英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

revise [revise 词源字典]: revise: see visit
[revise etymology, revise origin, 英语词源]
revive: revive: see vivid
revoke: revoke: see vocation
revolt: revolt: [16] Latin volvere meant ‘roll’ (it is the source of English vault ‘jump’). Addition of the prefix re- ‘back’ produced revolvere ‘roll back, unroll’, hence ‘come to the original point, return, revolve’. English acquired this as revolve [14], and also took over its late Latin derivative revolūtiō via Old French as revolution [14], whose leading modern meaning ‘violent overthrow of a government’ emerged in the 16th century via an intermediate ‘complete reversal’.

The term revolver [19] for a pistol with a revolving chamber was apparently coined by its inventor Samuel Colt. Revolt itself came via French révolter and Italian rivoltare from Vulgar Latin *revolvitāre, a derivative of revolvere.
=> vault, volume
reward: reward: [14] Reward is ultimately the same word as regard, and indeed was originally used interchangeably with it. It came from rewarder, the Anglo-Norman version of Old French regarder, source of English regard. The modern meaning of reward, ‘recompense’, which goes back to the 14th century, presumably arose from the notion of ‘regarding’ someone with favour.
=> guard, regard
rhapsody: rhapsody: [16] A rhapsody is etymologically the product of a ‘weaver of songs’. It goes back ultimately to Greek rhapsōidíā ‘epic poem recited on a single occasion’, which was derived from rhapsōidós ‘writer of such poems’. This was a compound formed from rháptein ‘sew together’ and ōidé ‘song’ (source of English ode, parody, prosody, etc). The somewhat trivialized modern meaning ‘self-indulgently effusive piece of verse, music, etc’ emerged in the 17th century.
=> melody, ode, parody, prosody
rhetoric: rhetoric: [14] In ancient Greece, a rhétōr was a ‘public speaker’, an ‘orator’. The word went back to a prehistoric Indo-European base *wer- ‘speak, say’, which also produced English verb and word. From it was derived the adjective rhētorikós, which passed into English as a noun via Latin rhētorica and Old French rethorique.
=> verb, word
rheumatic: rheumatic: [14] Greek rheuma meant literally ‘flow, stream’ (it came ultimately from the same Indo-European base as produced English stream, and was a close relative of the Greek verb rhein ‘flow’, which provides the second halves of English catarrh and diarrhoea). It was used for a ‘watery discharge from the body’, and was borrowed into English (via late Latin rheuma and Old French reume) as rheum [14] in the sense ‘mucous discharge from the eyes or nose’.

Pains in the joints were in former times thought to be caused by watery secretions within the body, and so towards the end of the 17th century the term rheumatism was applied to them.
=> catarrh, diarrhoea, rhyme, rhythm
rhinoceros: rhinoceros: [13] Rhinoceros means literally ‘nose-horn’. The term was coined in Greek from rhīno-, the stem form of rhīs ‘nose’, and kéras ‘horn’ (a distant relative of English horn). Greek rhīnókerōs reached English via Latin rhīnocerōs. The abbreviated form rhino is first recorded in the 1880s.
=> antirrhinum, horn, keratin
rhizome: rhizome: see liquorice
rhododendron: rhododendron: [17] A rhododendron is etymologically a ‘rose-tree’. The term comes from Greek rhodódendron, a compound formed from rhódon ‘rose’ (apparently a relative of English rose) and déndron ‘tree’ (source of English dendrite [18] and dendrochronology [20]). This denoted the ‘oleander’, an application it retained through Latin rhododendron into English. The first record of its use for the plant we now know as the rhododendron dates from the mid 17th century.
=> rose
rhubarb: rhubarb: [14] The Greeks had two words for ‘rhubarb’: rhéon, which was borrowed from Persian rēwend, and which evolved into Latin rheum, now the plant’s scientific name; and rha, which is said to have come from Rha, an ancient name of the river Volga, in allusion to the fact that rhubarb was once grown on its banks (rhubarb is native to China, and was once imported to Europe via Russia).

