英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

aesthetic [aesthetic 词源字典]: aesthetic: [18] In strict etymological terms, aesthetic relates to perception via the senses. It comes ultimately from the Greek verb aísthesthai ‘perceive’ (which is related to Latin audīre ‘hear’), and this meaning is preserved in anaesthetic, literally ‘without feeling’. The derived adjective aisthētikós reached Western Europe via modern Latin aesthēticus, and was first used (in its Germanized form ästhetisch) in the writings of the philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724–1804).

Here, it retained its original sense, ‘perceptual’, but its use by A T Baumgarten as the title (Æsthetica) of a work on the theory of beauty in art (1750) soon led to its adoption in its now generally accepted meaning.
=> audible, audition[aesthetic etymology, aesthetic origin, 英语词源]
altar: altar: [OE] The etymological notion underlying the word altar is that of sacrificial burning. Latin altar, which was borrowed directly into Old English, was a derivative of the plural noun altāria, ‘burnt offerings’, which probably came from the verb adolēre ‘burn up’. Adolēre in turn appears to be a derivative of olēre ‘smell’ (the connection being the smell made by combustion), which is related to English odour, olfactory, and redolent. (The traditional view that altar derives from Latin altus ‘high’ is no longer generally accepted, although no doubt it played a part, by association, in its development.) In Middle English, the Old French form auter replaced altar, but in the 16th century the Latin form re-established itself.
=> odour, olfactory, redolent
amphibious: amphibious: [17] The Greek prefix amphimeant ‘both, on both sides’ (hence an amphitheatre [14]: Greek and Roman theatres were semicircular, so two joined together, completely surrounding the arena, formed an amphitheatre). Combination with bios ‘life’ (as in biology) produced the Greek adjective amphibios, literally ‘leading a double life’. From the beginning of its career as an English word it was used in a very wide, general sense of ‘combining two completely distinct or opposite conditions or qualities’ (Joseph Addison, for example, used it as an 18th-century equivalent of modern unisex), but that meaning has now almost entirely given way to the word’s zoological application.

At first, amphibious meant broadly ‘living on both land and water’, and so was applied by some scientists to, for example, seals; but around 1819 the zoologist William Macleay proposed the more precise application, since generally accepted, to frogs, newts, and other members of the class Amphibia whose larvae have gills but whose adults breathe with lungs.
=> biology
astronomy: astronomy: [13] Astronomy comes via Old French and Latin from Greek astronomíā, a derivative of the verb astronomein, literally ‘watch the stars’. Greek ástron and astér ‘star’ (whence English astral [17] and asterisk [17]) came ultimately from the Indo-European base *ster-, which also produced Latin stella ‘star’, German stern ‘star’, and English star.

The second element of the compound, which came from the verb némein, meant originally ‘arrange, distribute’. At first, no distinction was made between astronomy and astrology. Indeed, in Latin astrologia was the standard term for the study of the stars until Seneca introduced the Greek term astronomia. When the two terms first coexisted in English (astrology entered the language about a century later than astronomy) they were used interchangeably, and in fact when a distinction first began to be recognized between the two it was the opposite of that now accepted: astrology meant simply ‘observation’, whereas astronomy signified ‘divination’.

The current assignment of sense was not fully established until the 17th century.
=> asterisk, astral, star
bayonet: bayonet: [17] Bayonet comes from French bayonette, an early spelling of what is now baïonette. The French term is traditionally derived from Bayonne, the name of a town and port on the southwest coast of France, near Biarritz, where bayonets were supposedly first used by Basques of the area, in the 17th century. But this etymology is not universally accepted, and some have noted the resemblance to Old French bayon ‘crossbow bolt’.
benzene: benzene: [19] The original name given to this hydrocarbon, by the German chemist Eilhardt Mitscherlich in 1833, was benzine. He based it on the term benzoic acid, a derivative of benzoin, the name of a resinous substance exuded by trees of the genus Styrax. This came ultimately from Arabic lubān-jāwī, literally ‘frankincense of Java’ (the trees grow in Southeast Asia).

When the expression was borrowed into the Romance languages, the initial lu- was apprehended as the definite article, and dropped (ironically, since in so many Arabic words which do contain the article al, it has been retained as part and parcel of the word – see ALGEBRA). This produced a variety of forms, including French benjoin, Portuguese beijoim, and Italian benzoi.

