| 单词 | 显然 |
| 释义 | 〔ax〕To understand the origin of the idiomax to grind, we need to know thatgrind means "to sharpen.” This phrase is said to have come from a story by the 19th-century journalist Charles Miner (alias Poor Robert) about a seemingly friendly manwho was able by flattery to persuade a young boy to turn a grindstone for him.The tale first appeared in the Luzerne, Pennsylvania,Federalist on September 7, 1810, under the title "Who'll Turn Grindstones?” and later in an 1815 book entitledEssays from the Desk of Poor Robert the Scribe. Because "Poor Robert" was confused with "Poor Richard,”the story has often been erroneously attributed to Benjamin Franklin.The idiom itself is an Americanism—a word or expression originating in the United States.It was at first restricted to political contexts,but quotations from James Joyce ("Skin-the-Goat . . . evidently with an axe to grind, was airing his grievances")and George Bernard Shaw ("distinguished statesmen of different nations . . . each with a national axe to grind") attest that the phrase has traveled abroad and,as we know only too well, is no longer found only in political contexts.为了理解成语ax to grind 的出处， 我们需要知道grind 意思是“磨尖”。 这个短语据说出自19世纪旅行家查尔斯·麦纳（别名穷罗伯特）所写的关于一个似乎很友善的人的故事，他能够奉承地劝说一名男孩为他翻过一块磨光石。这个传说第一次出现在1810年9月7日宾夕法尼亚州的卢泽恩，在1810年9月7日题为“谁将推翻磨石”的联邦制拥护者 中提到， 之后1815年又在名为作家穷·罗伯特文集 一书中提到。 因为"poor Robert和"poor Richard"易被弄混淆，这个故事经常被错误地认为是本杰明·弗兰克林创作的。这个成语本身是美国式的词或表达源于美国。一开始被限于在政治性言词的情况中使用，但是从以下的引文表明这个短语已广泛地传播，一个是引于詹姆斯·琼斯（“这个显然别有企图的披着人皮的狼，正在诉苦”），另一个引自乔治·萧伯纳（“辨认出不同国家的人…每个国家都有自己国家的打算”），正如我们所熟知的，它不会只在政治性言论的上下文间才可以找到的〔consider〕The faculty deems the essay to be by far the best one submitted.教师们认为这篇文章在已经交来的当中显然是最好的。〔conspicuity〕The quality of being conspicuous; obviousness.显然：显而易见的特性；明显，显然〔irony〕An occurrence, a result, or a circumstance notable for such incongruity.See Usage Note at ironic 具有讽刺意味的事：显然具有这样一种不一致的事件、结果或情形 参见 ironic〔undersell〕Now that our proposal has failed, it's obvious that we undersold it.我们的计划现在已失败，显然我们没尽力〔spontaneous〕These adjectives mean acting, reacting, or happening without apparent forethought, prompting, or planning.这些形容词的意思是没有显然地事前考虑、外力推动和计划而行动、反应或发生。〔expressly〕In an express or a definite manner; explicitly:明白地，显然地，确切地：快速或肯定的方式地；显示地：〔war〕A piece of liverwurst may perhaps help us gain some insight into the nature of war,at least into the semantic history of the wordwar. War and the -wurst part of liverwurst can be traced back to the same Indo-European root, wers-, "to confuse, mix up.” In the Germanic family of the Indo-European languages,this root gave rise to several words having to do with confusion or mixture of various kinds.In the case of the ancestry ofwar, the hypothetical Germanic stem .werza-, "confusion,” became .werra-, which passed into Old French, a language descended from spoken Latin but supplemented by more than 200 words borrowed from the Frankish invaders of the 5th century.From the Germanic stem came both the formwerre in Old North French, the form borrowed into English in the 12th century, and guerre (the source of guerilla ) in the rest of the Old French-speaking area. Both forms meant "war,” a very confused condition indeed.Meanwhile another Indo-European form derived from the same Indo-European root had developed into Old High Germanwurst, meaning "sausage,” from an underlying sense of "mixture,” which is, of course, related to the sense of the root "to confuse, mix up.”Modern Germanwurst was borrowed into English in the 19th century, first by itself (recorded in 1855) and then as part of the wordliverwurst (1869), the liver being a translation of Germanleber in leberwurst. 一块肝肠也许会帮助我们对战争的性质增加些认识，至少可了解war这一词的语义史。 War和 liverwurst 的一部分 -wurst 可以追溯到同一印欧语系词根 wers- “使迷惑，混杂”。 在印欧语系中的日耳曼语系中，该词根造出了好几个与迷惑或各种东西的混合物有关的词语。在war 的词源一例中，假定的日耳曼语词干 werza- “迷惑”变成了 werra- ， 又传入了来自拉丁语口语的古法语中，但是又附加了由5世纪法兰克侵略者带来的200多个单词。从日耳曼语词干中，既产生了古老的北部法语中的werre (12世纪该词传入英语），又产生了其它讲古法语地区的人用的 guerre ( guerilla 的词源）。 两个形式都表示“战争”，一个的确很糟糕的局面。同时，另一个从相同的印欧语系词根派生来的印欧语形式发展成了旧高地德语wurst “香肠”， 这是从其潜含义“混合物”而来的，“混合物”显然与“使困惑，混杂”的词根的含义有关。