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agnostic [agnostic 词源字典]

agnostic: [19] Agnostic is an invented word. It was coined by the English biologist and religious sceptic T H Huxley (1825–95) to express his opposition to the views of religious gnostics of the time, who claimed that the world of the spirit (and hence God) was knowable (gnostic comes ultimately from Greek gnōsis ‘knowledge’). With the addition of the Greek-derived prefix a- ‘not’ Huxley proclaimed the ultimate unknowability of God.

The circumstances of the coinage, or at least of an early instance of the word’s use by its coiner, were recorded by R H Hutton, who was present at a party held by the Metaphysical Society in a house on Clapham Common in 1869 when Huxley suggested agnostic, basing it apparently on St Paul’s reference to the altar of ‘the Unknown God’.
[agnostic etymology, agnostic origin, 英语词源]

assert

assert: [17] Assert comes ultimately from Latin asserere, which meant literally ‘join oneself to something’. It was a compound verb formed from the prefix ad- ‘to’ and serere ‘join’ (source of English series and serial), and it came to take on various metaphorical connotations: if one ‘joined oneself to’ a particular thing, one ‘declared one’s right to’ it, and if one ‘joined oneself to’ a particular point of view, one ‘maintained’ it, or ‘claimed’ it.

The verb was used in both these senses when English acquired it, from the Latin past participial stem assert-, but the former had more or less died out by the end of the 18th century.
=> serial, series

bogey

bogey: [19] Bogey is one of a set of words relating to alarming or annoying manifestations of the supernatural (others are bogle, bug, bugbear, and possibly boggle and bugaboo) whose interconnections are difficult to sort out. A strand common to most of them is a northern origin, which has led some to suggest an ultimate source in Scandinavia – perhaps an ancestor of Norwegian dialect bugge ‘important man’ (which has also been linked with English big) might lie behind Middle English bugge, originally ‘scarecrow’ but later used for more spectral objects of terror.

Others, however, noting Welsh bwg, bwgan ‘ghost’, have gone with a Celtic origin. Of more recent uses of bogey, ‘policeman’ and ‘nasal mucus’ seem to have appeared between the two World Wars, while ‘golf score of one stroke over par’ is said to have originated at the Great Yarmouth Golf Club in the 1890s, when a certain Major Wellman exclaimed, during the course of a particularly trying round, that he must be playing against the ‘bogey-man’ (a figure in a popular song of the time). Bogie ‘undercarriage’ [19] is a different word (of if anything obscurer origin than bogey).

chicken

chicken: [OE] Chicken is a widespread Germanic word (Dutch has kuiken, for instance, and Danish kylling), whose ancestor has been reconstructed as *kiukīnam. This was formed, with a diminutive suffix, on a base *keuk-, which some have claimed is a variant of a base which lies behind cock; if that is so, a chicken would amount etymologically to a ‘little cock’ (and historically the term has been applied to young fowl, although nowadays it tends to be the general word, regardless of age). Chick is a 14thcentury abbreviation.

The modern adjectival sense ‘scared’ is a 20th-century revival of a 17thand 18th-century noun sense ‘coward’, based no doubt on chicken-hearted.
=> cock

cockle

cockle: [14] The cockle is related etymologically to another mollusc, the conch: they both began life in Greek kónkhē – which meant ‘mussel’ as well as ‘conch’. From this was formed the diminutive konkhúlion ‘small variety of conch’ – hence ‘cockle’. The Greek word subsequently became reduced to kokhúlion, whose plural passed into medieval Latin as *cochilia.

Next in the chain was Old French coquille, source of the English word. The origin of the phrase cockles of one’s heart (first recorded in the mid 17th century) are not clear: some have claimed that the heart resembles a cockle shell, or more specifically that the fibres of the heart muscle spiral like the lines on a cockle shell, while others note a supposed resemblance of cockle to corculum, a Latin diminutive of cor ‘heart’, and others again point out that the scientific name for the cockle is Cardium, from Greek kardíā ‘heart’, but none of these explanations really carries conviction.
=> conch

coffee

coffee: [16] The word coffee first reached us in a form which we would now recognize in the 17th century, probably via Italian caffè. It is ultimately, however, of Middle Eastern origin, and the earliest spellings recorded in English reflect this: chaoua, cauwa, kahue, cahve, etc are modelled closely on Turkish kahveh and its source, Arabic qahwah.

