quword 趣词
Word Origins Dictionary
- arouse



[arouse 词源字典] - arouse: [16] Shakespeare is the first writer on record to use arouse, in 2 Henry VI, 1593: ‘Loud howling wolves arouse the jades that drag the tragic melancholy night’. It was formed, with the intensive prefix a-, from rouse, a word of unknown origin which was first used in English in the 15th century as a technical term in falconry, meaning ‘plump up the feathers’.
=> rouse[arouse etymology, arouse origin, 英语词源] - bay




- bay: There are no fewer than six distinct words bay in English. The ‘sea inlet’ [14] comes via Old French baie from Old Spanish bahia. Bay as in bay leaf [14] comes from a different Old French word baie, whose source was Latin bāca ‘berry’. The ‘reddish-brown colour of a horse’ [14] comes via Old French bai from Latin badius, which is related to Old Irish buide ‘yellow’.
The ‘recessed area or compartment’ [14] comes from yet another Old French baie, a derivative of the verb bayer ‘gape, yawn’, from medieval Latin batāre (English acquired abash and abeyance from the same source, and it may also be represented in the first syllable of beagle). Bay ‘bark’ [14] comes from Old French abaiier, in which the element -bai- probably originated as an imitation of a dog howling.
And it is the source of bay as in at bay [13] (from Old French abai), the underlying idea of which is that of a hunted animal finally turning and facing its barking pursuers.
=> abash, abeyance, beagle - bay (n.3)




- "howl of a dog," early 14c., earlier "howling chorus raised (by hounds) when in contact with the hunted animal," c. 1300, from Old French bayer, from PIE root *bai- echoic of howling (compare Greek bauzein, Latin baubari "to bark," English bow-wow; also see bawl). From the hunting usage comes the transferred sense of "final encounter," and thence, on the notion of putting up an effective defense, at bay.
- howl (v.)




- early 13c., houlen, probably ultimately of imitative origin; similar formations are found in other Germanic languages. Related: Howled; howling. As a noun from 1590s.
- ululation (n.)




- 1590s, from Latin ululationem (nominative ululatio) "a howling or wailing," noun of action from past participle stem of ululare "to howl, yell, shriek, wail, lament loudly," from a reduplicated imitative root (cognates: Greek ololyzein "to cry aloud," Sanskrit ululih "a howling," Lithuanian uluti "howl," Gaelic uileliugh "wail of lamentation," Old English ule "owl").