vanguard: [15] Vanguards have nothing to do with guarding vans. The word denotes etymologically an ‘advance guard’. It is short for the long defunct avantgard, which was borrowed from Old French avant-garde, a compound formed from avant ‘in front’ and garde ‘guard’. (Its modern French descendant was reborrowed into English as avant-garde [20].) => avant-garde, guard[vanguard etymology, vanguard origin, 英语词源]