Where the Arabic word came from is not known for certain: probably it is based in some way on Kaffa, the name of an area in the south Abyssinian highlands from which the coffee tree is said to originate, but it has also been claimed to have signified originally some sort of wine. Café [19] comes of course from French café, whose source was Italian caffè. From the French word was derived caféine, from which English gets caffeine [19], while Spanish café produced cafetero ‘coffeeseller’, source of English cafeteria [20].
=> café, caffeine, cafeteria

cricket

cricket: English has two completely unrelated words cricket. The name of the small grasshopper-like insect [14] comes from Old French criquet, a derivative of the verb criquer ‘click, creak’, which no doubt originated as an imitation of the sound itself. The origins of the name of the game cricket [16] have never been satisfactorily explained. One explanation often advanced is that it comes from Old French criquet ‘stick’, or its possible source, Flemish krick, although it is not clear whether the original reference may have been to the stick at which the ball was aimed (the forerunner of the modern stumps) or to the stick, or bat, used to hit the ball.

Another possible candidate is Flemish krickstoel, a long low stool with a shape reminiscent of the early types of wicket.

cube

cube: [16] Greek kúbos meant literally ‘six-sided solid figure’, a sense handed down to English via Latin cubus. Apart from more obvious metaphorical applications, such as ‘dice’, the Greek word was used for the internal cavity of the pelvis, a semantic feature which links it with its possible relative, English hip. The fine-art term cubism was introduced to English in 1911 from French, where it seems to have been coined in 1908 by an anonymous member of the Hanging Committee of the Salon des Independents. The story goes that when a painting by Georges Braque was being shown to the committee, he exclaimed ‘Encore des Cubes! Assez de cubisme!’.

dredge

dredge: English has two distinct words dredge, neither with a particularly well-documented past. Dredge ‘clear mud, silt, etc from waterway’ [16] may be related in some way to the 15thcentury Scottish term dreg-boat, and similarities have been pointed out with Middle Dutch dregghe ‘drag-net’, although if the two are connected, it is not clear who borrowed from whom.

It has also been suggested that it is related ultimately to drag. Dredge ‘sprinkle with sugar, flour, etc’ [16] is a verbal use based on a now obsolete noun dredge, earlier dradge, which meant ‘sweet’. This was borrowed from Old French dragie (its modern French descendant gave English dragée [19]), which may be connected in some way to Latin tragēmata and Greek tragémata ‘spices, condiments’ (these Latin and Greek terms, incidentally, may play some part in the obscure history of English tracklements ‘condiments to accompany meat’ [20], which the English food writer Dorothy Hartley claimed to have ‘invented’ on the basis of an earlier – but unrecorded – dialect word meaning more generally ‘appurtenances’).
=> dragée

edict

edict: [15] An edict is literally that which is ‘spoken out’ or ‘proclaimed’. It was acquired directly from Latin ēdictum, which comes from the past participle of ēdīcere ‘proclaim’. This was a compound verb formed from the prefix ex- ‘out’ and dīcere ‘say’ (source of English diction, dictionary, dictate amongst a host of others). The passing resemblance of edict to edit is quite fortuitous, for they are completely unrelated.
=> dictate, diction, dictionary

gaudy

gaudy: [16] Middle English had a colour term gaudy-green ‘yellowish-green’, which originally denoted ‘green produced by dye obtained from the plant dyer’s rocket, Reseda luteola’, a plant formerly known as weld [14]. The word weld came from a Germanic source which, borrowed into Old French, produced gaude – whence English gaudy-green. It has been claimed that this gaudy soon lost its literal meaning ‘produced from weld-dye’, and came to be interpreted as ‘bright’.

