英语词源字典 - 在线词源网站

category [category 词源字典]: category: [15] The word category has a rather complicated semantic history. It comes ultimately from Greek katēgorein ‘accuse’, a compound formed from the prefix katá- ‘against’ and agorá ‘public assembly’ (source of English agoraphobia and related to gregarious) – hence ‘speak against publicly’. ‘Accuse’ gradually became weakened in meaning to ‘assert, name’, and the derived noun katēgoríā was applied by Aristotle to the enumeration of all classes of things that can be named – hence ‘category’. The word reached English via late Latin catēgoria or French catégorie.
=> agoraphobia, gregarious, panegyric[category etymology, category origin, 英语词源]
bespeak (v.): Old English besprecan "speak about, speak against, complain," from be- + sprecan "to speak" (see speak (v.)). A common Germanic compound (cognates: Old Saxon bisprecan, Dutch bespreken, Old High German bisprehhan, German besprechen); originally "to call out," it evolved a wide range of meaning in English, including "speak up," "oppose," "request," "discuss, "arrange," and "to order (goods)" (1580s).
The connection of the senses is very loose; some of them appear to have arisen quite independently of each other from different applications of BE- pref. [OED]
category (n.): 1580s, from Middle French catégorie, from Late Latin categoria, from Greek kategoria "accusation, prediction, category," verbal noun from kategorein "to speak against; to accuse, assert, predicate," from kata "down to" (or perhaps "against;" see cata-) + agoreuein "to harangue, to declaim (in the assembly)," from agora "public assembly" (see agora). Original sense of "accuse" weakened to "assert, name" by the time Aristotle applied kategoria to his 10 classes of things that can be named.
category should be used by no-one who is not prepared to state (1) that he does not mean class, & (2) that he knows the difference between the two .... [Fowler]
contradict (v.): 1570s, "speak against," also "assert the contrary" (1580s), from Latin contradictus, past participle of contradicere (see contradiction). Related: Contradicted; contradicting; contradictive.
contradiction (n.): late 14c., from Old French contradiction or directly from Latin contradictionem (nominative contradictio) "a reply, objection, counterargument," noun of action from past participle stem of contradicere, in classical Latin contra dicere "to speak against," from contra "against" (see contra) + dicere "to speak" (see diction).
obloquy (n.): mid-15c., "evil speaking," from Late Latin obloquium "speaking against, contradiction," from Latin obloqui "to speak against, contradict," from ob "against" (see ob-) + loqui "to speak," from PIE *tolk(w)- "to speak" (see locution). Related: Obloquious.
again-say: "To speak against, contradict; to dispute; = gainsay. Also without object with to", Late Middle English; earliest use found in The Wycliffite Bible (early version). From again- + say interjection.