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blank [blank 词源字典]: blank: [15] Although English got blank from French blanc ‘white’, its ultimate source is Germanic. Forms such as Old High German blanc ‘white’ suggest a prehistoric Germanic *blangkaz, which could have been borrowed into Romanic, the undifferentiated precursor of the Romance languages, as *blancus – hence French blanc, Italian bianco, Spanish blanco, and Portuguese branco.

The word originally meant simply ‘white’ in English, but this sense had all but died out by the early 18th century, by which time the present-day ‘unmarked’ was well established. Other derivatives of French blanc include the verb blanch [14], from French blanchier, and blanket [13], from Old French blancquet. Blanco is a trade name (based on blanc) coined in the 1890s for a whitening preparation for military webbing (subsequently applied to the khakicoloured version as well).
=> blanch, blanket[blank etymology, blank origin, 英语词源]
loo: loo: [20] Loo presents one of the more celebrated puzzles of English etymology. Not the least of its problematical points is that there is no reliable evidence of its existence before the 1920s, whereas most of its suggested sources have a more dated air than that. Amongst them, the most widely touted is of course gardy loo!, a shout of warning (based on French gardez l’eau ‘beware of the water’) supposedly used when emptying chamber pots from upper-storey windows in the days before modern plumbing; but that is chronologically most unlikely.

Other possibilities are that it is short for Waterloo, which was a trade name for cast-iron lavatory cisterns in the early part of the 20th century (‘O yes, mon loup. How much cost? Waterloo. Watercloset’, James Joyce, Ulysses 1922), and that it comes from louvre, from the use of slatted screens for a makeshift lavatory. But perhaps the likeliest explanation is that it derives from French lieux d’aisances, literally ‘places of ease’, hence ‘lavatory’ (perhaps picked up by British servicemen in France during World War I).
vaseline: vaseline: [19] The term vaseline was coined around 1872 as a trade name for a sort of petroleum jelly newly brought out by the Chesebrough Manufacturing Company. The first syllable, vas-, comes from an anglicized spelling of German wasser ‘water’; the second represents the el- of Greek élation ‘oil’; and the third is the scientific-sounding suffix -ine.
=> water
Ambien: trade name for prescription medication Zolpidem, registered 1993 in U.S., no doubt suggested by ambient or words like it in French.
Benzedrine (n.): trade name of a type of amphetamine, 1933, registered as a proprietary name 1935 by Smith, Kline & French Laboratories, from benzoic (see benzene) + chemical suffix -edrine from ephedrine, etc. It is a carbonate of benzyl-methyl-carbinamine. Slang shortening benny first attested 1955.
escalator (n.): 1900, American English, trade name of an Otis Elevator Co. moving staircase, coined from escalade + -ator in elevator. Figurative use is from 1927.
excelsior: Latin excelsior "higher," comparative of excelsus (adj.) "high, elevated, lofty," past participle of excellere "rise, be eminent" (see excel). Taken 1778 as motto of New York State, where it apparently was mistaken for an adverb. Popularized 1841 as title of a poem by Longfellow. As a trade name for "thin shavings of soft wood used for stuffing cushions, etc.," first recorded 1868, American English.
Luminal (n.): trade name of phenobarbitone, used as a sedative and hypnotic, coined 1912 in German from Latin lumen "light," related to lucere "to shine" (see light (n.)), + -al (3), "the root here being used, very irregularly, as an equivalent of pheno- [Flood].
Perspex: 1935, trade name in Britain for what in the U.S. is called Plexiglas or Lucite, irregularly formed from Latin perspect-, past participle stem of perspicere "look through, look closely at" (see perspective).
Rohypnol (n.): 1995, trade name for a powerful insomnia drug.
towelette (n.): 1896, originally a trade name, from towel (n.) + -ette.
Trojan (adj.): Old English Troian "of or pertaining to ancient Troy," from Latin Trojanus, from Troia, Troja "Troy," from the Greek name for the city, said to be from Tros, name of a king of Phrygia, the mythical founder of Troy. Trojan horse was figurative of ambush-from-within in Roman times (equus Troianus); attested in English from 1570s; the computer virus sense is attested by 1982.

As a noun from mid-14c., "inhabitant of ancient Troy;" in early modern English, the noun could mean "a determined fellow, one who fights or works hard," from the Trojans' long resistance to the Greeks in the Trojan War, but also in 17c., it was a colloquial term for "person of dissolute life, carousing companion." The trade name for a brand of prophylactic contraceptive was registered 1927 in U.S.
tweed (n.): 1839, a trade name for a type of woolen fabric:
MICHAEL NOWAK, alias John Mazurkiewiez, was indicted for stealing on the 15th of April 2 ¼ yards of woollen cloth, called tweed, value 12s., and 2 ¼ yards of woollen cloth, called doe skin, value 17s., the goods of George Priestley Heap. [London Central Criminal Court minutes of evidence from 1839]
This apparently developed from the "Tweed Fishing or Travelling Trousers" advertised in numerous publications from 1834-1838 by the clothing house of Doudney & Son, 49 Lombard Street.
So celebrated has amateur rod-fishing in the Tweed become, that the proper costume of the sportsman has now become an object of speculation among the London tailors, one of whom advertises among other articles of dress "Tweed Fishing Trousers." The anglers who have so long established their head-quarters at Kelso, for the purpose of enjoying the amusement of salmon fishing in the Tweed, have had excellent sport lately : some of the most skilful having caught five or six salmon a day, weighing from six to fourteen pounds each. ["New Sporting Magazine," June 1837]
Thus ultimately named for the River Tweed in Scotland. The place name has not been explained, and it is perhaps pre-Celtic and non-Indo-European.
Tylenol (n.): introduced 1955 as the name of an elixir for children, trade name originally registered by McNeil Laboratories, Philadelphia, Pa., from elements abstracted from N-acetyl-para-aminophenol, the chemical name of its active compound.