English probably acquired the word mainly from French (a supposition supported by the folketymological alteration benjamin which was in common use in English from the end of the 16th century), but took the z from the Italian form. Meanwhile, back with benzine, in the following year, 1834, the German chemist Justus von Liebig proposed the alternative name benzol; and finally, in the 1870s, the chemist A W Hofmann regularized the form to currently accepted chemical nomenclature as benzene.
=> benzol
boy: boy: [13] The etymology of boy has long been problematical, but the now most generally accepted view is that it is probably a reduced form of an unrecorded Anglo-Norman *abuie or *embuie ‘fettered’, from the Old French verb embuier ‘fetter’. This came from Vulgar Latin *imboiāre, a compound verb based on Latin boiae ‘leather collar, fetter’, which was adapted from Greek boeiai doraí ‘ox-hides’ (hence ‘oxleather thongs’), from bous ‘ox’ (related to English bovine and cow).

The apparently implausible semantic connection is elucidated by the early meaning of boy in English, which was ‘male servant’; according to this view, a boy was etymologically someone kept in leather fetters, and hence a ‘slave’ or ‘servant’. The current main sense, ‘young male’, developed in the 14th century.
=> cow
butterfly: butterfly: [OE] A number of theories have been put forward as to how the butterfly got its name. Perhaps the most generally accepted is that it is a reflection of a once-held notion that butterflies land on and consume butter or milk left uncovered in kitchen or dairy (an idea perhaps supported by the German name for the ‘butterfly’, milchdieb, literally ‘milk-thief’). Other suggestions are that the word is a reference to the yellow wings of certain species of the insect, or to the colour of butterflies’ excrement.
cabbage: cabbage: [14] The shape of a cabbage, reminiscent of someone’s head, led to its being named in Old French caboce, which meant literally ‘head’. English acquired the word via the Old Northern French variant caboche (whose modern French descendant caboche, in the sense ‘head’, is said to provide the basis for Boche, the contemptuous term for ‘Germans’).

It is not known where it comes from ultimately; etymologists used to link it with Latin caput ‘head’, but that theory is no longer generally accepted. The Old English word for ‘cabbage’ was cāwel, which remains with us in the form of various Germanic relatives such as kohl-rabi, cauliflower, and Scottish kale.
caterwaul: caterwaul: [14] The earliest known use of this word comes in Chaucer’s Wife of Bath’s Prologue 1386: ‘If the cat’s skin be slick and grey, forth she will, ere any day be dawned, to show her skin, and go a-caterwauling’. The first element of the word is generally accepted to be cat, while the second (in Middle English it was usually -wawe or -wrawe) is presumably onomatopoeic, imitating the sound of a cat wailing or yowling. It is not clear whether it was a purely native creation, or whether English borrowed it from Low German katerwaulen (where kater means ‘tom cat’).
crumb: crumb: [OE] Relatives of crumb are fairly widespread in the Germanic languages – German has krume, for example, and Dutch kruim – and it is represented in some non- Germanic Indo-European languages, such as Greek grūméā and even Albanian grime. As these forms indicate, the b is not original (the Old English word was cruma); it first appeared in the 16th century, but crum remained an accepted spelling well into the 19th century. The derivative crumble appeared in the 16th century.
=> crumble
culprit: culprit: [17] Culprit appears to be a fossilized survival of the mixture of English and French once used in English courts. The usually accepted account of its origin is that it is a lexicalization of an exchange in court between the accused and the prosecutor. If the prisoner pleaded ‘not guilty’ to the charge read out against him, the prosecutor would have countered, in Law French, with ‘Culpable: prit d’averrer …’, literally ‘Guilty: ready to prove’. (English culpable [14] comes ultimately from Latin culpa ‘guilt’, and prit is the Anglo- Norman form of what in modern French has become prêt ‘ready’, from Latin praestus – source of English presto).

The theory is that this would have been noted down by those recording the proceedings in abbreviated form as cul. prit, which eventually came to be apprehended as a term used for addressing the accused.
=> culpable, presto
germ: germ: [17] As its close relatives germane and germinate [17] suggest, germ has more to do etymologically with ‘sprouting’ and ‘coming to life’ than with ‘disease’. It comes via Old French germe from Latin germen ‘sprout, offshoot’, which may go back ultimately to the Indo- European base *gen- ‘produce’ (source of English gene, generate, genitive, etc).

