英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

kernel [kernel 词源字典]: kernel: [OE] Etymologically, a kernel is a ‘little seed’. Old English corn, ancestor of modern English corn, meant ‘seed, grain’, and its diminutive form cyrnel was applied to ‘pips’ (now obsolete), to ‘seeds’ (a sense which now survives only in the context of cereals), and to the ‘inner part of nuts, fruit stones, etc’.
=> corn[kernel etymology, kernel origin, 英语词源]
porridge: porridge: [16] Porridge is a 16th-century alteration of pottage [13]. This originally denoted a stew of vegetables and sometimes meat, boiled to submission, but it gradually came to be applied to a gruel, of varying consistency, made of cereals, pulses, etc, and it was the sort made from oatmeal that eventually took over the word porridge. Its transformation from pottage took place via an intermediate poddage (the t pronounced /d/ as in American English), and the change to r is mirrored in such forms as geraway and geroff for getaway and get off.

The same thing happened in the case of porringer ‘dish’ [16], which came from an earlier pottinger. Pottage itself was acquired from Old French potage, which etymologically meant simply ‘something from a pot’ (it was a derivative of pot ‘pot’). English reborrowed it in the 16th century as potage ‘soup’.
=> pot, potage, pottage
aggie (n.2): type of toy marble, by 1905, American English, colloquial shortening of agate (q.v.).
Excited groups gather about rude circles scratched in the mud, and there is talk of "pureys," and "reals," and "aggies," and "commies," and "fen dubs!" There is a rich click about the bulging pockets of the boys, and every so often in school time something drops on the floor and rolls noisily across the room. When Miss Daniels asks: "Who did that?" the boys all look so astonished. Who did what pray tell? ["McClure's Magazine," May 1905]
bit (n.1): "small piece," c. 1200; related Old English bite "act of biting," and bita "piece bitten off," probably are the source of the modern words meaning "boring-piece of a drill" (1590s), "mouthpiece of a horse's bridle" (mid-14c.), and "a piece bitten off, morsel" (c. 1000). All from Proto-Germanic *biton (cognates: Old Saxon biti, Old Norse bit, Old Frisian bite, Middle Dutch bete, Old High German bizzo "biting," German Bissen "a bite, morsel"), from PIE root *bheid- "to split" (see fissure).

Meaning "small piece, fragment" is from c. 1600. Sense of "short space of time" is 1650s. Theatrical bit part is from 1909. Money sense in two bits, etc. is originally from Southern U.S. and West Indies, in reference to silver wedges cut or stamped from Spanish dollars (later Mexican reals); transferred to "eighth of a dollar."
Chloe: fem. proper name, Latin, from Greek Khloe, literally "young green shoot;" related to khloros "greenish-yellow," from PIE *ghlo- variant of root *ghel- (2) "to shine," with derivatives referring to bright materials and gold, and bile or gall (such as Latin helvus "yellowish, bay," Gallo-Latin gilvus "light bay;" Lithuanian geltonas "yellow;" Old Church Slavonic zlutu, Polish żółty, Russian zeltyj "yellow;" Sanskrit harih "yellow, tawny yellow," hiranyam "gold;" Avestan zari "yellow") and "green" (such as Latin galbus "greenish-yellow;" Greek khloros "greenish-yellow color," kholos "bile;" Lithuanian zalias "green," zelvas "greenish;" Old Church Slavonic zelenu, Polish zielony, Russian zelenyj "green;" Old Irish glass, Welsh and Breton glas "green," also "gray, blue").

Buck says the interchange of words for yellow and green is "perhaps because they were applied to vegetation like grass, cereals, etc., which changed from green to yellow." It is possible that this whole group of yellow-green words is related to PIE root *ghlei- "to shine, glitter, glow, be warm" (see gleam (n.)).
eight (n.): late 14c., eighte, earlier ehte (c. 1200), from Old English eahta, æhta, from Proto-Germanic *akhto (cognates: Old Saxon ahto, Old Frisian ahta, Old Norse atta, Swedish åtta, Dutch acht, Old High German Ahto, German acht, Gothic ahtau), from PIE *okto(u) "eight" (cognates: Sanskrit astau, Avestan ashta, Greek okto, Latin octo, Old Irish ocht-n, Breton eiz, Old Church Slavonic osmi, Lithuanian aštuoni). From the Latin word come Italian otto, Spanish ocho, Old French oit, Modern French huit.

For spelling, see fight (v.). Meaning "eight-man crew of a rowing boat" is from 1847. The Spanish piece of eight (1690s) was so called because it was worth eight reals (see piece (n.)). Figure (of) eight as the shape of a race course, etc., attested from c. 1600. To be behind the eight ball "in trouble" (1932) is a metaphor from shooting pool. Eight hours as the ideal length of a fair working day is recorded by 1845.
endogenous (adj.): "growing or proceeding from within," especially with reference to a class of plants including cereals, palms, plantains, etc., 1822, from endo- "within" + -genous "producing."
piece (n.): c. 1200, "fixed amount, measure, portion," from Old French piece "piece, bit portion; item; coin" (12c.), from Vulgar Latin *pettia, probably from Gaulish *pettsi (compare Welsh peth "thing," Breton pez "piece, a little"), perhaps from an Old Celtic base *kwezd-i-, from PIE root *kwezd- "a part, piece" (cognates: Russian chast' "part"). Related: Pieces.

Sense of "portable firearm" first recorded 1580s; that of "chessman" is from 1560s. Meaning "person regarded as a sex object" is first recorded 1785 (compare piece of ass, human beings colloquially called piece of flesh from 1590s; also compare Latin scortum "bimbo, anyone available for a price," literally "skin"). Meaning "a portion of a distance" is from 1610s; that of "literary composition" dates from 1530s. Piece of (one's) mind is from 1570s. Piece of work "remarkable person" echoes Hamlet. Piece as "a coin" is attested in English from 1570s, hence Piece of eight, old name for the Spanish dollar (c. 1600) of the value of 8 reals.
PIECE. A wench. A damned good or bad piece; a girl who is more or less active and skilful in the amorous congress. Hence the (Cambridge) toast, may we never have a PIECE (peace) that will injure the constitution. ["Dictionary of Buckish Slang, University Wit and Pickpocket Eloquence," London, 1811]