Other etymologists, however, favour the explanation that gaudy comes from gaud ‘joke, plaything’ [14], which was adapted from Old French gaudir ‘rejoice’, a descendant of Latin gaudēre ‘delight in’ (from which English gets joy).

goal

goal: [16] The earliest examples of what can confidently be identified as the word goal come from the first half of the 16th century, when it was used for both the ‘finishing line of a race’ and the ‘posts through which the ball is sent in football’. Before that we are in the realm of speculation. A 14th-century text from Kent has the word gol ‘boundary’, which could quite plausibly be the ancestor of the 16th-century goal, and gol suggest an Old English *gāl.

No such word has come down to us, but the Old English verb gǣlan ‘hinder’, which looks as though it could have been related to a noun *gāl, indicates that if it existed it might have meant ‘obstacle, barrier’ (which would lead on quite logically through ‘boundary’ and ‘finishing line’ to ‘something to be aimed at’).

goon

goon: [20] The antecedents of goon are murky. It may have been inspired by goony ‘simpleton’, which is first recorded in the 1890s and which may well be the same word as the much earlier gony with the same meaning, which in turn goes right back to the 16th century and could be related to Scottish gonyel ‘fool’. An ultimate connection with the obsolete verb gane ‘yawn’ has been suggested, but all we know for certain about goon itself is that it was introduced to the English language at large in America in 1921 by Frederick Lewis Allen, writing in Harper’s Magazine.

He claimed that it had been in use in his family for some years, with the meaning ‘stolid person’, but he had no suggestions to offer as to its origins. It then disappears from the record until the 1930s, when its resurrection seems to have been set in train by ‘Alice the Goon’, a slow-witted, muscular character in the comic strip ‘Thimble Theater, featuring Popeye’ by E.C. Segar, which first came out in 1933 (it is not clear whether Segar knew about the earlier, 1920s usage).

Taken up enthusiastically in student slang, by the end of the decade goon was firmly established in the senses ‘fool’ and ‘thug, strong-arm man’. During World War II it was applied by Allied prisoners of war to their German guards, and it has often been suggested that that was the inspiration for the goon of The Goon Show (originally Crazy People), the popular BBC radio comedy programme of the 1950s.

Its creator, Spike Milligan, denied this, and said that he got the idea from the ‘Goon’ of the Popeye cartoons. Either way, it is the show’s particular brand of comical surreality that colours today’s meaning of the word.

hobbit

hobbit: [20] The name of these small furry-footed human-like creatures was invented by their creator, J.R.R. Tolkien, and first appeared in public in The Hobbit (1937). It probably simply occurred to him as a pleasing- and appropriatesounding name, but with typical linguistic thoroughness he later worked up a detailed etymological rationale for it: in their own language, he claimed, hobbits were called kuduk; this was a worn-down version of an original kûd-dûkan, which meant literally ‘holedweller’; in Old English, ‘hole-dweller’ would have been holbytla, which in modern English could plausibly have become eroded to hobbit.

innuendo

innuendo: [17] An innuendo was originally a hint given with a ‘nod’ or a wink. The word is a derivative of Latin innuere ‘signal to by means of a nod’, a compound verb formed from in- ‘towards’ and nuere ‘nod’. The ablative case of its gerund, innuendō ‘by nodding’, was used in medieval legal documents as the equivalent of ‘that is to say, i.e’. In particular, it introduced the derogatory meaning claimed by the plaintiff in a libel case to be contained in or implied by a statement, and this formed the basis for its metaphorical transference to any ‘oblique derogatory implication’.

