英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

grand: grand: [16] The original Latin word for ‘big’ was magnus (as in magnify, magnitude, etc). However, it also had grandis. This not only denoted great physical size; it also had connotations of moral greatness or sublimity, and in addition often carried the specialized meaning ‘full-grown’. This last, together with a possibly etymologically connected Greek brénthos ‘pride’ and Old Church Slavonic gradi ‘breast’ suggest that its underlying meaning may be ‘swelling’.

French (grand) and Italian and Spanish (grande) have taken it over as their main adjective for ‘big’, but in English it remains a more specialized word, for things or people that are ‘great’ or ‘imposing’. Its use for denoting family relationships separated by two generations, as in grandmother, was adopted from Old French, and goes back, in the case of grandame and grandsire, to the 13th century, well before the independent adjective grand itself was borrowed.

But the underlying notion is as old as the Greeks and Romans, who used mégas and magnus in the same way.
traitor: traitor: [13] Traitor and tradition [14] come from the same ultimate source: Latin trādere. This was a compound verb formed from the prefix trāns- ‘across’ and dare ‘give’ (source of English data, date, etc). It originally meant ‘hand over, deliver’, and it is this sense that (via the derivative trāditiō) has given English tradition – etymologically something ‘handed over’ to succeeding generations. But it was also used metaphorically for ‘betray’, and this meaning has passed through into English in betray, traitor, and treason.
=> betray, tradition, traitor, treason
Anglo-Saxon: Old English Angli Saxones (plural), from Latin Anglo-Saxones, in which Anglo- is an adjective, thus literally "English Saxons," as opposed to those of the Continent (now called "Old Saxons"). Properly in reference to the Saxons of ancient Wessex, Essex, Middlesex, and Sussex.
I am a suthern man, I can not geste 'rum, ram, ruf' by letter. [Chaucer, "Parson's Prologue and Tale"]
After the Norman-French invasion of 1066, the peoples of the island were distinguished as English and French, but after a few generations all were English, and Latin-speaking scribes, who knew and cared little about Germanic history, began to use Anglo-Saxones to refer to the pre-1066 inhabitants and their descendants. When interest in Old English writing revived c. 1586, the word was extended to the language we now call Old English. It has been used rhetorically for "English" in an ethnological sense from 1832, and revisioned as Angle + Saxon.
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]
folkways (n.): coined 1906 in a book of the same name by U.S. sociologist William Graham Sumner (1840-1910); see folk (n.) + way (n.).
Folkways are habits of the individual and customs of the society which arise from efforts to satisfy needs. ... Then they become regulative for succeeding generations and take on the character of a social force. [Sumner, "Folkways"]
Sumner also often is credited with ethnocentrism, which is found in the same book but is older.
jabroni (n.): c. 2000, professional wrestling slang for one whose main purpose is to make the better-known wrestlers of the organization look good; he or she does this by losing to them. More commonly known as a jobber (though some enthusiasts claim there is a difference), and perhaps a mock-Italianized form of that word (but compare jaboney "naive person, immigrant, hoodlum," of unknown origin, American English, in use c. 1990).
Jobber -- A performer who regularly loses on television and doesn't receive much if any push. A comparable term for such a performer is jabroni, which is a favorite catch-phrase of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. To soften the blow of such labels, some wrestling promotions refer to jobbers as enhancement talent. Carpenter was the phrase used by earlier generations. ["The Professional Wrestlers' Instructional and Workout Guide," 2005]
Nestor: name for "old king renowned for wise counsel," 1580s, from Greek, name of the aged and wise hero in the "Iliad," king of Pylus, who outlived three generations. Klein says the name is literally "one who blesses," and is related to nostimos "blessed;" Watkins connects it with the root of the first element in nostalgia.
paranoia (n.): "mental disorder characterized by systematized delusions," 1848 (earlier paranoea 1811), from Greek paranoia "mental derangement, madness," from paranoos "mentally ill, insane," from para- "beside, beyond" (see para- (1)) + noos "mind."
FOR several years frequent descriptions have been given in the foreign journals, especially German and Italian, of the forms of insanity designated by the names Paranoia, Verrücktkeit, and Wahnsinn. ["Paranoia -- Systematized Delusions and Mental Degenerations," J. Séglas (transl. William Noyes), 1888]
scourge (n.): c. 1200, "a whip, lash," from Anglo-French escorge, back-formation from Old French escorgier "to whip," from Vulgar Latin *excorrigiare, from Latin ex- "out, off" (see ex-) + corrigia "thong, shoelace," in this case "whip," probably from a Gaulish word related to Old Irish cuimrech "fetter," from PIE root *reig- "to bind" (see rig (v.)). Figurative use from late 14c. Scourge of God, title given by later generations to Attila the Hun (406-453 C.E.), is attested from late 14c., from Latin flagellum Dei.
secular (adj.): c. 1300, "living in the world, not belonging to a religious order," also "belonging to the state," from Old French seculer (Modern French séculier), from Late Latin saecularis "worldly, secular, pertaining to a generation or age," from Latin saecularis "of an age, occurring once in an age," from saeculum "age, span of time, generation."

According to Watkins, this is probably from PIE *sai-tlo-, with instrumental element *-tlo- + *sai- "to bind, tie" (see sinew), extended metaphorically to successive human generations as links in the chain of life. Another theory connects it with words for "seed," from PIE root *se- "to sow" (see sow (v.), and compare Gothic mana-seþs "mankind, world," literally "seed of men").

Used in ecclesiastical writing like Greek aion "of this world" (see cosmos). It is source of French siècle. Ancient Roman ludi saeculares was a three-day, day-and-night celebration coming once in an "age" (120 years). In English, in reference to humanism and the exclusion of belief in God from matters of ethics and morality, from 1850s.
sustainability (n.): 1907, in reference to a legal objection, from sustainable + -ity. General sense (in economics, agriculture, ecology) by 1972.
Sustainability is defined as a requirement of our generation to manage the resource base such that the average quality of life that we ensure ourselves can potentially be shared by all future generations. ... Development is sustainable if it involves a non-decreasing average quality of life. [Geir B. Asheim, "Sustainability," The World Bank, 1994]
treadmill (n.): invented (and named) 1822; originally an instrument of prison discipline; from tread (v.) + mill (n.1). Treadwheel as a similar method of driving machinery is from 1570s.
As a corrective punishment, the discipline of the stepping mill has had a most salutary effect upon the prisoners, and is not likely to be easily forgotten, while it is an occupation which by no means interferes with, nor is calculated to lessen the value of, those branches of prison regulation which provide for the moral and religious improvement of the criminal. ["Description of the Tread Mill Invented by Mr. William Cubitt of Ipswich for the Employment of Prisoners," London, 1822]
By later generations regarded as a path to physical fitness.
metagenesis: "The alternation of generations between sexual and asexual reproduction", Late 19th century: modern Latin.