英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

groats (n.)[groats 词源字典]: "hulled grain coarsely ground or crushed; oatmeal," early 14c., from grot "piece, fragment," from Old English grot "particle," from same root as grit (n.). The word also meant "excrement in pellets" (mid-15c.).[groats etymology, groats origin, 英语词源]
hail (n.): "frozen rain, pellets of ice falling in showers," Old English hægl, hagol (Mercian hegel) "hail, hailstorm," also the name of the rune for H, from Proto-Germanic *haglaz (cognates: Old Frisian heil, Old Saxon, Old High German hagal, Old Norse hagl, German Hagel "hail"), probably from PIE *kaghlo- "pebble" (cognates: Greek kakhlex "round pebble").
pellet (v.): "to form into pellets," 1590s, from pellet (n.).
scattershot (adj.): 1959, figurative use of term for a kind of gun charge meant to broadcast the pellets when fired (1940), from scatter (v.) + shot (n.).
shotgun (n.): 1821, American English, from shot (n.) in the sense of "lead in small pellets" (1770) + gun (n.). As distinguished from a rifle, which fires bullets. Shotgun wedding first attested 1903, American English. To ride shotgun is 1963, from custom of having an armed man beside the driver on the stagecoach in Old West movies to ward off trouble.