offend

offend: [14] Latin offendere meant ‘strike against’. It was a compound verb formed from the prefix ob- ‘against’ and -fendere ‘hit’ (source also of English defend). Its literal sense survived into English (‘The navy is a great defence and surety of this realm in time of war, as well to offend as defend’ proclaimed an act of parliament of Henry VIII’s time), and continues to do so in the derivatives offence [14] and offensive [16], but as far as the verb is concerned only the metaphorical ‘hurt the feelings’ and ‘violate’ remain.
=> defend, fend

panjandrum

panjandrum: [18] Panjandrum is an invented word, coined in 1755 by the English actor and playwright Samuel Foote (1720–77) to test the memory of the actor Charles Macklin, who claimed to be able to memorize and repeat anything said to him (it was one of several inventions in the same vein that Foote put to him: ‘And there were present the Picninnies, and the Joblillies, and the Garyulies, and the Grand Panjandrum himself, with the little round button at top’). It does not seem to have been taken up as a general comical term for a ‘pompous highranking person’ until the 19th century.

potshot

potshot: [19] A potshot was originally a shot taken at an animal or bird simply in order to kill it for food – in order to get it into the ‘pot’, in other words – rather than in accordance with the strict code and precise techniques of shooting as a ‘sport’. Indeed to begin with it was distinctly a contemptuous term among the hunting and shooting fraternity. But gradually it broadened out in meaning to any ‘casually aimed shot’.

quiz

quiz: [19] No one has ever been able satisfactorily to explain the origins of quiz. A word of that form first appeared at the end of the 18th century, meaning ‘odd person’ or, as a verb, ‘make fun of’ (in the early 19th century it was claimed to have been coined by a Dublin theatre proprietor by the name of Daly, but no proof has ever been found for this). The verb later came to be used for ‘look at mockingly or questioningly through a monocle’, and it may be that this led on (perhaps helped by associations with inquisitive or Latin quis? ‘who?, what?’) to the sense ‘interrogate’.

snob

snob: [18] Snob originally meant a ‘shoemaker’. Cambridge University students of the late 18th century took it over as a slang term for a ‘townsman, someone not a member of the university’, and it seems to have been this usage which formed the basis in the 1830s for the emergence of the new general sense ‘member of the lower orders’ (‘The nobs have lost their dirty seats – the honest snobs have got ’em’, proclaimed the Lincoln Herald on 22 July 1831, anticipating the new Reform Act).

This in turn developed into ‘ostentatiously vulgar person’, but it was the novelist William Thackeray who really sowed the seeds of the word’s modern meaning in his Book of Snobs 1848, where he used it for ‘someone vulgarly aping his social superiors’. It has since broadened out to include those who insist on their gentility as well as those who aspire to it. As for the origins of the word snob itself, they remain a mystery.

An ingenious suggestion once put forward is that it came from s. nob., supposedly an abbreviation for Latin sine nobilitate ‘without nobility’, but this ignores the word’s early history.

tennis

tennis: [14] The earliest recorded English forms of the word tennis include tenetz, teneys, and tenes. These suggest that it probably came from tenez, the imperative plural of Old French tenir ‘hold’, hence ‘receive’, supposedly shouted by the server to his opponent as a warning to get ready to receive the ball. The word originally referred, of course, to what is now known as real tennis (in which the real does simply mean ‘real’; it has no connection, as is often claimed, with obsolete English real ‘royal’); it was first applied to the newly invented outdoor game in 1874, in the compound lawn tennis, and this was soon shortened to simply tennis.
=> tenant

acclaim (v.)

early 14c., "to lay claim to," from Latin acclamare "to cry out at" (see acclamation); the meaning "to applaud" is recorded by 1630s. Related: Acclaimed; acclaiming.

