英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

Dalek [Dalek 词源字典]: Dalek: [20] The name of these pathologically destructive robots, which first appeared on BBC TV’s Dr Who in 1963, was coined by their creator, Terry Nation. The story went about that he had come up with it one day while staring in a library at the spine of an encyclopedia volume covering entries from DA to LEK, but he has subsequently denied this.
[Dalek etymology, Dalek origin, 英语词源]
elope: elope: [17] Etymologically, elope signifies ‘leap away’. It was originally an Anglo-Norman legal term applied to a married woman running off with a lover, and only in the past couple of hundred years has it come to be applied to a couple leaving home to get married when parental permission is denied. It is thought that the Anglo-Norman term was an adaptation of Middle English *alopen, past participle of an unrecorded verb *alepen ‘run away’, which would have been formed from the prefix a- ‘away’ and lepen ‘run, leap’ (source of modern English leap and related to lope and German laufen ‘run’).
=> leap, lope
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.
basket case (n.): 1919, American English, originally a reference to rumors of quadriplegics as a result of catastrophic wounds suffered in World War I (the military vehemently denied there were any such in its hospitals), from basket (n.) + case (n.2). Probably literal, i.e., stuck in a basket, but basket had colloquial connotations of poverty (begging) and helplessness long before this. Figurative sense of "person emotionally unable to cope" is from 1921.
cant (n.1): "insincere talk," 1709, earlier it was slang for "whining of beggars" (1640s), from the verb in this sense (1560s), from Old North French canter (Old French chanter) "to sing, chant," from Latin cantare, frequentative of canere "to sing" (see chant (v.)). Sense in English developed after 1680 to mean the jargon of criminals and vagabonds, thence applied contemptuously by any sect or school to the phraseology of its rival.
... Slang is universal, whilst Cant is restricted in usage to certain classes of the community: thieves, vagrom men, and -- well, their associates. ... Slang boasts a quasi-respectability denied to Cant, though Cant is frequently more enduring, its use continuing without variation of meaning for many generations. [John S. Farmer, Forewords to "Musa Pedestris," 1896]
Collins (n.): "iced gin drink served in a tall glass" (called a Collins glass), 1940, American English; earlier Tom Collins (by 1878), of uncertain origin. Popular in early 1940s; bartending purists at the time denied it could be based on anything but gin. The surname (12c.) is from a masc. proper name, a diminutive of Col, itself a pet form of Nicholas.
deny (v.): early 14c., from Old French denoiir "deny, repudiate, withhold," from Latin denegare "to deny, reject, refuse" (source of Italian dinegarre, Spanish denegar), from de- "away" (see de-) + negare "refuse, say 'no,' " from Old Latin nec "not," from Italic base *nek- "not," from PIE root *ne- "no, not" (see un-). Related: Denied; denying.
grounded (adj.): late 14c., "learned, instructed thoroughly in the basics;" 1540s as "firmly fixed or established," past participle adjective from ground (v.). Electrical sense is from 1889. Meaning "having been denied privileges" is from 1940s. Dickens had room-ridden "confined to one's room."
Marcionite (n.): 1540, early Christian sect, named for Gnostic Marcion of Sinope (c. 140), who denied any connection between the Old Testament and the New. They contrasted the barbaric and incompetent creator in the Old Testament, who favored bandits and killers, with the "higher god" of Christ. They also emphasized virginity and rejection of marriage. They flourished, especially in the East, until late 4c.
nincompoop (n.): 1670s, nicompoop. Despite similarity [noted by Johnson] to Latin legal phrase non compos mentis "insane, mentally incompetent" (c. 1600), the connection is denied by etymologists because the earliest forms lack the second -n-. Weekley thinks first element may be a proper name, and cites Nicodemus, which he says was used in French for "a fool," or Nicholas. Klein says probably an invented word.
Pelagian: 1530s (n.); 1570s (adj.), from Medieval Latin Pelagianus, from Pelagius, Latinized form of the name of 4c. British monk who denied the doctrine of original sin. Combated by Augustine, condemned by Pope Zosimus in 418 C.E. His name in Welsh was said to have been Morgan, literally "sea-dweller" (hence his Church name, from Greek pelagos "sea;" see pelagic). Related: Pelagianism.
phlogiston (n.): 1730, hypothetical inflammatory principle, formerly believed to exist in all combustible matter, from Modern Latin (1702), from Greek phlogiston (1610s in this sense), neuter of phlogistos "burnt up, inflammable," from phlogizein "to set on fire, burn," from phlox (genitive phlogos) "flame, blaze" (see bleach (v.)). Theory propounded by Stahl (1702), denied by Lavoisier (1775), defended by Priestley but generally abandoned by 1800. Related: Phlogistic; phlogisticated.
Sadducee (n.): Old English, from Late Latin Sadducaei (plural), from Greek Zaddoukaios, an inexact transliteration of Hebrew tzedoqi, from personal name Tzadhoq "Zadok" (2 Sam. viii:17), the high priest from whom the priesthood of the captivity claimed descent. According to Josephus, the sect denied the resurrection of the dead and the existence of angels and spirits; but later historians regard them as more the political party of the priestly class than a sect per se. Related: Sadducean.
shuck (v.): "to remove the shucks from," 1819, from or related to shuck (n.). Related: Shucked; shucking.

Many extended senses are from the notion of "stripping" an ear of corn, or from the capers associated with husking frolics; such as "to strip (off) one's clothes" (1848) and "to deceive, swindle, cheat, fool" (1959); phrase shucking and jiving "fooling, deceiving" is suggested from 1966, in U.S. black English, but compare shuck (v.) a slang term among "cool musicians" for "to improvise chords, especially to a piece of music one does not know" (1957), and shuck (n.) "a theft or fraud," in use by 1950s among U.S. blacks.
[B]lack senses probably fr[om] the fact that black slaves sang and shouted gleefully during corn-shucking season, and this behavior, along with lying and teasing, became a part of the protective and evasive behavior normally adopted towards white people in "traditional" race relations; the sense of "swindle" is perhaps related to the mid-1800s term to be shucked out, "be defeated, be denied victory," which suggests that the notion of stripping someone as an ear of corn is stripped may be basic in the semantics. ["Dictionary of American Slang"]