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amphibious [amphibious 词源字典]: amphibious: [17] The Greek prefix amphimeant ‘both, on both sides’ (hence an amphitheatre [14]: Greek and Roman theatres were semicircular, so two joined together, completely surrounding the arena, formed an amphitheatre). Combination with bios ‘life’ (as in biology) produced the Greek adjective amphibios, literally ‘leading a double life’. From the beginning of its career as an English word it was used in a very wide, general sense of ‘combining two completely distinct or opposite conditions or qualities’ (Joseph Addison, for example, used it as an 18th-century equivalent of modern unisex), but that meaning has now almost entirely given way to the word’s zoological application.

At first, amphibious meant broadly ‘living on both land and water’, and so was applied by some scientists to, for example, seals; but around 1819 the zoologist William Macleay proposed the more precise application, since generally accepted, to frogs, newts, and other members of the class Amphibia whose larvae have gills but whose adults breathe with lungs.
=> biology[amphibious etymology, amphibious origin, 英语词源]
amphibian (adj.): 1630s, "having two modes of existence, of doubtful nature," from Greek amphibia, neuter plural of amphibios "living a double life," from amphi- "of both kinds" (see amphi-) + bios "life" (see bio-).

Formerly used by zoologists to describe all sorts of combined natures (including otters and seals), the biological sense "class of animals between fishes and reptiles that live both on land and in water" and the noun derivative both are first recorded 1835. Amphibia was used in this sense from c. 1600 and has been a zoological classification since c. 1819.
amphibious (adj.): 1640s, from Greek amphibios "having a double life" (see amphibian). Of motor vehicles, from 1915.
amphibrach (n.): 1580s, from Latin amphibrachus, from Greek amphibrakhys, a foot consisting of a long syllable between two short, literally "short at both ends," from amphi- "on both sides" (see amphi-) + brakhys "short" (see brief (adj.)).
amphibology: "A phrase or sentence that is grammatically ambiguous, such as She sees more of her children than her husband", Late Middle English: from Old French amphibologie, from late Latin amphibologia, from Latin amphibolia, from Greek amphibolos 'ambiguous' (see amphibole).
amphibole: "Any of a class of rock-forming silicate or aluminosilicate minerals typically occurring as fibrous or columnar crystals", Early 19th century: from French, from Latin amphibolus 'ambiguous' (because of the varied structure of these minerals), from Greek amphibolos, from amphi- 'both, on both sides' + ballein 'to throw'.