现代德语中的wurst 于19世纪传入英语中， 首先是它的独立形式（记载于1855年），然后是liverwurst 的一部分(1869年）， “肝”这层含义是由德语leberwurst 中的 leber 翻译而来 〔somebody〕"Obviously she was somebody—a real presence in the room"(Oleg Cassini)“很显然她是个重要人物——是屋子里真正举足轻重的人”(奥列格·卡西尼)〔bring〕 When the relevant point of focus is not the place of speaking itself,the difference obviously depends on the context.We can say eitherThe labor leaders brought or took their requests to the mayor's office, depending on whether we want to describe things from the point of view of the labor leaders or the mayor.Perhaps for this reason, the distinction betweenbring and take has been blurred in some areas; a parent may say of a child, for example, 当注意的相关点不再指说话人所在处时，显然是靠上下文来判断。我们可以说The labor leaders brought 或 took their requests to the mayor's office（工会领导带着他们的要求去市长办公室）， 这取决于我们叙述事情是从工会领导的角度还是从市长的角度出发。也许由于这个原因，bring 和 take 之间的区别在一些地区不是很明显； 例如，家长可以说他的孩子： 〔between〕The truck driver had obviously been drinking between stops. 卡车司机显然在中途站间喝了酒 〔amateur〕When Mrs. T.W. Atkinson remarked in her 1863Recollections of the Tartar Steppes and their Inhabitants, "I am no amateur of these melons,” she usedamateur in a sense unfamiliar to us. That sense, "a lover, an admirer,” is, however, clearly descended from the senses of the word's ultimate Latin source,amātor, "lover, devoted friend, devotee, enthusiastic pursuer of an objective,” and from its immediate Latin-derived French source,amateur, with a similar range of meanings. First recorded in English in 1784 with the sense in which Mrs. Atkinson used it,amateur is found in 1786 with a meaning more familiar to us, "a person who engages in an art, for example, as a pastime rather than as a profession,” a sense that had already developed in French.Given the limitations of doing something as an amateur,it is not surprising that the word is soon after recorded in the disparaging sensewe still use to refer to someone who lacks professional skill or ease in performance.当T.W.阿特金森夫人在她1863年出版的塔塔·史坦普和其居民回忆录， 中提到“我并不喜欢这些瓜果”时， 她使用的amateur 是我们所不熟悉的一个意思。 可是这种“爱好者，喜爱者，”的意思显然有其正宗拉丁语来源，amator, 意思是“爱人，忠实的朋友，奉献者，对某目标热情的追求者”， 还有由拉丁语直接派生出的法语来源，amateur, 具有相似的意思。 1784年记录在英语文字中出现的这个词正是阿特金森夫人使用的意思，1786年出现的amateur 有我们更为熟悉的意思， “如一个从事艺术，把它作为一项消遣，而不是一个职业的人，”法语的词早已发展了这种意思。如果把意思限定为从事业余活动的人，这个词被记录下来后不久就有了贬义含意，也就不足为奇了，我们用它来指在表演中缺乏专业技巧或缺乏得心应手的感觉〔chivalry〕The Age of Chivalry was also the age of the horse.Bedecked in elaborate armor and other trappings,horses were certainly well dressedalthough they might have wished for lighter loads.That the horse should be featured so prominently during the Age of Chivalryis etymologically appropriate,becausechivalry goes back to the Latin word caballus, "horse, especially a riding horse or packhorse.”Borrowed from French, as were so many other important words having to do with medieval English culture,the English wordchivalry is first recorded in works composed around the beginning of the 14th century and is found in several senses,including "a body of armored mounted warriors serving a lord" and "knighthood as a ceremonially conferred rank in the social system.”Our modern sense,"the medieval system of knighthood,”could not exist until the passage of several centuries had allowed the perspective for such a conceptualization,with this sense being recorded first in 1765.骑士时代同时也是马的时代。马被用精美的铠甲和其它马饰打扮起来，它们显然穿戴得很好，虽然它们可能会喜欢稍轻一些的负担。在骑士时代马被放在如此显要的地位，这从词源学上来看是恰当的，因为chivalry 一词可追溯到拉丁语中 caballus 一词， 即“马，尤其是用来骑的马或驮马”的意思。象与中世纪英国文化有关的许多其它重要的词一样，英语中chivalry 一词也是从法语中借用来的，最初出现在大约写于14世纪初的书籍中， 当时有好几个含义，其中包括：“为一名贵族服务的一队穿着铠甲、骑着马的武士”和“作为一种被正式授予的社会制度中等级的骑士资格”。我们现代的意义，即“中世纪的骑士制度”，是在几个世纪以后对这样一个概念的视角成为可能之时才出现的，这个意义最早出现在文字记载中是1765年〔contrived〕Obviously planned or calculated; not spontaneous; labored:精心设计的：显然是计划好的或精心设计的；非自动而发的；矫揉造作的：〔point〕Diplomacy is certainly not one of his strong points. Your weak point is your constant need for approval.外交显然不是他的特长。你的弱点是你总是需要得到别人的同意才有信心〔patently〕In a patent manner; openly, plainly, or clearly:显然地，一清二楚地：以公开方式地；公开地、显然地或清楚地：〔superficial〕Concerned with or comprehending only what is apparent or obvious; shallow.肤浅的：只关心或只理解很明显或很显然的事物的；浅薄的〔janitor〕A holiday for janitors ought to take place in January,for both words are linked.In Latiniānus was the word for "archway, gateway, or covered passage" and also for the god of gates, doorways, and beginnings in general.As many schoolchildren know,our month January—a month of beginnings—is named for the god.Latiniānitor, the source of our word janitor and ultimately also fromiānus, meant "doorkeeper or gatekeeper.”Probably becauseiānitor was common in Latin records and documents, it was adopted into English,first being recorded in the sense "doorkeeper" around 1567 in a Scots text.In an early quotation Saint Peter is called "the Janitor of heaven.”The term can still mean "doorkeeper,”but in Scots usagejanitor also referred to a minor school official. Apparently this position at times involved maintenance duties and doorkeeping,and the maintenance duties took over the more exalted tasks,giving us the position of janitor as we know it today.