英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

hamster: hamster: [17] The hamster is a native of western Asia and southeastern Europe, and its English name is of Slavic origin. In Old Slavic it was called chomestoru, and it appears that at some point in the past an ancestor of this was borrowed into Germanic. Old High German had hamustro, which became modern German hamster, source of the English word. In the 18th century the animal was also called the German rat.
pack: pack: [13] The ultimate origins of pack are unknown. English borrowed it from one of the Germanic languages of northeastern Europe (both Middle Dutch and Middle Low German had pak), but where they got it from is not clear. Its derivatives package [16] and packet [16] are both English formations.
sabre: sabre: [17] Both the sabre and its name are of eastern European origin. The word comes from either Polish szabla or Hungarian száblya. It was westernized as sabel in German, and in the early 17th century it passed in this guise into French, where for reasons that are not altogether clear is soon evolved into sabre – source of the English word.
yet: yet: [OE] Yet is one of the mystery words of English. It seems to have emerged from the Anglo-Frisian group of dialects in northeastern Europe before the Angles and Saxons crossed the Channel (Old Frisian had iēta), but its ultimate source is unknown.
Bohunk (n.): 1903, U.S. derogatory slang for "lower class immigrant from Central or Eastern Europe," probably from Bohemian + a distortion of Hungarian.
buttinski (n.): a jocular name for one who cuts into a line, etc., 1902, American English, from verbal phrase butt in (see butt (v.)) + surname ending based on Eastern European names.
Carpathian: 1670s, in reference to the mountain range of Eastern Europe, from Thracian Greek Karpates oros, literally "Rocky Mountain;" related to Albanian karpe "rock."
Galicia: region in Central Europe, perhaps ultimately from Lithuanian galas "end, peak," in reference to the Carpathian Mountains which rise there, or from the root of Gaul. The region in northwestern Spain of the same name is from the ancient Roman province of Gallaecia, which is perhaps from the Celtic root cala "watercourse," or else it, too, might be from the root of Gaul. Related: Galician (1749 of Spain, 1835 of Eastern Europe).
gherkin (n.): small cucumber used for pickling (either a small, prickly type of cucumber produced by a certain plant (Cucumis anguria), or a green or immature common cucumber), 1660s, from early modern Dutch gurken, augurken (late 16c.) "small pickled cucumber," from East Frisian augurk "cucumber," probably from a Balto-Slavic source (compare Polish ogórek "cucumber," Lithuanian agurkas, Russian oguretsŭ), possibly ultimately from Medieval Greek angourion "a kind of cucumber," which is said to be from Persian angarah [Klein, etc.], but OED seems to regard this as unlikely. A Dutch source says the Greek is from a word for "immature" and that the vegetable originated in northern India and came to Eastern Europe via the Byzantine Empire.

The Dutch suffix is perhaps the diminutive -kin, though some regard it as a plural affix, with the Dutch word mistaken for a singular in English. The -h- was added 1800s to preserve the hard "g" pronunciation.
Goth (n.): Old English Gota (plural Gotan) "a member of the Germanic people who lived in Eastern Europe c.100 C.E.," from Late Latin Gothus (plural Gothi), from Greek Gothos (plural Gothoi), from Gothic *Gutos, which is preserved in Gothic gutþiuda "Gothic people," the first element cognate with Old Norse gotar "men" (the second meaning "people; see Dutch). "The sense 'men' is usually taken to be the secondary one, but as the etymology of the word is unknown, this is uncertain" [Gordon]. The unhistorical -th- in the modern English word is from Late Latin.