Afghan

name of the people of Afghanistan, technically only correctly applied to the Durani Afghans; Old Afghan chronicles trace the name to an Afghana, son of Jeremiah, son of Israelite King Saul, from whom they claimed descent, but this is a legend. The name is first attested in Arabic in al-'Utbi's "History of Sultan Mahmud" written c.1030 C.E. and was in use in India from 13c. Attested from 1833 as a type of blanket or wrap (in full, Afghan shawl); 1973 as a style of sheepskin coat; 1877 as a type of carpet; 1895 as a breed of hunting dog.

aim (v.)

early 14c., "to estimate, calculate," also "to intend," from Old French aesmer "value, rate; count, estimate," from Latin aestimare "appraise" (see estimation); current meaning apparently developed from "esteem," to "calculate," to "calculate with a view to action" (c. 1400), then to "direct a missile, a blow, etc." (1570s). Related: Aimed; aiming.

allow (v.)

early 14c., allouen, "to commend, praise; approve of, be pleased with; appreciate the value of;" also, "take into account or give credit for," also, in law and philosophy, "recognize, admit as valid" (a privilege, an excuse, a statement, etc.). From late 14c. as "sanction or permit; condone;" in business use from early 15c.

The Middle English word is from Anglo-French alouer, Old French aloer, alloiier (13c.) "allot, apportion, bestow, assign," from Latin allocare (see allocate). This word in Old French was confused and ultimately merged with aloer; alloer "to praise, commend," from Latin allaudare, adlaudare, compound of ad- "to" (see ad-) + laudare "to praise" (see laud). From the first word came the sense preserved in allowance as "money granted;" from the second came its meaning "permission based on approval."

Between the two primary significations there naturally arose a variety of uses blending them in the general idea of assign with approval, grant, concede a thing claimed or urged, admit a thing offered, permit, etc., etc. [OED].

Related: Allowed; allowing.

America

1507, in Cartographer Martin Waldseemüller's treatise "Cosmographiae Introductio," from Modern Latin Americanus, after Amerigo Vespucci (1454-1512) who made two trips to the New World as a navigator and claimed to have discovered it. His published works put forward the idea that it was a new continent, and he was first to call it Novus Mundus "New World." Amerigo is more easily Latinized than Vespucci.

The name Amerigo is Germanic, said to derive from Gothic Amalrich, literally "work-ruler." The Old English form of the name has come down as surnames Emmerich, Emery, etc. The Italian fem. form merged into Amelia.

Colloquial pronunciation "Ameri-kay," not uncommon 19c., goes back to at least 1643 and a poem that rhymed the word with away. Amerika "U.S. society viewed as racist, fascist, oppressive, etc." first attested 1969; the spelling is German, but may also suggest the KKK.

It is interesting to remember that the song which is essentially Southern -- "Dixie" -- and that which is essentially Northern -- "Yankee Doodle" -- never really had any serious words to them. ["The Bookman," June 1910]

FREDONIA, FREDONIAN, FREDE, FREDISH, &c. &c.
These extraordinary words, which have been deservedly ridiculed here as well as in England, were proposed sometime ago, and countenanced by two or three individuals, as names for the territory and people of the United States. The general term American is now commonly understood (at least in all places where the English language is spoken,) to mean an inhabitant of the United States; and is so employed, except where unusual precision of language is required. [Pickering, 1816]

assertion (n.)

early 15c., assercioun, from Middle French assertion (14c.) or directly from Late Latin assertionem (nominative assertio), noun of action from past participle stem of Latin asserere "claim rights over something, state, maintain, affirm," from ad- "to" (see ad-) + serere "join" (see series). By "joining oneself" to a particular view, one "claimed" or "maintained" it.

aubain (n.)

1727, from French aubaine (12c.), which is of unknown origin, perhaps from Medieval Latin Albanus, but the sense is obscure. Klein suggests Frankish *alibanus, literally "belonging to another ban." A right of French kings, whereby they claimed the property of every non-naturalized stranger who died in their realm. Abolished 1819.

autochthon (n.)

1640s, "one sprung from the soil he inhabits" (plural autochthones), from Greek autokhthon "aborigines, natives," literally "sprung from the land itself," used of the Athenians and others who claimed descent from the Pelasgians, from auto- "self" (see auto-) + khthon "land, earth, soil" (see chthonic).

be (v.)