看门人的假日应该放在一月，因为以下两个词都同一月有联系。拉丁文中的ianus 表示的是“拱门、道路或走廊”， 也是通常所说的门神、门口和开始。正如许多小学生知道的那样，我们的一月——最初的一个月——是以神的名字命名的。拉丁文ianitor 是单词 janitor 的来源， 追根溯源它也来自ianus， 意思是“看门人或管门人”。也许因为ianitor 这个词在拉丁文记录和文件中很普遍， 它才被英语所采用，最早被记录为“看门人”之意时大约在1567年的一篇苏格兰文章中。圣彼得在早期的引文中被称为“天堂守护神”。这个词仍然是“看门人”的意思，但在苏格兰用法中janitor 也指代低层的学校公务员。 显然这个职位时不时地也包含着维护的责任和守门的义务，这种维护的责任吸取了更为崇高的任务，于是就有了正如我们今天所知道的看门人这个职务〔toady〕A toady is not a pleasant individual,and the origin of the word makes being a toady even less pleasant.Toady is obviously derived from the word toad. The-y suffix can have diminutive force, and the earliest recorded sense (around 1690) oftoady (now obsolete), "a little or young toad,” illustrates this force. The sense we know has nothing to do with baby toadsbut rather with the practice of certain quacks or charlatans who claimed that they could cast out poison.Toads were thought to be poisonous,so these charlatans would have an attendant eat a toad or pretend to eat oneand then remove the poison from the attendant.Such an attendant is obviously a type of person who would do anything,and thustoadeater (first recorded 1629) was the perfect name for a flattering, fawning parasite. Toadeater and the verb derived from it, toadeat, influenced the sense of the noun and verb toad and the noun toady, so that both nouns could mean "sycophant"and the verbtoady could mean "to act like a toady to someone.” 拍马者并不是一个讨人喜欢的人，这个词的来源使做拍马者这种作法更加不令人喜欢。Toady 很显然是从 toad 这个词衍生而来。 后缀-y 可以有一种指小的效力， Toady 这个词最早有记载(1690年左右）的含义“一只小或幼年蟾蜍”（现已废弃）正说明了这种效力。 我们现在知道的含义与年幼的蟾蜍没有什么关系，而与某些宣称能够驱毒的冒牌医生或江湖郎中的某些做法有关。当时人们认为蟾蜍有毒，所以这些江湖朗中会叫一个手下人吃下一只蟾蜍或假装吃下一只蟾蜍，然后把毒物从他的手下人身体中驱除出去。很明显，这样一个帮手是一种什么事都会做的人，这样，用toadeater （最早记载于1629年）这个词来称呼奉承拍马的寄生者是再合适不过了。 Toadeater 和从它衍生而来的动词 toadeat 影响了作为名词或动词的 toad 和作为名词 toady 的含义， 于是二个名词都可以理解为“拍马者”的意思，而动词toady 有“在某人面前象一个拍马者一样行动”的意思 〔pant〕It would seem unlikely that the name of a 4th-century Roman Catholic saint should be the ultimate source of a word for a modern article of clothing commonly worn by both men and women.Pants, however, can be traced back to Pantaleon, the patron saint of Venice. He became so closely associated with the inhabitants of that citythat the Venetians became popularly known asPantaloni. Consequently, among the commedia dell'arte's stock characters the representative Venetian (a stereotypically wealthy but miserly merchant) was calledPantalone. His name in French,Pantalon, was borrowed into English (first recorded around 1590). During the middle of the 17th centurythe French came to identify him with one particular style of trousers,and this same style became known aspantaloons in English. Pantaloons was later applied to another style of trousers that came into fashion toward the end of the 18th century, tight-fitting garments that had begun to replace knee breeches.After thatpantaloons was used to refer to trousers in general. The last step in the development of the wordpants met with some resistance. This abbreviation ofpantaloon was considered vulgar and, as Oliver Wendell Holmes put it,"a word not made for gentlemen, but ‘gents.’”First found in the writings of Edgar Allan Poe in 1840,pants has replaced the "gentleman's word" in English and has lost all obvious connection to Saint Pantaleon.看起来一位公元4世纪的罗马天主教徒的名字似乎不可能是这个做为男人和女人平常都穿的布做的现代物品的根本词源。Pants 但可以追溯到奥塔莱昂，威尼斯的庇护神。 他变得与这座城市里的居民联系得这样紧密，以至于威尼斯人也通俗的被称为Pantaloni 。 结果，在即兴喜剧的角色中那个有代表性的威尼斯人（一个愚富而吝啬的商人）被称作Pantalone。 他的法语名字Panlalon 被借用到英语中（初次记录大约在1590年）。 在17世纪中期，法国人开始把它与一种特殊类型的裤子等同起来，同一种类型的裤子在英语中是pantaloons 。 Pantaloons 后来被用作另一种类型的裤子并在18世纪末日渐流行， 紧身衣服已经开始取代齐膝马裤。在那以后，pantaloons 被用来泛指裤子。 在pants 一词发展的最后遇到了一些阻力。 Pantaloon 的缩写被认为是粗俗的， 并且正如奥立弗·温德尔·霍姆斯所说，“并不是为绅士而造的词，而是为‘家伙们所造’”。