quword 趣词
Word Origins Dictionary
- champion



[champion 词源字典] - champion: [13] Etymologically, a champion is someone who fought in the campus or arena. Latin campus (source of English camp) meant, among other things, ‘field of battle’ – both a fullscale military battlefield and an area for staged battles between gladiators. Those who fought in such battles – the gladiators – were called in medieval Latin campiones.
The word passed into English via Old French champion. The word’s original meaning survives historically in such phrases as ‘king’s champion’, someone who will fight on behalf of the king, and by extension in ‘supporter’, as in ‘a champion of prisoners’ rights’. The modern sense ‘winner’ did not develop until the early 19th century. The abbreviated form champ is 19th-century American.
An alternative and now obsolete form of the word is campion, from Old Northern French, and it has been speculated that this is the origin of the plant-name campion [16], on the basis that it was used to make garlands for fighters.
=> camp, campion, champagne, champion[champion etymology, champion origin, 英语词源] - parson




- parson: [13] Parson and person started off as the same word (both come from Latin persōna) but split into two. It is not altogether clear why parson came to be used for a ‘priest’. It may simply have been a specialized application of an extended post-classical sense of Latin persōna, ‘person of rank, important person, personage’ – hence ‘person of high position within the church’. But it has also been speculated that it originated in the notion of the priest as the ‘person’ who legally embodied the parish (who could for example sue or be sued on behalf of the parish).
=> person - procure




- procure: [13] The -cure of procure goes back to Latin cūrāre ‘look after’, source of English cure. Combination with prō- ‘for’ produced prōcūrāre ‘look after on behalf of someone else, manage’, which English acquired via Old French procurer as procure. The main modern sense ‘obtain’ developed via ‘take care, take pains’ and ‘bring about by taking pains’. The agent noun derived from the Latin verb was prōcūrātor ‘manager, agent’; English adopted this as procurator [13], and subsequently contracted it to proctor [14]. A similar process of contraction lies behind proxy, which goes back to Latin prōcūrātiō.
=> cure, proctor, proxy - sake




- sake: English has two nouns sake. The older, now used only in the expression for the sake of, was originally an independent fully-fledged noun, with a range of meanings including ‘strife’, ‘guilt’, and ‘lawsuit’ [OE]. Its use in for the sake of, which emerged in the 13th century, probably arose out of its legal usage, and thus denoted originally ‘on behalf of a litigant’s case in a lawsuit’.
The word itself came from a prehistoric Germanic *sakō ‘affair, thing, charge, accusation’, which also produced German sache ‘affair, subject, lawsuit’. It is also represented in English forsake [OE], which etymologically means ‘accuse, quarrel with’, hence ‘decline’, and finally ‘give up’; keepsake [18], etymologically something that is kept for the ‘sake’ of the giver; and namesake [17], which probably arose from the notion of two people being linked or associated for the ‘sake’ of their names. Seek is a distant relation. Sake, or saki, ‘rice wine’ [17] was borrowed from Japanese, where it literally means ‘alcohol’.
=> forsake, keepsake, namesake, seek, seize - acquit (v.)




- early 13c., "to satisfy a debt" (either for oneself or on behalf of another), from Old French aquiter "pay, pay up, settle a claim" (12c.), from a "to" (see ad-) + quite "free, clear" (see quit (adj.)). Meanings "set free from charges" and "to discharge one's duty" both recorded from late 14c. Related: Acquitted; acquitting.
- almoner (n.)




- "official distributor of alms on behalf of another," c. 1300 (mid-13c. as a surname), from Old French almosnier (12c.; Modern French aumônerie), from Vulgar Latin *almosinarius, from Late Latin elemosinarius (adj.) "connected with alms," from eleemosyna "alms" (see alms).
- apprehension (n.)




- "perception, comprehension," late 14c., from Old French apprehension or directly from Latin apprehensionem (nominative apprehensio), noun of action from past participle stem of apprehendere (see apprehend). Sense of "seizure on behalf of authority" is 1570s; that of "anticipation" (usually with dread) is recorded from c. 1600.
- auspices (n.)