The meaning ‘sprout, from which new life develops’ persisted into English (and still occurs in such contexts as wheatgerm – and indeed in metaphorical expressions like ‘the germ of an idea’). Then at the beginning of the 19th century it began to be used to put into words the idea of a ‘seed’ from which a disease grew: ‘The vaccine virus must act in one or other of these two ways: either it must destroy the germe of the small-pox … or it must neutralize this germe’, Medical Journal 1803.

By the end of the century it was an accepted colloquialism for ‘harmful microorganism’.
=> germane, germinate
guilt: guilt: [OE] Guilt is a strictly English word; no other Germanic, or indeed Indo-European language has it, and it is not clear where it came from. One theory is that, like guild and yield, it comes ultimately from Germanic *gelth- ‘pay’, and originally meant ‘debt’. This is not generally accepted, but it is notable that the German word schuld means ‘debt’ as well as ‘guilt’, with ‘debt’ being the original sense.
kidney: kidney: [14] The origins of kidney are a matter of guesswork rather than certain knowledge. Probably the most widely accepted theory is that the -ey element represents ey, the Middle English word for ‘egg’, in allusion to the shape of the kidneys. The first syllable is more problematical, but one possible source is Old English cwith ‘womb’ or the related Old Norse kvithr ‘belly, womb’, in which case kidney would mean etymologically ‘belly-egg’.
=> egg
lazy: lazy: [16] Lazy is one of the problem words of English. It suddenly appears in the middle of the 16th century, and gradually replaces the native terms slack, slothful, and idle as the main word for expressing the concept ‘averse to work’, but no one knows for sure where it came from. Early spellings such as laysy led 19th-century etymologists to speculate that it may have been derived from lay, but the more generally accepted theory nowadays is that it was borrowed from Low German. Middle Low German had the similar lasich ‘lazy, loose’, which may go back to an Indo-European form denoting ‘slack’.
maroon: maroon: English has two distinct and completely unrelated words maroon. The one denoting ‘brownish red’ and ‘firework’ [16] has had a chequered semantic history, as its present-day diversity of meanings suggests. It comes ultimately from medieval Greek máraon ‘sweet chestnut’, and reached English via Italian marrone and French marron (as in marrons glacés).

It was originally used for ‘chestnut’ in English too, but that sense died out in the early 18th century, leaving behind the colour term (an allusion to the reddish brown of the chestnut’s inner shell) and ‘firework, exploding projectile’ (perhaps a reference to the shape of such devices). Maroon ‘abandon’ [17] comes from the noun maroon. This originally meant ‘runaway slave’, and comes via French from American Spanish cimarron.

The most widely accepted derivation of this is that it was based on Spanish cima ‘summit’, a descendant of Latin cyma ‘sprout’, and that it thus denotes etymologically ‘one who lives on the mountain tops’.
OK: OK: [19] Few English expressions have had so many weird and wonderful explanations offered for their origin as OK. There is still some doubt about it, but the theory now most widely accepted is that the letters stand for oll korrect, a facetious early 19th-century American phonetic spelling of all correct; and that this was reinforced by the fact that they were also coincidentally the initial letters of Old Kinderhook, the nickname of US president Martin Van Buren (who was born in Kinderhook, in New York State), which were used as a slogan in the presidential election of 1840 (a year after the first record of OK in print).
shampoo: shampoo: [18] Hindi chāmpō means ‘press!’ It is an imperative form of chāmpnā ‘press’, or more specifically ‘knead the muscles’. The English in India took the word up in the 18th century as a verb meaning ‘massage’, but by the middle of the 19th century we find it being used in the accepted modern sense, ‘wash the hair’. The linking factor was presumably the vigorous massaging action typically applied to the scalp when shampooing the hair.
shelter: shelter: [16] The origins of shelter are unclear, but the most usually accepted explanation is that it is an alteration of the now obsolete sheltron. This denoted a body of troops which protected itself in battle with a covering of joined shields. It was descended from Old English scieldtruma, a compound formed from scield, the ancestor of modern English shield, and truma ‘troop’.
=> shield
wainscot: wainscot: [14] Wainscot was borrowed from Middle Low German wagenschot. It is not altogether clear what the origins of this were, but the generally accepted theory is that it is a compound of wagen ‘waggon’ and schot ‘planks, boards’, and that it therefore originally meant ‘planks used for making waggons’. To begin with it was applied in English to ‘highgrade oak imported from Russia, Germany, and Holland’. Such wood was used mainly for panelling rooms, and by the 16th century wainscot had come to signify ‘wood panelling’.
=> waggon, wain
accept (v.): late 14c., "to take what is offered," from Old French accepter (14c.) or directly from Latin acceptare "take or receive willingly," frequentative of accipere "receive," from ad- "to" (see ad-) + capere "to take" (see capable). Related: Accepted; accepting.
anomie (n.): "absence of accepted social values," 1933, from Durkheim's "Suicide" (1897); a reborrowing with French spelling of anomy.
art (n.): early 13c., "skill as a result of learning or practice," from Old French art (10c.), from Latin artem (nominative ars) "work of art; practical skill; a business, craft," from PIE *ar-ti- (cognates: Sanskrit rtih "manner, mode;" Greek arti "just," artios "complete, suitable," artizein "to prepare;" Latin artus "joint;" Armenian arnam "make;" German art "manner, mode"), from root *ar- "fit together, join" (see arm (n.1)).

