quword 趣词
Word Origins Dictionary
- Basil[Basil 词源字典]
- masc. proper name, from Latin Basilius, from Greek Basileios "kingly, royal," from basileus "king," which is of unknown origin, possibly from a language of Asia Minor (compare Lydian battos "king").[Basil etymology, Basil origin, 英语词源]
- coin (n.)
- c. 1300, "a wedge," from Old French coing (12c.) "a wedge; stamp; piece of money; corner, angle," from Latin cuneus "a wedge." The die for stamping metal was wedge-shaped, and the English word came to mean "thing stamped, a piece of money" by late 14c. (a sense that already had developed in French). Compare quoin, which split off from this word 16c. Modern French coin is "corner, angle, nook." Coins were first struck in western Asia Minor in 7c. B.C.E.; Greek tradition and Herodotus credit the Lydians with being first to make and use coins of silver and gold.
- Croesus
- from Latinized form of Greek Kroisis, 6c. B.C.E. king of Lydia in Asia Minor, famously wealthy; hence "rich man" or in other allusions to riches, from late 14c.
- labyrinth (n.)
- c. 1400, laberynthe (late 14c. in Latinate form laborintus) "labyrinth, maze," figuratively "bewildering arguments," from Latin labyrinthus, from Greek labyrinthos "maze, large building with intricate passages," especially the structure built by Daedelus to hold the Minotaur near Knossos in Crete, from a pre-Greek language; perhaps related to Lydian labrys "double-edged axe," symbol of royal power, which fits with the theory that the labyrinth was originally the royal Minoan palace on Crete and meant "palace of the double-axe." Used in English for "maze" early 15c., and in figurative sense of "confusing state of affairs" (1540s).
- meat (n.)
- Old English mete "food, item of food" (paired with drink), from Proto-Germanic *mati (cognates: Old Frisian mete, Old Saxon meti, Old Norse matr, Old High German maz, Gothic mats "food," Middle Dutch, Dutch metworst, German Mettwurst "type of sausage"), from PIE *mad-i-, from root *mad- "moist, wet," also with reference to food qualities, (cognates: Sanskrit medas- "fat" (n.), Old Irish mat "pig;" see mast (n.2)).
Narrower sense of "flesh used as food" is first attested c. 1300; similar sense evolution in French viande "meat," originally "food." In Middle English, vegetables still could be called grene-mete (15c.). Figurative sense of "essential part" is from 1901. Dark meat, white meat popularized 19c., supposedly as euphemisms for leg and breast, but earliest sources use both terms without apparent embarrassment.
The choicest parts of a turkey are the side bones, the breast, and the thigh bones. The breast and wings are called light meat; the thigh-bones and side-bones dark meat. When a person declines expressing a preference, it is polite to help to both kinds. [Lydia Maria Child, "The American Frugal Housewife," Boston, 1835]
First record of meat loaf is from 1876. Meat-market "place where one looks for sex partners" is from 1896 (meat in various sexual senses of "penis, vagina, body regarded as a sex object, prostitute" are attested from 1590s; Old English for "meat-market" was flæsccyping ('flesh-cheaping')); meat wagon "ambulance" is from 1920, American English slang, said to date from World War I (in a literal sense by 1857). Meat-grinder in the figurative sense attested by 1951. Meat-hook in colloquial transferred sense "arm" attested by 1919. - mixo-
- word-forming element meaning "mixed," from Greek mixo-, from mixis "a mixing, mingling, intercourse," from root of mignynai "to mix, mix up, mingle" (see mix (v.)). E.g. Mixolydian.
- Philadelphia
- city in Pennsylvania, U.S., from Greek, taken by William Penn to mean "brotherly love," from philos "loving" (see -phile) + adelphos "brother" (see Adelphia). Also the name recalls that of the ancient city in Lydia, mentioned in the New Testament, which was so called in honor of Attalos II Philadelphos, 2c B.C.E. king of Pergamon, who founded it. His title is said to have meant "loving the brethren." Philadelphia lawyer "clever, shrewd attorney" attested from 1788 in London, said originally to have been applied to Andrew Hamilton, who obtained the famous acquittal of J.P. Zenger on libel charges in 1735.
[C]ricket and coaching were after all popular in their day in places besides Philadelphia. It was merely that Philadelphia kept on with them longer than most places. This is a perennial Philadelphia trick, and gives to Philadelphia a sort of perpetual feeling of loss. Philadelphians are always just now getting rid of things that are picturesque, like those gas lamps on the streets, only because everybody else got rid of them long ago. [Nathaniel Burt, "The Perennial Philadelphians," 1963]
- quince (n.)
- early 14c., plural of quoyn, from Old French cooin (Modern French coing), from Vulgar Latin codoneum, from Latin cotoneum malum "quince fruit," probably a variant of cydonium malum, from Greek kydonion malon "apple of Kydonia" (modern Khania), ancient seaport city in Crete.
The plant is native to Persia, Anatolia, and Greece; the Greeks imported grafts for their native plants from a superior strain in Crete, hence the name. Kodu- also was the Lydian name for the fruit. Italian cotogno, German Quitte, etc. all are ultimately from the Greek word. - Sephardim
- plural of Sephardi "a Spanish or Portuguese Jew" (1851), from Modern Hebrew Sepharaddim "Spaniards, Jews of Spain," from Sepharad, name of a country mentioned only in Obad. v:20, probably meaning "Asia Minor" or a part of it (Lydia, Phrygia), but identified by the rabbis after the Jonathan Targum as "Spain." Related: Sephardic.
- tyrant (n.)
- c. 1300, "absolute ruler," especially one without legal right; "cruel, oppressive ruler," from Old French tiran, tyrant (12c.), from Latin tyrannus "lord, master, monarch, despot," especially "arbitrary ruler, cruel governor, autocrat" (source also of Spanish tirano, Italian tiranno), from Greek tyrannos "lord, master, sovereign, absolute ruler unlimited by law or constitution," a loan-word from a language of Asia Minor (probably Lydian); Klein compares Etruscan Turan "mistress, lady" (surname of Venus).
In the exact sense, a tyrant is an individual who arrogates to himself the royal authority without having a right to it. This is how the Greeks understood the word 'tyrant': they applied it indifferently to good and bad princes whose authority was not legitimate. [Rousseau, "The Social Contract"]
Originally in Greek the word was not applied to old hereditary sovereignties (basileiai) and despotic kings, but it was used of usurpers, even when popular, moderate, and just (such as Cypselus of Corinth), however it soon became a word of reproach in the usual modern sense. The spelling with -t arose in Old French by analogy with present participle endings in -ant. Fem. form tyranness is recorded from 1590 (Spenser); Medieval Latin had tyrannissa (late 14c.). - Arachne
- "A woman of Colophon in Lydia, a skilful weaver who challenged Athene to a contest. Athene destroyed Arachne’s work and Arachne tried to hang herself, but Athene changed her into a spider", From Greek arakhnē 'spider'.