最早在1840年发现于艾德加·爱伦·坡的作品中，pants 在英语中已经替代了那个“绅士的语言”， 而且显然已失去了和圣奥塔莱昂的一切联系〔wanigan〕Wanigan is apparently borrowed from Ojibwa waanikaan, "storage pit,” from the verbwaanikkee-, "to dig a hole in the ground.” Nineteenth-century citations in theOxford English Dictionary indicate that the word was then associated chiefly with the speech of Maine. It denoted a storage chest containing small supplies for a lumber camp,a boat outfitted to carry such supplies,or, as in Algonquian, the camp equipment and provisions.In Alaska, on the western edge of the vast territory inhabited by Algonquian-speaking tribes,the same word was borrowed into English to indicate a little temporary hut, usually built on a log raft to be towed to wherever men were working. According to Russell Tabbert of the University of Alaska,wanigan is still used in the northernmost regions of Alaska to mean "a small house, bunkhouse, or shed mounted on skids" to be dragged along behind a tractor train as a place for a work crew to eat and sleep. However, Tabbert notes that in southeast Alaska, where mobile homes are a common option for housing,wanigan now means an addition built onto a trailer house for extra living or storage space. Classified advertisements for trailer homes frequently mentionwanigans. Wanigan 很显然是从奥吉布瓦语 waanikdan 而来， “储物处”从动词waanikkee （意为“在地上挖洞”）而来。 牛津英语词典 里的19世纪的引文表明，该词当时主要与缅因语相连。 它指示供应木料营地用的贮物箱，载有供应品的小船，或如在阿尔贡金语中所指的宿营装备或供应品。在阿拉斯加讲阿尔贡金语部族居住的广大土地西端，该词被借入到英语中，表示一个通常是建在木筏上的临时性小屋，每当人们搬迁的时候就将其拽走。根据阿拉斯加大学的拉塞尔·泰伯特所言，wanigan 仍然用于阿拉斯加最北部地区，意为用牵引车牵引着的供一工作组食宿的“建于轮子上的小房子、工房或工棚”。 但是泰伯特指出，在阿拉斯加东南部常选择活动房作为住所，wanigan 现在的意思是供额外居住或贮存用的一个活动房屋的附加物。 关于活动房屋的分类广告经常提到wanigans 〔specious〕Aspecious argument is not simply a false one but one that has the ring of truth.Those aware of the specialized use of the word may therefore sense a certain contradiction in hearing an argument described asobviously specious or specious on the face of things; if the fallaciousness is apparent,the argument was probably not plausible-sounding to begin with.一种似是而非的 论点并不只是一个错误的论点， 而是指貌似正确的论点。那些意识到这个词的特殊用法的人听到这种“显然是似是而非的” 或 “就表面看起来有理的” 论点时，会因此感到某些矛盾； 如果此论点错误很明显的话，这样的论点可能一开始就不会让人觉得有道理〔new〕Novel applies to what is both new and strikingly unusual: Novel 适用于既是新的又显然不寻常的东西： 〔face〕From appearances alone; apparently:从表面上判断；显然：〔patently〕a patently false statement.显然是一派胡言〔manifestation〕The state of being manifested.显然：处于显而易见的状态〔unique〕Over the course of the centuryunique has become the paradigmatic example of the class of terms that do not allow comparison or modification by an adverb of degree such as very, somewhat, or quite. Thus, most grammarians believe that it is incorrect to say that something isvery unique or more unique than something else, though phrases such asnearly unique and almost unique are acceptable. In the most recent survey the sentenceHer designs are quite unique in today's fashion scene was unacceptable to 80 percent of the Usage Panel. · Critical objections to the comparison and degree modification of absolute terms date to the 18th centuryand have been applied to a wide group of adjectives includingequal, fatal, omnipotent, parallel, perfect, and unanimous. According to the standard argument, such words denote properties that a thing either does or does not have but cannot have to a qualifiable degree.Thus ifunique is properly used to mean "without equal or equivalent,” something either is unique or it isn't, and phrases such asvery unique and more unique can only betray a weakening of the sense to mean something like "unusual" or "distinctive.” It is true that comparison and modification ofunique are often associated with the style favored by copywriters, as in the advertisement announcing thatOmaha's most unique restaurant is now even more unique or in the claim that a new automobile is So unique, it's patented. But modification ofunique is also found in the work of reputable writers, where it may lack any connotations of hyperbole.A painting is described asthe most unique of Beckman's self-portraits, and a travel writer states thatChicago is no less unique an American city than New York or San Francisco. The relative acceptability of these usages reflects the semantic subtlety ofunique itself. If we were to useunique only according to the strictest criteria of logic, after all, we might freely apply the term to anything in the worldsince nothing is wholly equivalent to anything else.Clearly, then, when we say that a restaurant or painting is unique,we mean that it is worthy of inclusion