In Middle English usually with a sense of "skill in scholarship and learning" (c. 1300), especially in the seven sciences, or liberal arts. This sense remains in Bachelor of Arts, etc. Meaning "human workmanship" (as opposed to nature) is from late 14c. Sense of "cunning and trickery" first attested c. 1600. Meaning "skill in creative arts" is first recorded 1610s; especially of painting, sculpture, etc., from 1660s. Broader sense of the word remains in artless.

Fine arts, "those which appeal to the mind and the imagination" first recorded 1767. Expression art for art's sake (1824) translates French l'art pour l'art. First record of art critic is from 1847. Arts and crafts "decorative design and handcraft" first attested in the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society, founded in London, 1888.
Supreme art is a traditional statement of certain heroic and religious truths, passed on from age to age, modified by individual genius, but never abandoned. The revolt of individualism came because the tradition had become degraded, or rather because a spurious copy had been accepted in its stead. [William Butler Yeats]
ask (v.): Old English ascian "ask, call for an answer; make a request," from earlier ahsian, from Proto-Germanic *aiskon (cognates: Old Saxon escon, Old Frisian askia "request, demand, ask," Middle Dutch eiscen, Dutch eisen "to ask, demand," Old High German eiscon "to ask (a question)," German heischen "to ask, demand"), from PIE *ais- "to wish, desire" (cognates: Sanskrit icchati "seeks, desires," Armenian aic "investigation," Old Church Slavonic iskati "to seek," Lithuanian ieškau "to seek").

Form in English influenced by a Scandinavian cognate (such as Danish æske; the Old English would have evolved by normal sound changes into ash, esh, which was a Midlands and southwestern England dialect form). Modern dialectal ax is as old as Old English acsian and was an accepted literary variant until c. 1600. Related: Asked; asking. Old English also had fregnan/frignan which carried more directly the sense of "question, inquire," and is from PIE root *prek-, the common source of words for "ask" in most Indo-European languages (see pray). If you ask me "in my opinion" is attested from 1910. Asking price is attested from 1755.
awaken (v.): Old English awæcnan (intransitive), "to spring into being, arise, originate," also, less often, "to wake up;" earlier onwæcnan, from a- (1) "on" + wæcnan (see waken). Transitive meaning "to rouse from sleep" is recorded from 1510s; figurative sense of "to stir up, rouse to activity" is from c. 1600.

Originally strong declension (past tense awoc, past participle awacen), already in Old English it was confused with awake (v.) and a weak past tense awæcnede (modern awakened) emerged and has since become the accepted form, with awoke and awoken transferred to awake. Subtle shades of distinction determine the use of awake or awaken in modern English. Related: Awakening.
banister (n.): 1660s, unexplained corruption of baluster. As late as 1830 condemned as "vulgar," it is now accepted. Surname Bannister is from Old French banastre "basket," hence, "basket-maker."
bigot (n.): 1590s, "sanctimonious person, religious hypocrite," from French bigot (12c.), which is of unknown origin. Earliest French use of the word is as the name of a people apparently in southern Gaul, which led to the now-doubtful, on phonetic grounds, theory that the word comes from Visigothus. The typical use in Old French seems to have been as a derogatory nickname for Normans, the old theory (not universally accepted) being that it springs from their frequent use of the Germanic oath bi God. But OED dismisses in a three-exclamation-mark fury one fanciful version of the "by god" theory as "absurdly incongruous with facts." At the end, not much is left standing except Spanish bigote "mustache," which also has been proposed but not explained, and the chief virtue of which as a source seems to be there is no evidence for or against it.

