humble: [13] Etymologically, humble means ‘close to the ground’. It comes via Old French umble from Latin humilis ‘low, lowly’. This was a derivative of humus ‘earth’, which is related to English chameleon and human and was itself acquired by English in the 18th century. In postclassical times the verb humiliāre was formed from humilis, and English gets humiliate [16] from it. => chameleon, human, humiliate, humus[humble etymology, humble origin, 英语词源]