英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

atrocious [atrocious 词源字典]: atrocious: [17] Traced back to its ultimate source, atrocious meant something not too dissimilar to ‘having a black eye’. Latin āter was ‘black, dark’ (it occurs also in English atrabilious ‘melancholic’ [17] – Greek mélās meant ‘black’), and the stem *-oc-, *-ox meant ‘looking, appearing’ (Latin oculus ‘eye’ and ferox ‘fierce’ – based on ferus ‘wild’, and source of English ferocious – were formed from it, and it goes back to an earlier Indo-European base which also produced Greek ōps ‘eye’ and English eye).

Combined, they formed atrox, literally ‘of a dark or threatening appearance’, hence ‘gloomy, cruel’. English borrowed it (in the stem form atrōci-) originally in the sense ‘wantonly cruel’.
=> eye, ferocious, inoculate, ocular[atrocious etymology, atrocious origin, 英语词源]
boast: boast: [13] The immediate source of boast appears to be Anglo-Norman bost, but where it came from before that is far from clear; German dialect bauste(r)n ‘swell’ has been compared, suggesting that it could be of Germanic origin. To begin with it meant ‘loud or threatening talk’ as well as ‘bragging’.
menace: menace: [13] Latin mināx meant ‘threatening’ (it was formed from a base *min- ‘jut’ which also produced English eminent and prominent, and hence etymologically denoted ‘overhanging’). From it was derived the noun minācia ‘threatening things’, which passed into English via Old French manace. The closely related demeanour comes ultimately from a word denoting ‘drive animals with threats’.
=> eminent, prominent
atrocity (n.): 1530s, from Middle French atrocité or directly from Latin atrocitatem (nominative atrocitas) "cruelty, fierceness, harshness," noun of quality from atrox "fierce, cruel, frightful," from PIE *atro-ek-, from root *ater- "fire" (see atrium) + *okw- "see" (see eye (n.)); thus "of fiery or threatening appearance." The meaning "an atrocious deed" is from 1793.
glower (v.): mid-14c., "to shine;" c. 1500, "to stare with wide eyes," perhaps from a Scandinavian source (compare Norwegian dialectal glora "to glow, gleam; stare"), or related to Middle Dutch gluren "to leer;" in either case from Proto-Germanic *glo- (see glow (v.)), root of Old English glowan "to glow," which influenced the spelling of this word. Meaning "to look angrily, look intently and threateningly, scowl" is from 18c. Related: Glowered; glowering. As a noun, 1715, "an angry or threatening stare," from the verb.
lower (v.2): "to look dark and threatening," also lour, Middle English louren, luren "to frown" (early 13c.), "to lurk" (mid-15c.), from Old English *luran or from its cognates, Middle Low German luren, Middle Dutch loeren "lie in wait." Form perhaps assimilated to lower (1). Related: Lowered; lowering.
menace (n.): c. 1300, "declaration of hostile intent," also "act of threatening," from Old French menace "menace, threat" (9c.), from Vulgar Latin minacia "threat, menace" (also source of Spanish amenaza, Italian minaccia), singular of Latin minaciæ "threatening things," from minax (genitive minacis) "threatening," from minari "threaten, jut, project," from minæ "threats, projecting points," from PIE root *men- (2) "to project." Applied to persons from 1936.
minacious (adj.): "threatening," 1650s, from Latin minaci-, stem of minax "threatening, menacing" (from minari; see menace (n.)) + -ous. Related: Minaciously.
portentous (adj.): 1540s, from Latin portentosus "monstrous, marvelous, threatening," from portentem "portent" (see portend). Related: Portentously.
scent (v.): late 14c., sent "to find the scent of," from Old French sentir "to feel, smell, touch, taste; realize, perceive; make love to," from Latin sentire " to feel, perceive, sense, discern, hear, see" (see sense (n.)).

Originally a hunting term. The -c- appeared 17c., perhaps by influence of ascent, descent, etc., or by influence of science. This was a tendency in early Modern English, also in scythe and for a time threatening to make scite and scituate. Figurative use from 1550s. Transitive sense "impregnate with an odor, perfume" is from 1690s. Related: Scented; scenting.
threaten (v.): late 13c., "attempt to influence by menacing," from Old English þreatnian "to threaten" (see threat). Related: Threatened. Threatening in the sense of "portending no good" is recorded from 1520s.
thunder (v.): 13c., from Old English þunrian, from the source of thunder (n.). Figurative sense of "to speak loudly, threateningly, or bombastically" is recorded from mid-14c. Related: Thundered; thundering. Compare Dutch donderen, German donnern.
gazump: "Make a higher offer for a house than (someone whose offer has already been accepted by the seller) and thus succeed in acquiring the property", 1920s (in sense 2): from Yiddish gezumph 'overcharge'. sense 1 dates from the 1970s. More These days we associate gazumping with the buying and selling of houses, a use that dates from the 1970s. It now means ‘to raise the price of a house after accepting an offer from a prospective buyer’, but in the early 20th century it simply meant ‘to swindle’, deriving from Yiddish gezumph ‘to overcharge’. In the late 1980s the opposite term gazunder (a combination of gazump and under) was coined to describe the practice of lowering the amount of an offer that the seller has already accepted while threatening to withdraw if the new offer is not accepted.
comminatory: "Threatening, punitive, or vengeful", Early 16th century: from medieval Latin comminatorius, from comminat- 'threatened', from the verb comminari (see commination).
commination: "The action of threatening divine vengeance", Late Middle English: from Latin comminatio(n-), from the verb comminari, from com- (expressing intensive force) + minari 'threaten'.
plagueful: "Conveying or threatening plague or disease; pestilent. Also in weakened use: annoying, troublesome", Late 16th cent.; earliest use found in Richard Carew (1555–1620), antiquary and poet. From plague + -ful.