In support of the "by God" theory, as a surname Bigott, Bygott are attested in Normandy and in England from the 11c., and French name etymology sources (such as Dauzat) explain it as a derogatory name applied by the French to the Normans and representing "by god." The English were known as goddamns 200 years later in Joan of Arc's France, and during World War I Americans serving in France were said to be known as les sommobiches (see also son of a bitch). But the sense development in bigot is difficult to explain. According to Donkin, the modern use first appears in French 16c. This and the earliest English sense, "religious hypocrite," especially a female one, might have been influenced by beguine and the words that cluster around it. Sense extended 1680s to other than religious opinions.
bohemian (n.): "a gypsy of society," 1848, from French bohemién (1550s), from the country name (see Bohemia). The modern sense is perhaps from the use of this country name since 15c. in French for "gypsy" (they were wrongly believed to have come from there, though their first appearance in Western Europe may have been directly from there), or from association with 15c. Bohemian heretics. It was popularized by Henri Murger's 1845 story collection "Scenes de la Vie de Boheme," the basis of Puccini's "La Bohème." Used in English 1848 in Thackary's "Vanity Fair."
The term 'Bohemian' has come to be very commonly accepted in our day as the description of a certain kind of literary gipsey, no matter in what language he speaks, or what city he inhabits .... A Bohemian is simply an artist or littérateur who, consciously or unconsciously, secedes from conventionality in life and in art. ["Westminster Review," 1862]
cabbala (n.): 1520s, from Medieval Latin cabbala, from Mishnaic Hebrew qabbalah "reception, received lore, tradition," especially "tradition of mystical interpretation of the Old Testament," from qibbel "to receive, admit, accept." Compare Arabic qabala "he received, accepted."
catholic (adj.): mid-14c., "of the doctrines of the ancient Church," literally "universally accepted," from French catholique, from Church Latin catholicus "universal, general," from Greek katholikos, from phrase kath' holou "on the whole, in general," from kata "about" + genitive of holos "whole" (see safe (adj.)). Applied to the Church in Rome c. 1554, after the Reformation began. General sense of "of interest to all, universal" is from 1550s.
chivalric (adj.): 1797, from chivalry + -ic. Pronounced by poets with accent on the middle syllable, and because they are the only ones who need it, that pronunciation might as well be accepted.
commonplace (n.): 1540s, "a statement generally accepted," literal translation of Latin locus communis, from Greek koinos topos "general topic." See common (adj.) + place (n.). The adjectival sense of "having nothing original" dates from c. 1600.
continental drift: 1925, a translation of German Kontinentalverschiebung, proposed 1912 by German scientist Alfred Wegener (1880-1930); the theory was not widely accepted until after c. 1950.
current (adj.): c. 1300, "running, flowing," from Old French corant "running, lively, eager, swift," present participle of corre "to run," from Latin currere "to run, move quickly" (of persons or things), from PIE *kers- "to run" (cognates: Greek -khouros "running," Lithuanian karsiu "go quickly," Old Norse horskr "swift," Old Irish and Middle Welsh carr "cart, wagon," Breton karr "chariot," Welsh carrog "torrent"). Meaning "prevalent, generally accepted" is from 1560s.
delusion (n.): "act of misleading someone," early 15c.; as a form of mental derangement, 1550s, from Latin delusionem (nominative delusio) "a deceiving," noun of action from past participle stem of deludere (see delude).