They entered history in 3c. C.E. on the lower Danube and later invaded the Roman Empire and were converted to Arian Christianity. Used in sense of "rude or uncivilized person; savage despoiler" (1660s) in reference to their fifth-century sacking of Roman cities (compare vandal, and French gothique, still with a sense of "barbarous, rude, cruel"). In 19c., in reference to living persons, it meant "a Gothicist" (1812), that is, "an admirer of the Gothic style, especially in architecture." Modern use as an adjective in reference to a subculture style (typically with lower-case g-) is from 1986, short for Gothic in this sense.
By 1982, when the legendary Batcave club opened in London, the music press had begun to use the term gothic rock to describe the music and fandom around which a new postpunk subculture was forming. [Lauren M.E. Goodlad & Michael Bibby, "Goth: Undead Subculture," 2007]
hamster (n.): c. 1600, from German Hamster, from Middle High German hamastra "hamster," probably from Old Church Slavonic chomestoru "hamster" (the animal is native to southeastern Europe), which is perhaps a blend of Russian chomiak and Lithuanian staras, both meaning "hamster." The older English name for it was German rat.
Iron Curtain (n.): in reference to the Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe, famously coined by Winston Churchill March 5, 1946, in speech at Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri, but it had been used earlier in this context (for example by U.S. bureaucrat Allen W. Dulles at a meeting of the Council on Foreign Relations, Dec. 3, 1945). The figurative sense of "impenetrable barrier" is attested from 1819, and the specific sense of "barrier at the edge of the sphere of influence of the Soviet Union" is recorded from 1920. During World War II, Goebbels used it in German (ein eiserner Vorhang) in the same sense. Its popular use in the U.S. dates from Churchill's speech.
kike (n.): derogatory slang for "a Jew," by 1901, American English; early evidence supports the belief that it was used at first among German-American Jews in reference to newcomers from Eastern Europe, perhaps because the names of the latter ended in -ki or -ky.
There is no charity organization of any kind here [a small city in Pennsylvania] and, what is sadder to relate, the Jews in this city will not form one; that is, if the present temper of the people can be used as a criterion. The German Jews are bitterly opposed to the "Kikes," as they persist in calling the Russian Jews .... ["Report of the National Conference of Jewish Charities in the United States," Cleveland, 1912]
Philip Cowen, first editor of "The American Hebrew," suggests a source in Yiddish kikel "circle." According to him, Jewish immigrants, ignorant of writing with the Latin alphabet, signed their entry forms with a circle, eschewing the "X" as a sign of Christianity. On this theory, Ellis Island immigration inspectors began calling such people kikels, and the term shortened as it passed into general use.
minority (n.): 1530s, "condition of being smaller," from Middle French minorité (15c.), or directly from Medieval Latin minoritatem (nominative minoritas), from Latin minor (see minor (adj.)). Meaning "state of being under legal age" is from 1540s; that of "smaller number or part" is from 1736. The meaning "group of people separated from the rest of a community by race, religion, language, etc." is from 1919, originally in an Eastern European context.
Moldova: country in Eastern Europe, named for the river through it, probably from PIE root *mel- "dark, soiled, black."
paprika (n.): 1896, from German Paprika, from Hungarian paprika, a diminutive from Serbo-Croatian papar "pepper," from Latin piper or Modern Greek piperi (see pepper (n.)). A condiment made from a New World plant, introduced into Eastern Europe by the Turks; known in Hungary by 1569.
Romania: Eastern European nation, name taken officially in 1861 at the union of Wallachia and Moldavia, from Latin Romani "people from Rome," which was used to describe the descendants of colonists there from Roman times; see Roman + -ia. In early use often Rumania, or, from French, Roumania. Related: Romanian; Rumanian; Roumanian.
Sarmatia: Latin Sarmatia, from Greek Sarmates, name of an ancient tribe which wandered the plains of eastern Europe west of the Volga; later poetically identified with Poland. Related: Sarmatian.
shtetl (n.): Jewish small town or village in Eastern Europe, 1949, from Yiddish, literally "little town," from diminutive of German Stadt "city, town," from Old High German stat "place," from PIE root *sta- "to stand" (see stet).
steppe (n.): vast treeless plain of southeastern Europe and of Asia, 1670s, from German steppe and directly from Russian step', of unknown origin. Introduced in Western Europe by Humboldt.
tarragon (n.): Artemisia Dracunculus, Eastern European plant of the wormwood genus, 1530s, from Medieval Latin tragonia, from Byzantine Greek tarchon, from Arabic tarkhon, from a non-Arabic source, perhaps Greek drakon "serpent, dragon" (via drakontion "dragonwort"); see dragon. From the same source come Spanish taragona, Italian targone, French estragon (with unetymological prefix). Its aromatic leaves long have been used for flavoring (especially vinegar).
vampire (n.): spectral being in a human body who maintains semblance of life by leaving the grave at night to suck the warm blood of the living as they sleep, 1734, from French vampire (18c.) or German Vampir (1732, in an account of Hungarian vampires), from Hungarian vampir, from Old Church Slavonic opiri (cognates: Serbian vampir, Bulgarian vapir, Ukrainian uper), said by Slavic linguist Franc Miklošič to be ultimtely from Kazan Tatar ubyr "witch," but Max Vasmer, an expert in this linguistic area, finds that phonetically doubtful. An Eastern European creature popularized in English by late 19c. gothic novels, however there are scattered English accounts of night-walking, blood-gorged, plague-spreading undead corpses from as far back as 1196. Figurative sense of "person who preys on others" is from 1741. Applied 1774 by French biologist Buffon to a species of South American blood-sucking bat. Related: Vampiric.
Ashkenazi: "A Jew of central or eastern European descent. More than 80 per cent of Jews today are Ashkenazim; they preserve Palestinian rather than Babylonian Jewish traditions and some still use Yiddish", From modern Hebrew, from Ashkenaz, grandson of Japheth, one of the sons of Noah (Gen. 10:3).