in a class by itself according to certain implicit but generally accepted criteria.Thus a legitimately unique painting might be one that realizes an unparalleled aesthetic vision,but not one that is rendered only in pigments whose names begin with the lettero; and a legitimately unique restaurant might be one that serves 18th-century French cuisine according to the original recipes,not one that has been installed in a converted sardine cannery.Given this understanding, it is not inherently impossible to think of uniqueness as a matter of degree,in the sense that one painting or restaurant may be more or less worthy of inclusion in a class by itself than some other. ·What is troubling about the copywriters' use ofunique is not that the word has become a synonym for unusual. Rather, it is the copywriters who are using the word in conformity with strict logic.Uniqueness is claimed for a restaurant in virtue of some trivial properties of its decor or menu,or for a resort hotel that simply happens to have a singularly picturesque view of the bay.Though it may be true that such properties render these thingslogically unique, they do not constitute legitimate grounds for putting the things into a class by themselves according to the criteria ordinarily invoked when things are sorted into classes.In fact, the abuse ofunique can be cloying even when no modification or comparison is involved; when we read an advertisement for a line of sportswear that featuresa unique selection of colors, we may suspect that the distinctive properties of the color selection are not so remarkable as the advertiser would have us believe. But it is not surprising that these uses ofunique should lend themselves to promiscuous modification and comparison; for once it is granted that uniqueness can be claimed for any product or service that is somehow distinctive from all its competitors,it is inevitable that an increase in uniqueness will be seen in every minor innovation.See Usage Note at equal ,infinite ,parallel ,perfect 在本世纪整个过程中unique 已成为不能由程度副词，例 very、somewhat 或 quite， 比较或修饰的一类术语的例证。 因此，多数语法学家认为说某事是very unique 或 more unique than 是不正确的， 虽然短语例如nearly unique 和 almost unique 是可接受的。 在最近的调查中，句子Her designs are quite unique in today's fashion scene （她的设计在现今流行样式的场面中是很独特的） 对用法专题使用小组的百分之八十成员是不可接受的。 对纯粹术语的比较和程度修饰的主要异议可追述到18世纪，并已广泛用到许多形容词中，包括equal, fatal, omnipotent, parallel, perfect 和 unanimous。 根据标准论据，这些单词表示一事有或没有但不能有可修饰的程度的性质。于是如果unique 适当地用于表示“没有相等或相当的”，则某事是唯一的或不是唯一的， 而短语像very unique 和 more unique 仅能表露出说明某事像“不寻常的”或“独特的”的意义的减弱。 的确，unique 的比较和修饰常与撰稿人喜欢的文体相联系， 如在广告中称Omaha's most unique restaurant is now even more unique（奥马哈城的最独特的餐馆现在甚至是更加独特） 或声称新汽车是 So unique, it's patented（如此独特，它取得了专利权）。 但是unique 的修饰也在著名作家的作品中发现， 那里可能缺乏夸张法的任何涵义。描述一张油画为the most unique of Beckman's self-portraits（最独特的贝克曼的自画像）， 一位旅游作家叙述Chicago is no less unique an American city than New York or San Francisco（芝加哥比纽约或旧金山是不逊独特的美国城市）。 这些用法的相对可接受性反映unique 自身语义的巧妙。 如果我们仅按照逻辑的严格标准使用unique ， 则我们终于会自由地把此术语使用于世界上的任何事，因为没有完全等同于另一事的事。于是，显然当我们说餐馆或油画是独特的时，我们意味着根据某种隐含的但可普遍接受的判据它是值得包含在一个等级内的。于是合理独特的油画可能是实现空前未有的审美型的，而不是仅给予名字以字母O开始的颜料； 合理独特的餐馆可能根据原来的食谱提供18世纪法国菜肴的餐馆，而不是配备转换的沙丁鱼罐头食品的餐馆。按这样了解，将独特性视为程度问题不是本来就不可能的，在这个意义上一张油画或一个餐馆或多或少可能是极好的有价值的内涵物而不是其他。关于撰稿人使用unique 的困惑不是此单词已成为 unusual 的同义词。 相反地，正是撰稿人使用此单词与严密的逻辑相一致。对餐馆声称独特性是由于它的布置或菜单的某些不重要的性质，或者对于人们常去的旅馆仅因为有海湾的独一无二地别致的景象。虽然这样的性质使得这些事logically 独特的可能是真实的， 但是当事情进行了分类，根据平常实行的判据把这些事情自身放到一类，他们不组成正常的基础。事实上unique 的滥用会使人发腻，即使在没有涉及修饰或比较的时候； 当我们读运动服装的unique selection of colors（颜色的独特选择） 的一行广告时， 我们会怀疑颜色选择的独特性质并非广告商希望我们所认为的那么明显。但不必惊讶于unique 的这些用法应当适用于杂乱的修饰和比较； 就这一次可以承认，独特性能用来指任何产品或服务，它们与所有的竞争者相比较有某种程度的特色，在每一小的创新中可以看到独特性的增加是必然会发生的 参见 equal,infinite,parallel,perfect〔evidently〕According to the evidence available:显然地：根据现有的证据地：〔hassle〕It is difficult to believe that there were no hassles before 1945,but that is the year in which the nounhassle is first recorded in English. The origins of this word might be considered a hassle for the etymologist.An English dialect word,hassle, meaning "to hack at, cut with a blunt knife and with a sawing motion,” is recorded at the end of the 19th century.A Southern dialect word,hassle, "to pant, breathe heavily,” is also a possible source. A more popular notion has been thathassle is a blend, but here again we have a hassle.Three separate possibilities have been proposed,a combination ofh ar ass and hu stle, ha ggle and tu ssle, and ha ggle and wre stle. Given all these possibilities,it is clear why words such ashassle end up with the etymology "origin unknown.” 