selfyoudaoicibaDictYouDict[self 词源字典]
self: [OE] Self is a general Germanic word, closely related to German selbe, Dutch zelf, Swedish sjelv, and Danish selv. These all point back to a prehistoric Germanic *selba-. Where this came from is not known for certain, although it seems likely to be related in some way to various pronouns denoting ‘oneself’, such as German sich and French se. According to John Hacket in his Scrinia reserata 1693, the word selfish was coined in the early 1640s by the Presbyterians.
[self etymology, self origin, 英语词源]
self (pron.)youdaoicibaDictYouDict
Old English self, seolf, sylf "one's own person, -self; own, same," from Proto-Germanic *selbaz (cognates: Old Norse sjalfr, Old Frisian self, Dutch zelf, Old High German selb, German selb, selbst, Gothic silba), Proto-Germanic *selbaz "self," from PIE *sel-bho-, suffixed form of root *s(w)e-, pronoun of the third person and reflexive (referring back to the subject of a sentence), also used in forms denoting the speaker's social group, "(we our-)selves" (see idiom).
Trying to define yourself is like trying to bite your own teeth. [Alan Watts]
Its use in compounds to form reflexive pronouns grew out of independent use in Old English. As a noun from early 14c.