quword 趣词
Word Origins Dictionary
- agitate



[agitate 词源字典] - agitate: [16] Agitate is one of a host of English words descended ultimately from Latin agere (see AGENT). Among the many meanings of agere was ‘drive, move’, and a verb derived from it denoting repeated action, agitāre, hence meant ‘move to and fro’. This physical sense of shaking was present from the start in English agitate, but so was the more metaphorical ‘perturb’.
The notion of political agitation does not emerge until the early 19th century, when the Marquis of Anglesey is quoted as saying to an Irish deputation: ‘If you really expect success, agitate, agitate, agitate!’ In this meaning, a derivative of Latin agitāre has entered English via Russian in agitprop ‘political propaganda’ [20], in which agit is short for agitatsiya ‘agitation’.
=> act, agent[agitate etymology, agitate origin, 英语词源] - archipelago




- archipelago: [16] Originally, archipelago was a quite specific term – it was the name of the Aegean Sea, the sea between Greece and Turkey. Derivationally, it is a compound formed in Greek from arkhi- ‘chief’ and pélagos ‘sea’ (source of English pelagic [17] and probably related to plain, placate, and please). The term ‘chief sea’ identified the Aegean, as contrasted with all the smaller lagoons, lakes, and inlets to which the word pélagos was also applied.
An ‘Englished’ form of the word, Arch-sea, was in use in the 17th century, and in sailors’ jargon it was often abbreviated to Arches: ‘An island called Augusto near Paros, in the Arches’, Sir T Roe, Negotiations 1626. A leading characteristic of the Aegean Sea is of course that it contains a large number of islands, and from the 16th century onwards we see a strong and steady move towards what is now the word’s main meaning, ‘large group of islands’.
The immediate source of the English word was Italian arcipelago, and some etymologists have speculated that rather than coming directly from Greek arkhipélagos, this may have been a sort of folk-etymological resuscitation of it based on a misunderstanding of Greek Aigaion pelagos ‘Aegean Sea’.
=> pelagic - eradicate




- eradicate: [16] Semantically, eradicate is an analogous formation to uproot. It comes from the past participle of Latin ērādicāre ‘pull out by the roots’, a compound verb formed from the prefix ex- ‘out’ and rādix ‘root’ (source of English radical and radish and related to English root). In the 16th and 17th centuries it was often used literally (‘oaks eradicated by a prodigious whirlwind’, Thomas Nabbes, Hannibal and Scipio 1637), but since then the metaphorical ‘remove totally’ has taken over.
=> radish, root - vibrate




- vibrate: [17] Vibrate comes from Latin vibrāre ‘move quickly to and fro, shake’. This went back ultimately to a prehistoric Indo-European base *wib-, *weib- ‘move quickly to and fro’, which also produced English weave ‘move to and fro’ (as in ‘weave through the traffic’), whip, and wipe.
=> weave, whip, wipe - wave




- wave: English has two words wave, distinct in origin, which have grown to resemble each other over the centuries. The verb, ‘move to and fro’ [OE], goes back to a prehistoric Germanic base *wab-, which also produced English waver [14] (borrowed from Old Norse vafra ‘move unsteadily’) and wobble [17]. The noun wave ‘movement of the sea’ [16] seems to be an alteration (under the influence of the verb wave) of an earlier wawe ‘wave’. This in turn probably went back to Old English wǣg ‘motion, wave’, a derivative of the verb which produced modern English wag.
=> waver, wobble; wag - agitate (v.)




- 1580s, "to disturb," from Latin agitatus, past participle of agitare "to put in constant motion, drive onward, impel," frequentative of agere "to move, drive" (see agitation). Literal sense of "move to and fro, shake" is from 1590s. Related: Agitated; agitating.
- agitation (n.)




- 1560s, "mental tossing to and fro," from French agitation, from Latin agitationem (nominative agitatio) "motion, agitation," noun of action from past participle stem of agitare "move to and fro," frequentative of agere in its sense of "to drive" (see act (n.)).
- cite (v.)




- mid-15c., "to summon," from Old French citer "to summon" (14c.), from Latin citare "to summon, urge, call; put in sudden motion, call forward; rouse, excite," frequentative of ciere "to move, set in motion, stir, rouse, call, invite" from PIE root *keie- "to set in motion, to move to and fro" (cognates: Sanskrit cyavate "stirs himself, goes;" Greek kinein "to move, set in motion; change, stir up," kinymai "move myself;" Gothic haitan "call, be called;" Old English hatan "command, call"). Sense of "calling forth a passage of writing" is first attested 1530s. Related: Cited; citing.
- dodge (v.)




- "to move to and fro" (especially in an effort to avoid something), 1560s, origin and sense evolution obscure, perhaps akin to Scottish dodd "to jog." Common from early 18c. in figurative sense of "to swindle, to play shifting tricks." Related: Dodged; dodging.
- eloign (v.)




- 1530s, intransitive, "to remove to a distance" (especially in an effort to avoid the law), from Anglo-French eloign, Old French esloigner (Modern French éloigner), from Late Latin exlongare "remove, keep aloof, prolong, etc." (see elongation). Transitive use from 1550s. Related: Eloignment.
- elongation (n.)




- late 14c., from Medieval Latin elongationem (nominative elongatio), noun of action from past participle stem of Late Latin elongare "remove to a distance," from Latin ex- "out" (see ex-) + longus "long" (see long (adj.)).
- ion (n.)