- plural (and now the usual form) of auspice; 1530s, "observation of birds for the purpose of taking omens," from French auspice (14c.), from Latin auspicum "divination from the flight of birds; function of an auspex" (q.v.). Meaning "any indication of the future (especially favorable)" is from 1650s; earlier (1630s) in extended sense of "benevolent influence of greater power, influence exerted on behalf of someone or something," originally in expression under the auspices of.
- champion (n.)




- early 13c., "doughty fighting man, valorous combatant," also (c. 1300) "one who fights on behalf of another or others," from Old French champion "combatant, champion in single combat" (12c.), from Late Latin campionem (nominative campio) "gladiator, fighter, combatant in the field," from Latin campus "field (of combat);" see campus. Had been borrowed earlier by Old English as cempa. Sports sense in reference to "first-place performer in some field" is recorded from 1730.
- fight (v.)




- Old English feohtan "to combat, contend with weapons, strive; attack; gain by fighting, win" (intransitive; class III strong verb; past tense feaht, past participle fohten), from Proto-Germanic *fehtan (cognates: Old High German fehtan, German fechten, Middle Dutch and Dutch vechten, Old Frisian fiuhta "to fight"), from PIE *pek- (2) "to pluck out" (wool or hair), apparently with a notion of "pulling roughly" (cognates: Greek pekein "to comb, shear," pekos "fleece, wool;" Persian pashm "wool, down," Latin pectere "to comb," Sanskrit paksman- "eyebrows, hair").
Spelling substitution of -gh- for a "hard H" sound was a Middle English scribal habit, especially before -t-. In some late Old English examples, the middle consonant was represented by a yogh. Among provincial early Modern English spellings, Wright lists faight, fate, fecht, feeght, feight, feit, feyght, feyt, feort, foight.
From c. 1200 as "offer resistance, struggle;" also "to quarrel, wrangle, create a disturbance." From late 14c. as "be in conflict." Transitive use from 1690s. To fight for "contest on behalf of" is from early 14c. To fight back "resist" is recorded from 1890. Well figt þat wel fligt ("he fights well that flies fast") was a Middle English proverb. - filet (n.)




- 1841 in cookery, reborrowing from French of the same word that had been taken 14c. and anglicized as fillet (q.v.). Filet mignon is attested as a French word in English from 1815.
The 'Chateaubriand,' the 'entrecôte,' and the 'filet mignon' (of mutton), with other forms, are all due to the more enlarged sympathies of the French butcher for what is perfect. We must entirely change the mode of cutting up the carcase before we can arrive at the same perfection in form of meat purchasable, and as that is hopeless, so is it useless to insist further on the subject on behalf of the public. ["The Kitchen and the Cellar," "Quarterly Review," April 1877]
- mandate (v.)




- 1620s, "to command," from mandate (n.). Meaning "to delegate authority, permit to act on behalf of a group" is from 1958; used earlier in the context of the League of Nations, "to authorize a power to control a certain territory for some specified purpose" (1919). Related: Mandated; mandating.
- melodrama (n.)




- 1784 (1782 as melo drame), "a stage-play in which songs were interspersed and music accompanied the action," from French mélodrame (18c.), from Greek melos "song" (see melody) + French drame "drama" (see drama). Meaning "a romantic and sensational dramatic piece with a happy ending" is from 1883, because this was often the form of the original melodramas. Also from French are Spanish melodrama, Italian melodramma, German melodram. Related: Melodramatize.
The melodramatist's task is to get his characters labelled good & wicked in his audience's minds, & to provide striking situations that shall provoke & relieve anxieties on behalf of poetic justice. [Fowler]
- mouthpiece (n.)




- also mouth-piece, 1680s, "casting fitted on an open end of a pipe, etc.," from mouth (n.) + piece (n.). Meaning "piece of a musical instrument that goes in the mouth" is from 1776. Sense of "one who speaks on behalf of others" is from 1805; in the specific sense of "lawyer" it is first found 1857.
- per (prep.)