Old English beon, beom, bion "be, exist, come to be, become, happen," from Proto-Germanic *biju- "I am, I will be." This "b-root" is from PIE root *bheue- "to be, exist, grow, come into being," and in addition to the words in English it yielded German present first and second person singular (bin, bist, from Old High German bim "I am," bist "thou art"), Latin perfective tenses of esse (fui "I was," etc.), Old Church Slavonic byti "be," Greek phu- "become," Old Irish bi'u "I am," Lithuanian bu'ti "to be," Russian byt' "to be," etc. It also is behind Sanskrit bhavah "becoming," bhavati "becomes, happens," bhumih "earth, world."

The modern verb to be in its entirety represents the merger of two once-distinct verbs, the "b-root" represented by be and the am/was verb, which was itself a conglomerate. Roger Lass ("Old English") describes the verb as "a collection of semantically related paradigm fragments," while Weekley calls it "an accidental conglomeration from the different Old English dial[ect]s." It is the most irregular verb in Modern English and the most common. Collective in all Germanic languages, it has eight different forms in Modern English:

BE (infinitive, subjunctive, imperative)
AM (present 1st person singular)
ARE (present 2nd person singular and all plural)
IS (present 3rd person singular)
WAS (past 1st and 3rd persons singular)
WERE (past 2nd person singular, all plural; subjunctive)
BEING (progressive & present participle; gerund)
BEEN (perfect participle).

The paradigm in Old English was:

	SING.	PL.
1st pres.	ic eom ic beo	we sind(on) we beoð
2nd pres.	þu eart þu bist	ge sind(on) ge beoð
3rd pres.	he is he bið	hie sind(on) hie beoð
1st pret.	ic wæs	we wæron
2nd pret.	þu wære	ge waeron
3rd pret.	heo wæs	hie wæron
1st pret. subj.	ic wære	we wæren
2nd pret. subj.	þu wære	ge wæren
3rd pret. subj.	Egcferð wære	hie wæren

The "b-root" had no past tense in Old English, but often served as future tense of am/was. In 13c. it took the place of the infinitive, participle and imperative forms of am/was. Later its plural forms (we beth, ye ben, they be) became standard in Middle English and it made inroads into the singular (I be, thou beest, he beth), but forms of are claimed this turf in the 1500s and replaced be in the plural. For the origin and evolution of the am/was branches of this tangle, see am and was.

That but this blow Might be the be all, and the end all. ["Macbeth" I.vii.5]

blue blood (adj.)

1809 in reference to the blood that flows in the veins of the old and aristocratic families of Spain, translating Spanish sangre azul, claimed by certain families of Castile as uncontaminated by Moorish or Jewish admixture; the term is probably from the notion of the visible veins of people of fair complexion. In reference to English families by 1827. As a noun, "member of an old and aristocratic family," by 1877.

bogey (n.2)

in golfing, c. 1891, originally "number of strokes a good player is supposed to need for a given hole or course;" later, "score one over par" (1946); from the same source as bogey (n.1), on the notion of a "phantom" opponent, represented by the "ground score." The word was in vogue at the time in Britain because of the popularity of a music hall tune "Hush, Hush, Hush, Here Comes the Bogey Man."

One popular song at least has left its permanent effect on the game of golf. That song is 'The Bogey Man.' In 1890 Dr. Thos. Browne, R.N., the hon. secretary of the Great Yarmouth Club, was playing against a Major Wellman, the match being against the 'ground score,' which was the name given to the scratch value of each hole. The system of playing against the 'ground score' was new to Major Wellman, and he exclaimed, thinking of the song of the moment, that his mysterious and well-nigh invincible opponent was a regular 'bogey-man.' The name 'caught on' at Great Yarmouth, and to-day 'Bogey' is one of the most feared opponents on all the courses that acknowledge him. [1908, cited in OED]

Other early golfing sources give it an American origin. As a verb, attested by 1948.

Briton (n.)

