英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

cigar [cigar 词源字典]: cigar: [18] Cigar comes from Spanish cigarro, whose origin is disputed. One story, perhaps more picturesque than accurate, is that it is an adaptation of cigarra, the Spanish word for ‘cicada’; supposedly this insect, with its stout body round which are wrapped large transparent leaflike wings, was held to resemble a cigar. Others have preferred to see as the source sicar, the verb for ‘smoke’ in the language of the ancient Maya of Central America. Cigarette is a French derivative, with the diminutive suffix -ette, apparently coined in the early 1840s.
[cigar etymology, cigar origin, 英语词源]
banana republic (n.): "small Central American state with an economy dependent on banana production," 1901, American English.
central (adj.): 1640s, from French central or directly from Latin centralis "pertaining to a center," from centrum (see center (n.)). Centrally is attested perhaps as early as early 15c., which might imply a usage of central earlier than the attested date.

Slightly older is centric (1580s). As a U.S. colloquial noun for "central telephone exchange," first recorded 1889 (hence, "Hello, Central?"). Central processing unit attested from 1961. Central America is attested from 1826.
cochineal (n.): 1580s, from French cochenille (16c.), probably from Spanish cochinilla, from a diminutive of Latin coccinus (adj.) "scarlet-colored," from coccum "berry (actually an insect) yielding scarlet dye" (see kermes). But some sources identify the Spanish source word as cochinilla "wood louse" (a diminutive form related to French cochon "pig").

The insect (Coccus Cacti) lives on the prickly pear cactus in Mexico and Central America and is a relative of the kermes and has similar, but more intense, dying qualities. Aztecs and other Mexican Indians used it as a dyestuff. It first is mentioned in Europe in 1523 in Spanish correspondence to Hernán Cortés in Mexico. Specimens were brought to Spain in the 1520s, and cloth merchants in Antwerp were buying cochineal in insect and powdered form in Spain by the 1540s. It soon superseded the use of kermes as a tinetorial substance. Other species of coccus are useless for dye and considered mere pests, such as the common mealy bug.
dory (n.1): "small, flat-bottomed boat," 1709, American English, perhaps from a West Indian or Central American Indian language.
filibuster (n.): 1580s, flibutor "pirate," especially, in history, "West Indian buccaneer of the 17th century" (mainly French, Dutch, and English adventurers), probably ultimately from Dutch vrijbueter (now vrijbuiter) "freebooter," a word which was used of pirates in the West Indies in Spanish (filibustero) and French (flibustier, earlier fribustier) forms. See freebooter.

According to Century Dictionary, the spread of the word is owing to a Dutch work ("De Americaensche Zee-Roovers," 1678) "written by a bucaneer named John Oexmelin, otherwise Exquemelin or Esquemeling, and translated into French and Spanish, and subsequently into English (1684)." Spanish inserted the -i- in the first syllable; French is responsible for the -s-, inserted but not originally pronounced, "a common fact in 17th century F[rench], after the analogy of words in which an original s was retained in spelling, though it had become silent in pronunciation" [Century Dictionary].

In American English, from 1851 in reference to lawless military adventurers from the U.S. who tried to overthrow Central American governments. The major expeditions were those of Narciso Lopez of New Orleans against Cuba (1850-51) and by William Walker of California against the Mexican state of Sonora (1853-54) and against Nicaragua (1855-58).
FILIBUSTERING is a term lately imported from the Spanish, yet destined, it would seem, to occupy an important place in our vocabulary. In its etymological import it is nearly synonymous with piracy. It is commonly employed, however, to denote an idea peculiar to the modern progress, and which may be defined as the right and practice of private war, or the claim of individuals to engage in foreign hostilities aside from, and even in opposition to the government with which they are in political membership. ["Harper's New Monthly Magazine," January 1853]
The noun in the legislative sense is not in Bartlett (1859) and seems not to have been in use in U.S. legislative writing before 1865 (filibustering in this sense is from 1861). Probably the extension in sense is because obstructionist legislators "pirated" debate or overthrew the usual order of authority. Originally of the senator who led it; the maneuver itself so called by 1893. Not technically restricted to U.S. Senate, but that's where the strategy works best. [The 1853 use of filibustering by U.S. Rep. Albert G. Brown of Mississippi reported in the "Congressional Globe" and cited in the OED does not refer to legislative obstruction, merely to national policy toward Cuba.]
Guatemala: Central American country, from words in a native language, variously identified as Quauhtemellan "land of the eagle" or Uhatzmalha "mountain where water gushes." Related: Guatemalan.
Ladino (n.): 1889, Spanish mixed with Hebrew, Arabic, and other elements, written in Hebrew characters, spoken by Sephardim in Turkey, Greece, etc. From Spanish Ladino "sagacious, cunning crafty," originally "knowing Latin, Latin," from Latin Latinus. The Spanish word also has appeared in 19c. American English in its senses "vicious horse" and, in Central America, "mestizo, white person."
Panama: probably from an unknown Guarani word, traditionally said to mean "place of many fish." Originally the name of the settlement founded 1519 (destroyed 1671 but subsequently rebuilt). Panama hat, made from the leaves of the screw pine, attested from 1833, a misnomer, because it originally was made in Ecuador, but perhaps so called in American English because it was distributed north from Panama City. Panama red as a variety of Central American marijuana is attested from 1967.
psilocybin (n.): 1958, from Modern Latin psilocybe, name of a Central American species of mushroom, from Greek psilos "bare" (see psilo-) + kybe "head."
quetzal (n.): central American bird with brilliant plumage, 1827, from Spanish quetzal, from Aztec quetzalli the bird name, literally "tail-feather."
teonanacatl (n.): native name for a hallucinogenic fungi (Psilocybe mexicana) found in Central America, 1875, from Nahuatl (Aztecan), from teotl "god" + nancatl "mushroom."
platy: "A small live-bearing freshwater fish of Central America, which is popular in aquaria", Early 20th century: colloquial abbreviation of modern Latin Platypoecilus (former genus name), from Greek platus 'broad' + poikilos 'variegated'.
ocellated turkey: "A small wild turkey of Central America, Meleagris (or Agriocharis) ocellata, having prominent blue-centred eyespots on its tail", Mid 19th cent.; earliest use found in Edward Blyth (1810–1873), zoologist. After scientific Latin Meleagris ocellata.