Technically, delusion is a belief that, though false, has been surrendered to and accepted by the whole mind as a truth; illusion is an impression that, though false, is entertained provisionally on the recommendation of the senses or the imagination, but awaits full acceptance and may not influence action. Delusions of grandeur, the exact phrase, is recorded from 1840, though the two words were in close association for some time before that.
docimacy (n.): "judicial inquiry into the character of aspirants for office or citizenship," especially in ancient Athens, 1801, from Greek dokimasia "assay, proving, examination," from stem of dokimazein "to test, prove," from dokimos "proven, genuine," literally "accepted," related to dekhesthai "to take, accept," cognate with Latin decere "to be seemly or fitting" (see decent).
dollar (n.): 1550s, from Low German daler, from German taler (1530s, later thaler), abbreviation of Joachimstaler, literally "(gulden) of Joachimstal," coin minted 1519 from silver from mine opened 1516 near Joachimstal, town in Erzgebirge Mountains in northwest Bohemia. German Tal is cognate with English dale.

The thaler was a large silver coin of varying value in the German states (and a unit of the German monetary union of 1857-73 equal to three marks); it also served as a currency unit in Denmark and Sweden. English colonists in America used the word in reference to Spanish pieces of eight. Due to extensive trade with the Spanish Indies and the proximity of Spanish colonies along the Gulf Coast, the Spanish dollar was probably the coin most familiar in the American colonies and the closest thing to a standard in all of them; it was used in the government's records of public debt and expenditures; it had the added advantage of not being British. The Continental Congress in 1786 adopted dollar as a unit when it set up the modern U.S. currency system, which was based on the suggestion of Gouverneur Morris (1782) as modified by Thomas Jefferson. None were circulated until 1794 .
When William M. Evarts was Secretary of State he accompanied Lord Coleridge on an excursion to Mount Vernon. Coleridge remarked that he had heard it said that Washington, standing on the lawn, could throw a dollar clear across the Potomac. Mr. Evarts explained that a dollar would go further in those days than now. [Walsh]
Phrase dollars to doughnuts attested from 1890; dollar diplomacy is from 1910. The dollar sign ($) is said to derive from the image of the Pillars of Hercules, stamped with a scroll, on the Spanish piece of eight. However, according to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing of the U.S. Department of the Treasury:
[T]he most widely accepted explanation is that the symbol is the result of evolution, independently in different places, of the Mexican or Spanish "P's" for pesos, or piastres, or pieces of eight. The theory, derived from a study of old manuscripts, is that the "S" gradually came to be written over the "P," developing a close equivalent of the "$" mark. It was widely used before the adoption of the United States dollar in 1785.
entropy (n.): 1868, from German Entropie "measure of the disorder of a system," coined 1865 (on analogy of Energie) by German physicist Rudolph Clausius (1822-1888), in his work on the laws of thermodynamics, from Greek entropia "a turning toward," from en "in" (see en- (2)) + trope "a turning, a transformation" (see trope). The notion is supposed to be "transformation contents." Related: Entropic.
It was not until 1865 that Clausius invented the word entropy as a suitable name for what he had been calling "the transformational content of the body." The new word made it possible to state the second law in the brief but portentous form: "The entropy of the universe tends toward a maximum," but Clausius did not view entropy as the basic concept for understanding that law. He preferred to express the physical meaning of the second law in terms of the concept of disgregation, another word that he coined, a concept that never became part of the accepted structure of thermodynamics. [Martin J. Klein, "The Scientific Style of Josiah Willard Gibbs," in "A Century of Nathematics in America," 1989]
flannel (n.): "warm, loosely woven woolen stuff," c. 1300, flaunneol, probably related to Middle English flanen "sackcloth" (c. 1400); by Skeat and others traced to Welsh gwlanen "woolen cloth," from gwlan "wool," from Celtic *wlana, from PIE *wele- (1) "wool" (see wool). "As flannel was already in the 16th c. a well-known production of Wales, a Welsh origin for the word seems antecedently likely" [OED].

The Welsh origin is not a universally accepted etymology, due to the sound changes involved; Barnhart, Gamillscheg, Diez suggest the English word is from an Anglo-French diminutive of Old French flaine "a kind of coarse wool." Modern French flanelle is a 17c. borrowing from English.
flour (n.): "finer portion of ground grain," mid-13c., from flower (n.), and maintaining its older spelling, on the notion of flour as the "finest part" of meal, perhaps as the flower is the finest part of the plant or the fairest plant of the field (compare French fleur de farine), as distinguished from the coarser parts (meal (n.2)). Old French flor also meant both "a flower, blossom" and "meal, fine flour." The English word also was spelled flower until flour became the accepted form c. 1830 to end confusion. Flour-knave "miller's helper" is from c. 1300.
freemason (n.): late 14c., originally a traveling guild of masons with a secret code; in the early 17c. they began accepting honorary members and teaching them the secrets and lore, which was continued into or revived in the 17th century and by 1717 had developed into the secret fraternity of affiliated lodges known as Free and Accepted Masons (commonly abbreviated F. and A. M.). The accepted refers to persons admitted to the society but not belonging to the craft.