In medieval Latin rhubarb became known as rha barbarum ‘barbarian rhubarb, foreign rhubarb’, again with reference to the plant’s exotic origins; and in due course association with Latin rheum altered this to rheubarbarum. It passed into English via Vulgar Latin *rheubarbum and Old French reubarbe.
=> barbarian
rhyme: rhyme: [12] Etymologically, rhyme and rhythm are the same word. Both go back to medieval Latin rythmus ‘rhythm’, but whereas rhythm has reached us almost unchanged, rhyme has come via a branch line. The sort of accented verse to which the medieval Latin word was applied commonly rhymed, and so when rythmus passed into early Old French as *ritme, it carried connotations of ‘rhyming’ with it.

This later developed to rime, and when English borrowed it as rime, it still contained the notion of ‘rhythm’; but by the 13th century ‘rhyme’ was becoming its main meaning. The spelling rhyme, which emerged around 1600, represents a conscious partial return to the word’s ultimate ancestors, Latin rhythmus and Greek rhuthmós.
=> rhythm
rhythm: rhythm: [16] Rhythm goes back ultimately to Greek rhuthmós. This originally meant ‘recurring motion’, and was related to the verb rhein ‘flow’ (source of English catarrh and diarrhoea). It was subsequently applied to ‘recurrent accents in verse’, in which sense it passed into English via Latin rhythmus. (Later Old French alteration of the word led to English rhyme.)
=> catarrh, diarrhoea, rheumatic, rhyme
rib: rib: [OE] Rib is a widespread Germanic word, which goes back to a prehistoric *rebjō, source also of German rippe, Dutch rib, Swedish ribba ‘lath’, etc. Its Old Norse form rif is the ancestor of English reef. Outside Germanic it is related to Russian rebro ‘rib’.
=> reef
ribald: ribald: [13] Ribald was originally a noun, a derogatory term meaning ‘retainer or dependent of low status’. It was borrowed from Old French ribaut, a derivative of the verb riber ‘sleep around’. This is turn went back to Old High German rīban ‘rub’, hence ‘copulate’. It was not used as an adjective until the early 16th century.
rice: rice: [13] The word rice is presumably, like the plant it names, of oriental origin; its ancestor may well be represented in Sanskrit vrīhi-. It first appeared in Europe as Greek órūza. This passed into Latin as oryza, and eventually spread throughout the languages of Europe: French riz, Italian riso, Spanish arroz, German reis, Dutch rijst, Swedish and Russian ris, Welsh reis, Lithuanian rysai, English rice, etc.
rich: rich: [OE] The original meaning of rich was ‘mighty, noble’. It goes back ultimately to the Indo-European base *reg- ‘move in a straight line’, hence ‘direct’, hence ‘rule’, source of English right, Latin rēx ‘king’ (ancestor of English regal, royal, etc), and Latin regere ‘rule’ (ancestor of English regent, regiment, etc).

The Old Celtic equivalent of Latin rēx was rīx ‘king’. This was borrowed into prehistoric Germanic, where it subsequently evolved into German reich, Dutch rijk, Swedish rik, Danish rig, and English rich. (It was also taken over by the Romance languages, giving French riche, Italian ricco, etc.) The sense ‘mighty, noble’ survived in English into the late Middle Ages, but ‘wealthy’ had started to develop in Germanic, and eventually saw off ‘mighty’.
=> regal, right, royal
rickshaw: rickshaw: [19] Rickshaw is English’s attempt to domesticate Japanese jin-riki-sha. These small two-wheeled man-hauled vehicles were introduced in Japan around 1870, and their name, which means literally ‘man strength vehicle’, had made its way into English by 1874. By the 1880s it had been shortened to rickshaw.
rid: rid: [13] The verb rid was borrowed from Old Norse rythja, ancestor of modern Swedish rödja, Danish rydde, and Norwegian rydja. This in turn went back to a prehistoric Germanic *rudjan. Its past participle rid has been used in the context be rid of, get rid of since the 15th century. Riddance is a 16th-century English coinage.