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commodious [commodious 词源字典]: commodious: [15] Latin commodus meant ‘convenient’. It was a compound adjective formed from com- ‘with’ and modus ‘measure’, and thus meaning literally ‘conforming with due measure’. From it was derived the medieval Latin adjective commodiōsus, which passed, probably via French commodieux, into English. This originally meant ‘advantageous, useful, convenient’, and it was not really until the 16th century that it developed the meaning ‘affording a conveniently large amount of space’.

The noun derivative commodity entered English in the 14th century, and from earliest times had the concrete meaning ‘article of commerce’, deriving from the more general sense ‘something useful’. Commodus was borrowed into French as commode ‘convenient’, which came to be used as a noun meaning both ‘tall headdress for women’ and ‘chest of drawers’. English adopted the word in the 17th century, and in the 19th century added the new sense ‘chair housing a chamber pot’ (a semantic development paralleling the euphemistic use of convenience for lavatory).
=> commode, commodity[commodious etymology, commodious origin, 英语词源]
bureau (n.): 1690s, "desk with drawers, writing desk," from French bureau "office; desk, writing table," originally "cloth covering for a desk," from burel "coarse woolen cloth" (as a cover for writing desks), Old French diminutive of bure "dark brown cloth," which is perhaps either from Latin burrus "red," or from Late Latin burra "wool, shaggy garment." Offices being full of such desks, the meaning expanded 1720 to "division of a government." Meaning "chest of drawers" is from 1770, said to be American English but early in British use.
chest (n.): Old English cest "box, coffer, casket," from Proto-Germanic *kista (cognates: Old Norse and Old High German kista, Old Frisian, Middle Dutch, German kiste, Dutch kist), an early borrowing from Latin cista "chest, box," from Greek kiste "a box, basket," from PIE *kista "woven container." Meaning extended to "thorax" 1520s, replacing breast (n.), on the metaphor of the ribs as a box for the organs. Chest of drawers is from 1590s.
commode (n.): 1786, "chest of drawers," earlier (1680s) name of a type of fashionable ladies' headdress, from French commode, noun use of adjective meaning "convenient, suitable," from Latin commodus "proper, fit, appropriate, convenient, satisfactory," from com-, intensive prefix (see com-), + modus "measure, manner" (see mode (n.1)). Meaning "chair housing a chamber pot" first attested 1851 from notion of "convenience."
highboy (n.): "tall chest of drawers," 1891, American English (see tallboy); a hybrid, the second element is from French bois "wood" (see bush).
layette (n.): "baby's outfit," 1839, from French layette, properly the box in which it comes, subsequently transferred to the linen, from Middle French layette "chest of drawers," from laie "drawer, box," from Middle Dutch laeye, related to lade, load (v.).
lowboy (n.): "chest of drawers on short legs," 1891, a hybrid from low (adj.) + French bois "wood" (see bush).
tallboy (n.): also tall-boy, "high-stemmed glass or goblet," 1670s, from tall + boy, though the exact signification is unclear. In reference to a high chest of drawers it is recorded from 1769, here perhaps a partial loan-translation of French haut bois, literally "high wood."