英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

biology [biology 词源字典]: biology: [19] The modern European languages have made prolific use of Greek bíos ‘life’ as a prefix, particularly in the 20th century. The first compound into which it entered in English seems to have been biotic, in the now obsolete sense ‘of secular life’ (around 1600), but the trend was really set by biography, first recorded as being used by John Dryden in his Life of Plutarch 1683. Biology itself came along at the beginning of the 19th century, via French, having been coined in German by Gottfried Reinhold in 1802.

Twentieth-century contributions have included bioengineering, biometric, bionic, biorhythm, and biotechnology. Greek bíos itself goes back to an Indo-European base *gwej-, from which English also ultimately gets quick, vital, vivid, and zoo.
=> quick, vital, vivid, zoo[biology etymology, biology origin, 英语词源]
fence: fence: [14] Fence is short for defence, and indeed until the 16th century meant ‘defence’ (‘Yet, for [that is, despite] the fence that he could make, she struck it from his hand’, Felon Sowe Rokeby 1500). Of its present-day meanings, ‘enclosing structure’ (originally a ‘defence’ against intruders) and ‘sword-fighting’ (originally the use of a sword for ‘self-defence’, now used only as a verb) developed in the 16th century.

The sense ‘dealer in stolen property’ came along in the 17th century; it arose from the notion that such transactions are carried out under the cover, or ‘defence’, of secrecy. Similarly, fend [13] and fender [15] came by loss of the initial syllable from defend.
=> defence, fend, fender
jitney (n.): "bus which carries passengers for a fare," 1915, short for jitney bus (1906), American English, from gitney, said to be slang for any small coin, especially "a nickel," because the buses' fare typically was a nickel, the coin name perhaps via New Orleans from French jeton "coin-sized metal disk, slug, counter," from Old French jeter "to calculate," literally "to throw" (see jet (v.)).
"I'll give a nickel for a kiss,"
Said Cholly to a pretty miss.
"Skiddo," she cried, "you stingy cuss,"
"You're looking for a jitney buss."

["Jitney Jingle," 1915]
The origin and signification of the word was much discussed when the buses first appeared. Some reports say the slang word for "nickel" comes from the bus; most say the reverse, but there does not seem to be much record of jitney in a coin sense before the buses came along (a writer in "The Hub," August 1915, claims to have heard and used it as a small boy in San Francisco, and reported hearsay that "It has been in use there since the days of '49." In some sources it is said to be a St. Louis word, but most credit it to the U.S. West, especially California, though others trace it to "southern negroes, especially in Memphis" ["The Pacific," Feb. 7, 1915].