" is from 1967. Related: Mellowly; mellowness.
mellow (v.): 1570s, from mellow (adj.). Related: Mellowed; mellowing.
melodeon (n.): 1847, variant of melodion, from German Melopdoin, from Melodie, from Old French melodie (see melody).
melodic (adj.): 1818, from French mélodique, from Late Latin melodicus, from Greek melodikos, from melodia (see melody).
melodious (adj.): late 14c., from Old French melodios "melodious; delightful" (French mélodieux), from Medieval Latin melodiosus, from Latin melodia (see melody). Related: Melodiously; melodiousness.
melodise (v.): see melodize; also see -ize. Related: Melodised; melodising.
melodize: 1660s, from melody + -ize. Related: Melodized; melodizing.
melodrama (n.): 1784 (1782 as melo drame), "a stage-play in which songs were interspersed and music accompanied the action," from French mélodrame (18c.), from Greek melos "song" (see melody) + French drame "drama" (see drama). Meaning "a romantic and sensational dramatic piece with a happy ending" is from 1883, because this was often the form of the original melodramas. Also from French are Spanish melodrama, Italian melodramma, German melodram. Related: Melodramatize.
The melodramatist's task is to get his characters labelled good & wicked in his audience's minds, & to provide striking situations that shall provoke & relieve anxieties on behalf of poetic justice. [Fowler]
melodramatic (adj.): 1776; from foreign source of melodrama on model of dramatic. Related: Melodramatically.