oceanyoudaoicibaDictYouDict[ocean 词源字典]
ocean: [13] In Greek mythology, ōkeanós was a great river or sea that completely encircled the world. This was personified as Ōkeanós, a Titan who was god of this outer sea. The name passed into English via Latin ōceanus and Old French occean, and to begin with was used only for this mythical sea, or for the whole body of water surrounding the Eurasian landmass, with which it was identified. Not until the end of the 14th century did it begin to be applied to large individual sections of the Earth’s seas.
[ocean etymology, ocean origin, 英语词源]
Indian OceanyoudaoicibaDictYouDict
first attested 1515 in Modern Latin (Oceanus Orientalis Indicus), named for India, which projects into it; earlier it was the Eastern Ocean, as opposed to the Western Ocean (Atlantic) before the Pacific was surmised.
North SeayoudaoicibaDictYouDict
Old English norðsæ, usually meaning "the Bristol Channel." The application to the body of water presently so named (late 13c.) is from Dutch (Noordzee, Middle Dutch Noortzee); it lies to the north of Holland, where it was contrasted with the inland Zuider Zee, literally "Southern Sea"). To the Danes, it sometimes was Vesterhavet "West Sea." In English, this had been typically called the "German Sea" or "German Ocean," which follows the Roman name for it, Oceanus Germanicus. "German" persisted on some British maps at least into the 1830s.
ocean (n.)youdaoicibaDictYouDict
late 13c., from Old French occean "ocean" (12c., Modern French océan), from Latin oceanus, from Greek okeanos, the great river or sea surrounding the disk of the Earth (as opposed to the Mediterranean), of unknown origin. Personified as Oceanus, son of Uranus and Gaia and husband of Tethys. In early times, when the only known land masses were Eurasia and Africa, the ocean was an endless river that flowed around them. Until c. 1650, commonly ocean sea, translating Latin mare oceanum. Application to individual bodies of water began 14c.; there are usually reckoned to be five of them, but this is arbitrary; also occasionally applied to smaller subdivisions, such as German Ocean "North Sea."
Protean (adj.)youdaoicibaDictYouDict
1590s, from Greek Proteus, sea god (son of Oceanus and Tethys) who could change his form; his name is literally "first," from protos "first" (see proto-).
TethysyoudaoicibaDictYouDict
name for the sea that anciently lay between Eurasia and Africa-Arabia, coined 1893 by German geologist Eduard Suess (1831-1914), from Tethys, name of a Greek sea goddess, sister and consort of Oceanus.