The exact origin of the free- is a subject of dispute. Some [such as Klein] see a corruption of French frère "brother," from frèremaçon "brother mason;" others say it was because the masons worked on "free-standing" stones; still others see them as "free" from the control of local guilds or lords [OED]. Related: freemasonic.
galleon (n.): kind of large ship, 1520s, from French galion "armed ship of burden," and directly from Spanish galeón "galleon, armed merchant ship," augmentative of galea, from Byzantine Greek galea "galley" (see galley) + augmentative suffix -on. Developed 15c.-16c., it was shorter, broader, and with a higher stern superstructure than the galley. In English use, especially of Spanish royal treasure-ships or the government warships that escorted private merchant ships in the South American trade.
GALLEON. The accepted term for the type of ship which the Spaniards used in 1588; that is, an armed merchantman of exceptional quality, combining the strength of the mediaeval trader with some of the finer lines and fighting features of the GALLEY. [Sir Geoffrey Callender, "Sea Passages," 1943]
Italian agumented form of galea, galeaza, led to a different 16c. ship-name in English, galliass (1540s).
gazette (n.): "newspaper," c. 1600, from French gazette (16c.), from Italian gazzetta, Venetian dialectal gazeta "newspaper," also the name of a small copper coin, literally "little magpie," from gazza; applied to the monthly newspaper (gazeta de la novità) published in Venice by the government, either from its price or its association with the bird (typical of false chatter), or both. First used in English 1665 for the paper issued at Oxford, whither the court had fled from the plague.

The coin may have been so called for its marking; Gamillscheg writes the word is from French gai (see jay). The general story of the origin of the word is broadly accepted, but there are many variations in the details:
We are indebted to the Italians for the idea of newspapers. The title of their gazettas was, perhaps, derived from gazzera, a magpie or chatterer; or, more probably, from a farthing coin, peculiar to the city of Venice, called gazetta, which was the common price of the newspapers. Another etymologist is for deriving it from the Latin gaza, which would colloquially lengthen into gazetta, and signify a little treasury of news. The Spanish derive it from the Latin gaza, and likewise their gazatero, and our gazetteer, for a writer of the gazette and, what is peculiar to themselves, gazetista, for a lover of the gazette. [Isaac Disraeli, "Curiosities of Literature," 1835]

Gazzetta It., Sp. gazeta, Fr. E. gazette; prop. the name of a Venetian coin (from gaza), so in Old English. Others derive gazette from gazza a magpie, which, it is alleged, was the emblem figured on the paper; but it does not appear on any of the oldest Venetian specimens preserved at Florence. The first newspapers appeared at Venice about the middle of the 16th century during the war with Soliman II, in the form of a written sheet, for the privilege of reading which a gazzetta (= a crazia) was paid. Hence the name was transferred to the news-sheet. [T.C. Donkin, "Etymological Dictionary of the Romance Languages" (based on Diez), 1864]

GAZETTE. A paper of public intelligence and news of divers countries, first printed at Venice, about the year 1620, and so called (some say) because una gazetta, a small piece of Venetian coin, was given to buy or read it. Others derive the name from gazza, Italian for magpie, i.e. chatterer.--Trusler. A gazette was printed in France in 1631; and one in Germany in 1715. [Haydn's "Dictionary of Dates," 1857]
handicap (n.): 1650s, from hand in cap, a game whereby two bettors would engage a neutral umpire to determine the odds in an unequal contest. The bettors would put their hands holding forfeit money into a hat or cap. The umpire would announce the odds and the bettors would withdraw their hands -- hands full meaning that they accepted the odds and the bet was on, hands empty meaning they did not accept the bet and were willing to forfeit the money. If one forfeited, then the money went to the other. If both agreed either on forfeiting or going ahead with the wager, then the umpire kept the money as payment. The custom, though not the name, is attested from 14c. ("Piers Plowman").