- 1580s (earlier in various Latin and French phrases), from Latin per "through, during, by means of, on account of, as in," from PIE root *per- (1) "Base of prepositions and preverbs with the basic meanings of 'forward,' 'through,' and a wide range of extended senses such as 'in front of,' 'before,' 'early,' 'first,' 'chief,' 'toward,' 'against,' 'near,' 'at,' 'around'" [Watkins]. Cognates: Sanskrit pari- "around, about, through," pura "before, formerly;" Avestan pairi- "around," paro "before;" Old Persian pariy; Hittite para- "on, forth;" Greek peri "around, about, near, beyond," paros "before," para "from beside, beyond," pro "before;" Latin pro "before, for, on behalf of, instead of," porro "forward," prae "before;" Old English fore (prep.) "before, in front of;" (adv.) "before, previously;" German vor "for;" Old Church Slavonic pra-dedu "great-grandfather;" Russian pere- "through;" Lithuanian per "through;" Old Irish air- Gothic fair-, German ver-, Old English fer-, intensive prefixes.
- pro-




- word-forming element meaning "forward, forth, toward the front" (as in proclaim, proceed); "beforehand, in advance" (prohibit, provide); "taking care of" (procure); "in place of, on behalf of" (proconsul, pronoun); from Latin pro "on behalf of, in place of, before, for, in exchange for, just as," which also was used as a prefix.
Also in some cases from cognate Greek pro "before, in front of, sooner," which also was used in Greek as a prefix (as in problem). Both the Latin and Greek words are from PIE *pro- (cognates: Sanskrit pra- "before, forward, forth;" Gothic faura "before," Old English fore "before, for, on account of," fram "forward, from;" Old Irish roar "enough"), extended form of root *per- (1) "forward, through" (see per).
The common modern sense "in favor of, favoring" (pro-independence, pro-fluoridation, pro-Soviet, etc.) was not in classical Latin and is attested in English from early 19c. - solicitor (n.)




- early 15c., "one who urges," from Middle French soliciteur, from soliciter (see solicit). Meaning "one who conducts matters on behalf of another" is from early 15c. As a name for a specific class of legal practitioners in Britain, it is attested from 1570s. Both the fem. forms, solicitress (1630s) and solicitrix (1610s), have been in the sexual sense, but the latter seems more common in non-pejorative use.
- steward (n.)




- Old English stiward, stigweard "house guardian, housekeeper," from stig "hall, pen for cattle, part of a house" (see sty (n.1)) + weard "guard" (see ward (n.)). Used after the Conquest as the equivalent of Old French seneschal (q.v.). Meaning "overseer of workmen" is attested from c. 1300. The sense of "officer on a ship in charge of provisions and meals" is first recorded mid-15c.; extended to trains 1906. This was the title of a class of high officers of the state in early England and Scotland, hence meaning "one who manages affairs of an estate on behalf of his employer" (late 14c.). Meaning "person who supervises arrangements" at a meeting, dinner, etc., is from 1703.
The Scottish form (with terminal -t attested from late 14c.) is reflected in Stewart, name of the royal house descended from Walter (the) Steward, who married (1315) Marjorie de Bruce, daughter of King Robert. Stuart is a French spelling, attested from 1429 and adopted by Mary, Queen of Scots. - suffrage (n.)




- late 14c., "intercessory prayers or pleas on behalf of another," from Old French sofrage "plea, intercession" (13c.) and directly from Medieval Latin suffragium, from Latin suffragium "support, ballot, vote; right of voting; a voting tablet," from suffragari "lend support, vote for someone," conjectured to be a compound of sub "under" (see sub-) + fragor "crash, din, shouts (as of approval)," related to frangere "to break" (see fraction). On another theory (Watkins, etc.) the second element is frangere itself and the notion is "use a broken piece of tile as a ballot" (compare ostracism). Meaning "a vote for or against anything" is from 1530s. The meaning "political right to vote" in English is first found in the U.S. Constitution, 1787.
- spokeswoman




- "A woman who makes statements on behalf of a group or individual", Mid 17th century: from spoke2 + woman, after spokesman.