很难相信1945年以前没有麻烦这个词，但就在那一年hassle 这个名词第一次被记录在英语中。 词源学家认为这个词的来源是争吵。一个英语方言词hassle 的意思是“砍，用一个钝的刀锯”， 在19世纪被记录下来。一个南部的方言词hassle “喘气，重呼吸”也可能是它的来源。 但更普遍的是认为hassle 是一个合成词， 但我们对此又有了异议。词源学家提出的三种不同的可能性：h ar ass 与hu stle的结合、ha ggle与tu ssle 的结合和 ha ggle与wre stle 的结合。 尽管有这么多的可能性，但很显然，象hassle 这样的词仍“无源可溯” 〔testy〕To the casual eyetesty and heady seem to have no connection until one becomes less casual and notes that both words refer to the head.Thehead in heady is easy to see both in the form of the word and in the meanings of the word. The earliest sense,first recorded in a work composed before 1382,is "headlong, headstrong,”which is clearly a "head" sensebut so is the better known current sense "apt to go to the head, intoxicating.”To see thehead in testy, we must look back to the Old French wordtestu, the source of our word. Testu is derived from the Old French word teste, "head" (Modern French tête ). In Englishtesty developed another sense, "aggressive, contentious,” which passed into the sense we are familiar with, "irritable.” 粗看testy 和 heady 似乎没有联系， 直到一个人较为仔细才注意到两个词都指头部。heady 中的 head 很容易看出在形式与意义上均相似。 其最早的意义，首次记录于1382年以前的一部著作中，指“轻率的，顽固的”，显然是“头部”的意思，但现在更为人知的意思是“能入脑的；陶醉的”。而要看head 在 testy 中， 我们必须追溯到古法语testu ，我们这个词的词源。 Testu 源于古法语词 teste ，“头部”（现代法语 tete )。 在英语中，testy 所发展的另一层意思（“好战的，争论的”）转化成了我们熟悉的意思（“暴躁的”） 〔principle〕Despite generations of spelling lessons,the wordsprinciple and principal are still commonly confused. Perhaps an understanding of their history will help in keeping them straight.Both words go back to the same Latin word,prīnceps, meaning "first, as in time, position, or authority.”The split that has caused all the trouble occurred in the next stage of development.Fromprīnceps were derived the noun prīncipium, "start, origin, guiding principle,” the adjectiveprīncipālis, "first in importance or esteem,” and the noun prīncipālis, "a leading citizen.” Clearly the latter two words with theā between the p and the l have given us the adjectiveprincipal (first recorded around 1300) and the noun principal (also first recorded in a work composed around 1300).Perhaps it should not be mentioned that one Middle English spelling for the noun wasprinciple. On the other hand,the Latin wordprīncipium and its Old French descendant principe were involved in the creation of the word principle in Middle English, first recorded in a work written around 1380.Words likemanciple and participle influenced the spelling of this new word, but again perhaps we should keep silent about the fact that we also find the word spelledprincipal and prinsipal in Middle English. A key point to remember about these seemingly aberrant Middle English spellings isthat in Middle English spelling was not nearly as fixed as it usually is today,a development that was much furthered by the invention of printing.When we interchange spellings forprinciple and principal, we are doing something that would have been less of a fault in the days before the conformity imposed on us by this marvelous invention. 尽管在拼写课上反复强调，principle 和 principal 还是被人们搞混。 或许了解一下这两个词的历史有助于我们弄清楚它们的拼写。两个词都可追溯到同一个拉丁词princeps， 意为“在时间，地位或权威上第一的”。引起所有麻烦的分裂出现在发展过程的下一个阶段。从princeps 派生出了名词 principium， 意为“开端，根源，指导性原则，” 形容词principalis “最重要的或最受尊敬的”及名词 principalis 意为“处于领导地位的公民”。 显然，后两个词在p 和 l 之间带有 ā， 这就使我们有了形容词principal （最早记录于1300年左右）和名词 principal （最早记录也是在大约1300年左右创作的作品中）。或许我们不应提到这个名词在中古英语中的一种拼法是principle 。 另一方面，拉丁词principium 和其古法词的派生词 principe 共同作用创造了中古英语单词 principle， 最早记录于写于约1380年的一部作品。象manciple 和 participle 这样的单词都影响了这个新单词的拼写， 但是或许我们应该再一次对于这个单词也曾在中古英语中被拼写成principal 和 prinsipal 这一事实保持沉默。 记住这些在中古英语中貌似反常的拼写的关键在于，在中古英语中的拼写方式几乎不象今天这么固定，因为当时还没有发明印刷术。当这项神奇的发明把拼写一致的原则加到我们头上之前，我们把principle 和 principal 的拼写互相交换，也算不上什么大错 〔connection〕There appeared to be no connection between the two crimes.