winnow: [OE] Etymologically, to winnow grain is to separate it from the chaff by means of the ‘wind’. The verb was coined in the Old English period from wind. The same notion underlay Latin ventilāre ‘winnow’ (source of English ventilate), which was derived from ventus ‘wind’ (a relative of English wind). => wind[winnow etymology, winnow origin, 英语词源]