Anglo-French Bretun, from Latin Brittonem (nominative Britto, misspelled Brito in MSS) "a member of the tribe of the Britons," from *Britt-os, the Celtic name of the Celtic inhabitants of Britain and southern Scotland before the 5c. Anglo-Saxon invasion drove them into Wales, Cornwall, and a few other corners. In 4c. B.C.E. Greek they are recorded as Prittanoi, which is said to mean "tattooed people." Exclusively in historical use after Old English period; revived when James I was proclaimed King of Great Britain in 1604, and made official at the union of England and Scotland in 1707.

bundling (n.)

1640s, "a gathering into a bundle," verbal noun from bundle (v.). Meaning "sharing a bed for the night, fully dressed, wrapped up with someone of the opposite sex" (1782) is a former local custom in New England (especially Connecticut and southeastern Massachusetts). It was noted there from about 1750s and often regarded by outsiders as grossly immoral, but New Englanders wrote defenses of it and claimed it was practiced elsewhere, too. It seems to have died out with the 18th century.

I am no advocate for temptation; yet must say, that bundling has prevailed 160 years in New England, and, I verily believe, with ten times more chastity than the sitting on a sofa. I had daughters, and speak from near forty years' experience. Bundling takes place only in cold seasons of the year--the sofa in summer is more dangerous than the bed in winter. [The Rev. Samuel Peters, "A general history of Connecticut," 1782]

claim (v.)

c. 1300, "to call, call out; to ask or demand by virtue of right or authority," from accented stem of Old French clamer "to call, name, describe; claim; complain; declare," from Latin clamare "to cry out, shout, proclaim," from PIE *kele- (2) "to shout," imitative (compare Sanskrit usakala "cock," literally "dawn-calling;" Latin calare "to announce solemnly, call out;" Middle Irish cailech "cock;" Greek kalein "to call," kelados "noise," kledon "report, fame;" Old High German halan "to call;" Old English hlowan "to low, make a noise like a cow;" Lithuanian kalba "language"). Related: Claimed; claiming.

Meaning "to maintain as true" is from 1864; specific sense "to make a claim" (on an insurance company) is from 1897. Claim properly should not stray too far from its true meaning of "to demand recognition of a right."

claim (n.)

early 14c., "a demand of a right; right of claiming," from Old French claime "claim, complaint," from clamer (see claim (v.)). Meaning "thing claimed or demanded" is from 1792; specifically "piece of land allotted and taken" (chiefly U.S. and Australia, in reference to mining) is from 1851. Insurance sense is from 1878.

clitoris (n.)

"erectile organ of female mammals," 1610s, coined in Modern Latin from Late Greek kleitoris, a diminutive, but the exact sense intended by the coiners is uncertain. Perhaps from Greek kleiein "to sheathe," also "to shut," in reference to its being covered by the labia minora. The related Greek noun form kleis has a second meaning of "a key, a latch or hook (to close a door);" see close (v.), and compare slot (n.2).

Alternatively, perhaps related to Greek kleitys, a variant of klitys "side of a hill," itself related to klinein "to slope," from the same root as climax (see lean (v.)), and with a sense of "little hill." Some ancient medical sources give a supposed Greek verb kleitoriazein "to touch or titillate lasciviously, to tickle" (compare German slang der Kitzler "clitoris," literally "the tickler"), but the verb is likely from the anatomy in this case.

The anatomist Mateo Renaldo Colombo (1516-1559), professor at Padua, claimed to have discovered it ("De re anatomica," 1559, p. 243). He called it amor Veneris, vel dulcedo "the love or sweetness of Venus." It had been known earlier to women.

cui bono

a Latin phrase from Cicero. It means "to whom for a benefit," or "who profits by it?" not "to what good purpose?" as is often erroneously claimed. From cui "to? for whom?," an old form preserved here in the dative form of the interrogative pronoun quis "who?" (see who) + bono "good" (see bene-).

debatable (adj.)