显然这两件犯罪案没有联系〔paradise〕Perhaps the supreme example of the semantic process known as melioration is the wordparadise. In tracing this word from its origins to its present status,we see an elevation, or melioration, of meaning that raises the word to new heights.The history begins with the Avestan (the eastern dialect of Old Iranian) wordpairi-daēza-, "enclosure,” made up ofpairi, "around,” and daēza-, "wall.” The Greek military leader and historian Xenophon, who served with Greek mercenaries in Persia,first used the Greek wordparadeisos adopted from the Avestan wordto refer to the Persian kings' and nobles' parks or pleasure grounds.This Greek word extended to mean "garden" or "orchard" was an obvious choice for translators of the Bible into Greekto use both for the Garden of Eden and the Abode of the Blessed, or heaven.The Greek word was adopted into Late Latin and was used much as we might expect in its biblical senses in ecclesiastical Latin (Late Latinparadīsus ). The Old English wordparadis taken from Latin is found, but our word probably really established itself in Middle English (first recorded before 1200),derived both from Latin and from Old French, which had adopted the word from Latin.paradise. 这个词也许能作为词义进化最典型的例子， 从它的起源到现在的地位，我们可以看到词义的进化或改进把这个词带到了一个新的高度。这个历史过程从意为“领地，圈地”的阿维斯陀语（古伊朗人西部方言）pairi-daeza-, 开始， 由意为“环形的”pairi, 和意为“墙”的 daeza-, 组成。 曾随希腊雇佣军到波斯服役的希腊军事将领和历史学家色诺芬，首先使用了希腊语词paradeisos, ， 该词采用了阿维斯陀词，指波斯国王和贵族们的花园或游乐场，这个希腊词衍生到表示“花园”或“果园”，显然是译者在把《圣经》翻译成希腊文时所做出的选择，以用来表明伊甸园和天国或天堂，有这两种含义的希腊词被引入后期的拉丁语中且当它们在教会拉丁文（后期拉丁语paradisus )中意为《圣经》方面的意义时被更广泛地使用， 古英语paradis 一词来自拉丁文， 但我们用的这个词可能在中古英语（首次记录在1200年前）中真正确立了起来，人们发现它源于拉丁文和从拉丁文中采纳了这个词的古法语〔prude〕Being a prude has never been widely considered a good thing,but if we dig further into the history of the wordprude, we will find that it had a noble past.The change for the worse took place in French.Frenchprude first had a good sense, "wise woman,” but apparentlya woman could be too wise or, in the eyes of some,too observant of decorum and propriety,and soprude took on the sense in French that was brought into English along with the word, first recorded in 1704.The French word first meant "wise woman"becauseprude was a shortened form of prude femme (earlier in Old Frenchprode femme ), a word that was modeled on earlierpreudomme, "a man of experience and integrity.” The second part of this word is, of course,homme, "man.” Old Frenchprod, meaning "wise, prudent,” is from Vulgar Latin prōdis with the same sense. Prōdis in turn comes from Late Latin prōde, "advantageous,” derived from the verbprodesse, "to be good.” We can see that the history ofprude is filled with usefulness, profit, wisdom, and integrity, but in spite of all this,things did not turn out that well.人们从来没有普遍地认为做一个拘守礼仪的人是一件好事，但是如果我们深挖prude 这个词的历史， 我们会发现这个词有一个体面的过去。这个词变成贬义是在法语中发生的。法语词prude 开始时是褒义的，意为“明智或聪明的女人，” 但是很显然，女人可能会过于聪明或者在某些人的眼里，对仪表和行为的得体过分注重，这样法语词prude 就有了这个和词一起被引入英语的意思， 并最早记载于1704年。这个法语词开始时的意思之所以是“聪明的女人”，因为prude 是 prudefemme 的缩写形式 （更早的时候在古法语中为prodefemme )， 这个词模仿更早的一个词preudomme “一个富有经验而又正直的男人”而来。 这个词的第二部分当然是意为“男人”的homme。 意思是“聪明，谨慎”的古法语prod 由一个相同意思的俗拉丁词 prodis 而来。 Prodis 从后期拉丁语 prode 演变而来，意为“有利的”， 该词又从意思为“从善”的动词prudesse 衍生而来。 我们现在明白prude 的历史充满了有利、利益、智慧或忠诚的意思， 但尽管如此，事情并没有变得那么好〔retrograde〕Of or relating to the brief, regularly occurring, apparently backward movement of a planetary body in its orbit as viewed against the fixed stars, caused by the differing orbital velocities of Earth and the body observed.后退的：行星所做的短暂有规律的运动的，以静止星体为参照物进行观察时，这种运动显然是后退的，这是由地球和所观察天体具有不同的轨道速度引起的〔trashed〕Expressions for intoxication are among those that best showcase the creativity of slang. The boundless inventiveness in expressing the ordinary in not-so-ordinary ways led Walt Whitman to describe slang as"an attempt of common humanity to escape from bald literalism, and express itself illimitably.” Colloquial and slang expressions meaning "intoxicated" can fill several pages in slang thesauruses. Most fall into a few general groups. Common are expressions that originally meant "damaged, badly affected by something,” such as trashed, smashed, crocked, blitzed, hammered, wasted, messed up, and blasted. Cooking terms are also common, such as baked, fried, and boiled (said to have been coined at Princeton University in the 1920s). Terms relating to liquids or being filled are a natural source of metaphors for filling oneself up with drink or drugs: sloshed, oiled, tanked, and loaded are but a few. Some terms are not easily classified or have origins that are not fully clear, such as tight (first appearing in the 1830s), plastered (first appearing around 1912), blotto (perhaps from blot, first appearing in 1917), and stoned (apparently taken from such expressions as stone-drunk, stone-cold, and first appearing as stone in 1945). Most current terms for "intoxicated" are not very old, as one expects of slang terms generally; of those in the lists above, blotto, crocked, fried, loaded, plastered, tanked, tight, and oiled are recorded in the first half of the 20th century, and of these only tight and oiled are known to have existed before then. 