- 1834, introduced by English physicist and chemist Michael Faraday (suggested by the Rev. William Whewell, English polymath), coined from Greek ion, neuter present participle of ienai "go," from PIE root *ei- (1) "to go, to walk" (cognates: Greek eimi "I go;" Latin ire "to go," iter "a way;" Old Irish ethaim "I go;" Irish bothar "a road" (from *bou-itro- "cows' way"), Gaulish eimu "we go," Gothic iddja "went," Sanskrit e'ti "goes," imas "we go," ayanam "a going, way;" Avestan ae'iti "goes;" Old Persian aitiy "goes;" Lithuanian eiti "to go;" Old Church Slavonic iti "go;" Bulgarian ida "I go;" Russian idti "to go"). So called because ions move toward the electrode of opposite charge.
- jager (n.)




- "German sharpshooter," 1776, from German jäger, literally "huntsman," from jagen "to hunt," from Old High German jagon, related to Old Frisian jagia, Dutch jagen "to hunt," Old Norse jaga "to drive, to move to and fro" (see yacht). Applied to riflemen and sharpshooters in the German and Austrian armies. Englished as yager, yaeger from 1804.
- valgus (adj.)




- deformity in which a bone or joint is twisted outward from the center of the body; form of club-foot, 1800, from Latin valgus "bandy-legged, bow-legged, having the legs bent outward." Said to be probably related to Sanskrit valgati "to move up and down," Old English wealcan "to roll, move to and fro" (see walk (v.)), perhaps on the notion of "go irregularly or to and fro" [Tucker]. "Yet the main characteristic of 'bow-legged' is the crookedness of the legs, not 'going up and down' or 'to and fro'" [de Vaan] and there are phonetic difficulties. A classical word used in a different sense in modern medicine; also see varus.
- vibrant (adj.)




- 1550s, "agitated;" 1610s, "vibrating" (especially "vibrating so as to produce sound," of a string, etc.), from Latin vibrantem (nominative vibrans) "swaying," present participle of vibrare "move to and fro" (see vibrate). Meaning "vigorous, full of life" is first recorded 1860. Related: Vibrantly; vibrancy.
- vibrate (v.)




- 1610s (intransitive) "move to and fro;" 1660s, "swing to and fro;" from Latin vibratus, past participle of vibrare "set in tremulous motion, move quickly to and fro, quiver, tremble, shake," from PIE *wib-ro-, from root *weip- "to turn, vacillate, tremble ecstatically, move quickly to and fro" (cognates: Lithuanian wyburiu "to wag" (the tail), Danish vippe, Dutch wippen "to swing," Old English wipan "to wipe"). Transitive sense "cause to vibrate" is from c. 1700. Related: Vibrated; vibrating.
- waft (v.)




- c. 1500, transitive, "to move gently" (through the air), probably from Middle Dutch or Middle Low German, ultimately from wachten "to guard" (perhaps via notion of a ship that guards another as it sails), related to waken "rouse from sleep," from Proto-Germanic *waht- (see wake (n.1)). Possibly influenced by northern dialect waff "cause to move to and fro" (1510s), a variant of wave. Intransitive sense from 1560s. Related: Wafted; wafting.
- wave (v.)




- "move back and forth," Old English wafian "to wave, fluctuate" (related to wæfre "wavering, restless, unstable"), from Proto-Germanic *wab- (cognates: Old Norse vafra "to hover about," Middle High German waben "to wave, undulate"), possibly from PIE root *webh- "to move to and fro; to weave" (see weave (v.)). Transitive sense is from mid-15c.; meaning "to make a sign by a wave of the hand" is from 1510s. Related: Waved; waving.
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.
[Stevie Smith]
- wave (n.)




- "moving billow of water," 1520s, alteration (by influence of wave (v.)) of Middle English waw, which is from Old English wagian "to move to and fro" (cognates: Old Saxon, Old High German wag, Old Frisian weg, Old Norse vagr "water in motion, wave, billow," Gothic wegs "tempest;" see wag (v.)). The usual Old English word for "moving billow of water" was yð.
The "hand motion" meaning is recorded from 1680s; meaning "undulating line" is recorded from 1660s. Of people in masses, first recorded 1852; in physics, from 1832. Sense in heat wave is from 1843. The crowd stunt in stadiums is attested under this name from 1984, the thing itself said to have been done first Oct. 15, 1981, at the Yankees-A's AL championship series game in the Oakland Coliseum; soon picked up and popularized at University of Washington. To make waves "cause trouble" is attested from 1962. - weave (v.2)




- c. 1200, "to move from one place to another," of uncertain origin, perhaps from weave (v.1). From early 14c. as "move to and fro;" 1590s as "move side to side." Use in boxing is from 1818. Related: Weaved; weaving.
- wring (v.)




- Old English wringan "press, strain, wring, twist" (class III strong verb; past tense wrang, past participle wrungen), from Proto-Germanic *wreng- (cognates: Old English wringen "to wring, press out," Old Frisian wringa, Middle Dutch wringhen, Dutch wringen "to wring," Old High German ringan "to move to and fro, to twist," German ringen "to wrestle"), from PIE *wrengh-, nasalized variant of *wergh- "to turn," from root *wer- (3) "to turn, bend" (see versus). To wring (one's) hands "press the hands or fingers tightly together (as though wringing)" as an indication of distress or pain is attested from c. 1200.
- wigwag




- "Move to and fro", Late 16th century: reduplication of wag1.