英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

diaper [diaper 词源字典]: diaper: [14] The notion underlying diaper is of extreme whiteness. It comes ultimately from Byzantine Greek díaspros, which was a compound formed from the intensive prefix diaand áspros ‘white’. (Aspros itself has an involved history: it started life as Latin asper ‘rough’ – source of English asperity – which was applied particularly to bas-relief on carvings and coins; it was borrowed into Byzantine Greek and used as a noun to designate silver coins, and their brightness and shininess led to its reconversion into an adjective, meaning ‘white’.) Díaspros appears originally to have been applied to ecclesiastical vestments, and subsequently to any shiny fabric.

When the word first entered English, via medieval Latin diasprum and Old French diapre, it referred to a rather rich silk fabric embellished with gold thread, but by the 16th century it was being used for less glamorous textiles, of white linen, with a small diamond-shaped pattern. The specific application to a piece of such cloth used as a baby’s nappy (still current in American English) seems to have developed in the 16th century.
=> asperity[diaper etymology, diaper origin, 英语词源]
Argyle (n.): "diamond-shaped pattern of two or more colors in fabric," said to be so called from similarity to tartans worn by Campbell clan of Argyll, Scotland. The place name is literally "land of the Gaels," from Old Irish airer "country." Argyle socks is from 1935.
lozenge (n.): figure having four equal sides and two acute and two obtuse angles, early 14c., from Old French losenge "windowpane, small square cake," etc., used for many flat quadrilateral things (Modern French losange). It has cognates in Spanish losanje, Catalan llosange, Italian lozanga. Probably from a pre-Roman Celtic language, perhaps Iberian *lausa or Gaulish *lausa "flat stone" (compare Provençal lausa, Spanish losa, Catalan llosa, Portuguese lousa "slab, tombstone"), from a pre-Celtic language.

Originally in English a term in heraldry; meaning "small cake or tablet (originally diamond-shaped) of medicine and sugar, etc., meant to be held in the mouth and dissolved" is from 1520s.
quarrel (n.2): "square-headed bolt for a crossbow," mid-13c., from Old French quarel, carrel "bolt, arrow," from Vulgar Latin *quadrellus, diminutive of Late Latin quadrus (adj.) "square," related to quattuor "four" (see four). Now-archaic sense of "square or diamond-shaped plane of glass" first recorded mid-15c.