表示喝醉的词语充分体现了俚语的创造性。用非同寻常的方式创造极为寻常的俚语，其间蕴藏了无限创造空间，华尔特·惠特曼将俚语描述为“让平常心从文字束缚中逃离，并随性表达出来” 。表示“喝醉的，酒醉的”的口语以及俚语的表达方式，可以填满俚语同义词的数页空间。大多数俚语可归入几个分类。许多常见俚语的原意为“被破坏的，受某物负面影响”，如 trashed、smashed、crocked、blitzed、hammered、wasted、messed up 以及 blasted 。烹饪词汇也很普遍，如 baked、fried 和 boiled （据说由普林斯顿大学于20世纪20年代创造）。与液体或注入有关的词语是隐喻表示过多饮酒或吸毒而形成的自然来源： sloshed、oiled、tanked 和 loaded 只是其中少数例子。有些词语不易界定其类别或其原意较不清楚，如 tight （首次出现于19世纪30年代）、 plastered （首次出现于1912年）、 blotto （可能源自 blot ，首次出现于1917年）以及 stoned （显然来自词语 stone-drunk和stone-cold ，并于1945年首次以 stone 的形式出现）。正如大家对俚语的普遍看法，大多数表示“喝醉的，酒醉的”的现行词语都较新；在如上所列词汇中， blotto、crocked、fried、loaded、plastered、tanked、tight 和 oiled 首次见载于19世纪中叶，只有 tight 和 oiled 是所知早于那个时期 〔quark〕"Three quarks for Muster Mark! / Sure he hasn't got much of a bark / And sure any he has it's all beside the mark.” This passage of James Joyce'sFinnegans Wake is part of a scurrilous 13-line poem directed against King Mark,the cuckolded husband in the Tristan legend.The poem and the accompanying prose are packed with names of birds and words suggestive of birds,and the poem is a squawk,like the cawing of a crow, against King Mark.Thus, Joyce uses the wordquark, which comes from the standard English verbquark, meaning "to caw, croak,” and also from the dialectal verb quawk, meaning"to caw, screech like a bird.” But Joyce'squark was not what it has become: "any of a group of hypothetical subatomic particles proposed as the fundamental units of matter.”Murray Gell-Mann, the physicist who proposed these particles, in a private letter of June 27, 1978, to the editor of theOxford English Dictionary, said that he had actually been influenced by Joyce's word in naming the particle,although the influence was subconscious at first.Gell-Mann was thinking of using the pronunciation (kwôrk) for the particle,possibly something he had picked up fromFinnegans Wake, which he "had perused from time to time since it appeared in 1939. . . . The allusion to three quarks seemed perfect" (originally there were only three subatomic quarks).Gell-Mann, however, wanted to pronounce the word with (ô) not (ä), as Joyce seemed to indicate by rhyming words in the vicinity such asMark. Gell-Mann got around that "by supposing that one ingredient of the line ‘Three quarks for Muster Mark’was a cry of ‘Three quarts for Mister . . . ’ heard in H.C. Earwicker's pub.”冲马克王呱叫三声! / 很显然一声狗吠对他还不够 / 很显然他所有的一切都和盛名无关。 这一段出自詹姆斯·乔伊斯的为芬尼根守灵 ， 是对马克王进行侮辱谩骂的一首十三行诗中的一部分。马克王是特里斯特拉姆传奇故事中被戴了绿帽子的丈夫。这首诗和随同的叙述中充斥着鸟类的名字和暗示鸟类的词。这首诗是对马克王的粗声抗诉，就象乌鸦的啼叫。所以乔伊斯用了quark 一词， 它来源于标准英语动词quark （意思为“呱呱地叫，乌鸦叫”）和方言中的动词 quawk （意思为“象鸟一样呱呱地叫、尖叫”）。 乔伊斯笔下的quark 一词并不是现在形成的意思： “任何一组假想的亚原子粒子，被认为是物质的基本单位”。这些粒子的提出者——物理学家默里·基尔曼在1978年6月27日写给牛津英语词典 编者的一封私人信件中说, 他给这种粒子命名时确实受到了乔伊斯这个词的影响，虽然这种影响起初只是潜意识的。基尔曼本想用(kwôrk)这个发音来代表这种粒子，可能也是从为芬尼根守灵 一书中汲取出来的。 自从1939年这书出版以来，他曾时常精读…关于三声呱叫的暗示看上去很完满（最初只有三种亚原子夸克）。但是基尔曼想让这个词发音为(o)而不是(a)——乔伊斯将韵押为与Mark 相近的音好象表明该发这个音。 基尔曼认为这行诗中的一部分“对马克王呱叫三声”，实际上是在酒店中听到的“给这位先生来三夸脱酒”叫喊声〔far〕To the most extreme or evident degree:最，显然：到达极为明显的程度：〔of〕Grammarians have sometimes condemned categorically the so-called double genitive construction,as ina friend of my father's; a book of mine. The construction is well supported by literary precedent,however, and serves a useful purpose.Thus there is no substitute for the double genitive in a sentence such asThat's the only friend of yours that I've ever met, since sentences such asThat's your only friend that I've ever met and That's your only friend, whom I've ever met are obviously impossible. 语法学家有时谴责这种范畴上的双重所有格形式，如我父亲的朋友；我的一本书 。 这种结构为许多文学先进所支持，认为它们是很有用的。在一个如那是我曾经遇到的你唯一的朋友 的句子中双重所有格是没有替代式的， 因为句子如那是我曾遇到的你唯一的朋友 和 那是唯一一个我曾遇到的你的朋友 显然是完全不一样的 〔knowledge〕"Obviously, a man's judgment cannot be better than the information on which he has based it" (Arthur Hays Sulzberger).“很显然，一个人的判断不可能超越作为这种判断基础的信息” （阿瑟·海斯·舒尔茨伯格）。 |
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