Reference to horse racing is 1754 (Handy-Cap Match), where the umpire decrees the superior horse should carry extra weight as a "handicap;" this led to sense of "encumbrance, disability" first recorded 1890. The main modern sense, "a mental or physical disability," is the last to develop, early 20c.
Middle East (n.): 1899; never defined in a generally accepted way. Early use with reference to British India. Hence Middle-Eastern (1903).
pass (v.): late 13c. (transitive) "to go by (something)," also "to cross over," from Old French passer (11c.), from Vulgar Latin *passare "to step, walk, pass" (source also of Spanish pasar, Italian passare), from Latin passus "step, pace" (see pace (n.)). Intransitive sense of "to go on, to move forward, make one's way" is attested from c. 1300. Figurative sense of "to experience, undergo" (as in pass the time) is first recorded late 14c. Sense of "to go through an examination successfully" is from early 15c. Meaning "decline to do something" is attested from 1869, originally in cards (euchre). In football, hockey, soccer, etc., the meaning "to transfer the ball or puck to another player" is from c. 1865. Related: Passed; passing.

The meaning "to be thought to be something one is not" (especially in racial sense) is from 1935, from pass oneself off (as), first found 1809. The general verb sense of "to be accepted as equivalent" is from 1590s. Pass up "decline, refuse" is attested from 1896. Pass the buck is from 1865, said to be poker slang reference to the buck horn-handled knife that was passed around to signify whose turn it was to deal. Pass the hat "seek contributions" is from 1762. Pass-fail as a grading method is attested from 1955, American English.
perverse (adj.): mid-14c., "wicked," from Old French pervers "unnatural, degenerate; perverse, contrary" (12c.) and directly from Latin perversus "turned away, contrary, askew," figuratively, "turned away from what is right, wrong, malicious, spiteful," past participle of pervertere "to corrupt" (see pervert (v.)). The Latin word is glossed in Old English by forcerred, from past participle of forcyrran "to avoid," from cierran "to turn, return." Meaning "wrong, not in accord with what is accepted" is from 1560s; sense of "obstinate, stubborn" is from 1570s. It keeps the non-sexual senses of pervert (v.) and allows the psychological ones to go with perverted. Related: Perversely; perverseness.
poetry (n.): late 14c., "poetry; a poem; ancient literature; poetical works, fables, or tales," from Old French poetrie (13c.), and perhaps directly from Medieval Latin poetria (c.650), from Latin poeta (see poet). In classical Latin, poetria meant "poetess."
... I decided not to tell lies in verse. Not to feign any emotion that I did not feel; not to pretend to believe in optimism or pessimism, or unreversible progress; not to say anything because it was popular, or generally accepted, or fashionable in intellectual circles, unless I myself believed it; and not to believe easily. [Robinson Jeffers (1887-1962), forward to "Selected Poems"]

Poetry -- meaning the aggregate of instances from which the idea of poetry is deduced by every new poet -- has been increasingly enlarged for many centuries. The instances are numerous, varied and contradictory as instances of love; but just as 'love' is a word of powerful enough magic to make the true lover forget all its baser and falser, usages, so is 'poetry' for the true poet. [Robert Graves, "The White Goddess"]
Figurative use from 1660s. Old English had metergeweorc "verse," metercræft "art of versification." Modern English lacks a true verb form in this group of words, though poeticize (1804), poetize (1580s, from French poétiser), and poetrize (c. 1600) have been tried. Poetry in motion (1826) perhaps is from poetry of motion (1813) "dance" (also poetry of the foot, 1660s).
pony (n.): 1650s, powny, from Scottish, apparently from obsolete French poulenet "little foal" (mid-15c.), diminutive of Old French poulain "foal," from Late Latin pullanus "young of an animal," from Latin pullus "young of a horse, fowl, etc." (see foal (n.)) [Skeat's suggestion, still accepted].

German, sensibly, indicates this animal by attaching a diminutive suffix to its word for "horse," which might yield Modern English *horslet. Modern French poney is a 19c. borrowing from English. Meaning "crib of a text as a cheating aid" (1827) and "small liquor glass" (1849) both are from notion of "smallness" (the former also "something one rides"). As the name of a popular dance, it dates from 1963. The U.S. Pony Express began 1860 (and operated about 18 months before being superseded by the transcontinental telegraph). The figurative one-trick pony is 1897, American English, in reference to circus acts.