1530s (late 15c. in Anglo-Latin), from Old French debatable (Modern French débattable), from debatre (see debate (v.)). Earliest references were to lands claimed by two nations; general sense is from 1580s.

declaim (v.)

late 14c., from Middle French déclamer and directly from Latin declamare "to practice public speaking, to bluster," from de- intensive prefix + clamare "to cry, shout" (see claim (v.)). At first in English spelled declame, but altered under influence of claim. Related: Declaimed; declaiming.

deviance (n.)

1944; see deviant + -ance. A sociologists' word, perhaps coined because statisticians and astronomers already had claimed deviation.

disclaim (v.)

c. 1400, from Anglo-French disclaimer, Old French desclamer "disclaim, disavow," from des- (see dis-) + clamer "to call, cry out, claim" (see claim (v.)). Related: Disclaimed; disclaiming.

Doctor Martens

type of heavy walking boots, 1977 (use claimed from 1965), trademark name taken out by Herbert Funck and Klaus Martens of West Germany.

effectual (adj.)

"producing an effect; having power to produce an effect," late 14c., Old French effectuel, from Late Latin effectualis, from Latin effectus "accomplishment, performance" (see effect (n.)). Used properly of actions (not agents) and with a sense "having the effect aimed at" (effective is used of the thing done or the agent and means "having great effect"). Related: Effectually; effectualness.

exclaim (v.)

1560s, back-formation from exclamation or else from Middle French exclamer (16c.), from Latin exclamare "cry out loud, call out," from ex- "out," or else here as an intensive prefix (see ex-) + clamare "cry, shout, call" (see claim (v.)). Spelling influenced by claim. Related: Exclaimed; exclaiming.

Fatimid

also Fatimite, in reference to the Arab dynasty that ruled 908-1171 in North Africa and sometimes Egypt and Syria, is from Fatima, daughter of Muhammad by his first wife, Khadija; Fatima married Ali, and from them the dynasty claimed descent.

franchise (n.)

c. 1300, fraunchise, "a special right or privilege (by grant of a sovereign or government);" also "national sovereignty; nobility of character, generosity; the king's authority; the collective rights claimed by a people or town or religious institution," also used of the state of Adam and Eve before the Fall, from Old French franchise "freedom, exemption; right, privilege" (12c.), from variant stem of franc "free" (see frank (adj.)).

From late 14c. as "freedom; not being in servitude; social status of a freeman;" early 15c. as "citizenship, membership in a community or town; membership in a craft or guild." The "special right" sense narrowed 18c. to "particular legal privilege," then "right to vote" (1790). From mid-15c. as "right to buy or sell," also "right to exclude others from buying or selling, a monopoly;" meaning "authorization by a company to sell its products or services" is from 1959.

genocide (n.)

1944, apparently coined by Polish-born U.S. jurist Raphael Lemkin (1900-1959) in his work "Axis Rule in Occupied Europe" [p.19], in reference to Nazi extermination of Jews, literally "killing a tribe," from Greek genos "race, kind" (see genus) + -cide. The proper formation would be *genticide.

Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aimed at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves. [Lemkin]

Earlier in a similar sense was populicide (1799), from French populicide, by 1792, a word from the Revolution. This was taken into German, as in Völkermeuchelnden "genocidal" (Heine), which was Englished 1893 as folk-murdering. Ethnocide is attested from 1974 in English (1970 in French).

Gnostic (n.)

1580s, "believer in a mystical religious doctrine of spiritual knowledge," from Late Latin Gnosticus "a Gnostic," from Late Greek Gnostikos, noun use of adjective gnostikos "knowing, able to discern, good at knowing," from gnostos "known, to be known," from gignoskein "to learn, to come to know" (see gnostic (adj.)). Applied to various early Christian sects that claimed direct personal knowledge beyond the Gospel or the Church hierarchy; they appeared in the first century A.D., flourished in the second, and were stamped out by the 6th.

indictive (adj.)

1650s, from Latin indictivus "proclaimed," from indicere "to declare, announce," from in- "in" (see in- (2)) + dicere "to speak" (see diction).