| 单词 | 本来 |
| 释义 | 〔ravel〕To say that we will ravel the history ofravel is an ambiguous statement, given that history. Ravel comes from the obsolete Dutch verbravelen, "to tangle, fray out, unweave,” which comes in turn from the nounravel, "a loose thread.” We can see the ambiguity ofravel already in the notion of a loose thread, because threads can be loose when they are tangled or when they are untangling.The Dutch verb has both notions present in it,denoting both tangling and unweaving.In one of its earliest recorded uses in English (before 1585)the verb means "to become entangled or confused,”and in 1598 we find a use in the sense "to entangle.”But in 1611 the word is used with reference to a fabricin the sense "to fray out,”and in 1607 in the sense "to unwind, unweave, or unravel.”In 1582 we already have an author using the word in a figurative way to mean "to take to pieces or disentangle,”while in a work written before 1656 we have a figurative instance of the sense "to entangle or confuse.”Clearly there was a need for the wordunravel, which is first found in 1603, but strangely enoughit did not solve the problem,ravel retaining up to this day both "entangling" and "disentangling" senses. 说我们要解开ravel 这个词的历史， 只要“历史”的意思不变，这种说法本来就是含糊的。 Ravel 这个词来源于意为“纠缠，磨损掉，解开”的废荷兰语动词ravelen， 而这个词又是从意为“一束松线”的名词ravel 衍生而来的。 在这个意思中，我们已经能看到ravel 的双重意思， 因为一团线缠起来或被解开后都有可能松散。荷兰语的这个词两个意思都有，既指缠起来又指松开。 (1585年前）这个词在英语中第一次使用时，它是“变得纠缠在一起、和含混不清”的意思，1598年我们又发现了“使缠在一起”的意思。但1611年当这个词用于指纺织品时，它却是“使散开”的意思，1607年它的意思是“倒转，松开，打开。”1582年有一位作家已经使用这个词的比喻义“散成一片片或分开”，而在一部写于1656年前的著作中，又有“缠紧，弄混”的比喻意义。毫无疑问，出现于1603年的unravel 这个词有必要的存在， 但非常奇怪的是,这并没有解决ravel 这个词直到现在还有“缠紧”和“分开”这两个意思 〔mill〕Tomill, in Western U.S. English, means "to halt a cattle stampede by turning the lead animals.”In theOxford English Dictionary we find this 19th-century example of the verb: "At last the cattle ran with less energy, and it was presently easy to ‘mill’ them into a circle and to turn them where it seemed most desirable" (Munsey's Magazine).This usage ofmill comes from the resemblance of the cattle's circular motion to the action of millstones. A related intransitive sense of the verb is better known in Standard English: A crowd milled around in the street. Originally this sense ofmill also meant "circular motion"; now it means "to move around in churning confusion"with no pattern in particular.Mill 这个词在美国西部所说的英语中， 意为“通过让领头牲畜绕圈子跑来制止牛群的惊跑”。在牛津英语词典 中， 我们可以找到该动词19世纪用法的例子： “最后牛群终于跑得快没劲儿了，这时候可以容易地驱赶头牛，把其它牛绕进圈子里，然后把它们赶到最合适的地方去” （芒西杂志）。Mill 的这种用法来自牛群绕圈跑与磨石运作的相似之处。 该词作不及物动词时所具有的与此相关的意义在标准英语中更为常见： 一群人在大街上兜圈子。 Mill 的这一含义本来亦指“旋转运动”； 现在它指“在旋涡般的混乱中到处移动”，不再有其它特指〔laconic〕As the study of the classics has disappeared from the curriculum,so has the ready understanding that terms such aslaconic once possessed. Laconic, which comes to us via Latin from Greek Lakōnikos, is first recorded in 1583with the sense "of or relating to Laconia or its inhabitants.”Lakōnikos is derived from Lakōn, "a Laconian, a person from Lakedaimon,”the name for the region of Greeceof which Sparta was the capital.The Spartans, noted for being warlike and disciplined, were also known for the brevity of their speech,and it is this quality that English writers still denote by the use of the adjectivelaconic, which is first found in this sense in 1589. 当古典研究从学校的课程中消失的时候，人们对于诸如laconic 之类的曾经黯熟的词汇的本来理解也同时失去。 Laconic 这个词是从希腊文 Lakonikos 经拉丁文流传下来的， 它第一次出现于1583年，意思是“拉哥尼亚的或拉哥尼亚居民的”。Lakonikos 源于 Lakon ， 意为“一个拉哥尼亚人，来自拉栖第梦的人”，它是希腊的一个地区名，斯巴达是其首府。以好战和纪律严明闻名的斯巴达人也同样因为言简意赅而闻名，laconic 这个词从1589年起被发现有言简意赅的意思起直到今天仍然被英国作家用来表示这一意思 〔rattle〕A large proportion (86 percent) of the Usage Panel approved the use of the verbrattle in the sense "to unnerve" in the first edition ofThe American Heritage Dictionary, published in 1969. But we may ask how the verbrattle came to have such a sense. The earliest use of the word is found in a name,Johannes Ratellebagg, recorded in a document of around 1273; the earliest use of the word as a common noun (in the sense "to flap, used of a banner") is found in a work written about 1300and copied in manuscript around 1330.It is thought that the word probably comes from Middle Dutchratelen, which may be imitative in origin. In any case,the wordratelen was used mainly in intransitive senses such as "to make a rattling sound.”Already in Middle English, however, the transitive sense "to babble something" existed,and other transitive senses,as in "to make something rattle,” "to stir up, rouse,” "to drive in a rapid, rattling manner,” came into existence from the 16th century on.The transitive sense "to unnerve,”that is, "to make somebody rattle,” is first found in an American work of 1869.词语用法专题小组中有相当一部分人（百分之八十六）都同意rattle 这个词有“使人不安”的意思， 1969年出版的美国经典辞书 第一版收录了这一意思。 但人们不禁要问动词rattle 为何有了这个意思。 该词最早的使用发现于1273年前后记载的一个文件中的Johannes Ratellebagg 这个名字中； 1300年这个词第一次被用作普通名词（意为“飘扬，用于旗帜”），1330年又见于手抄的印本中。人们认为这个词可能来自原来可能是拟声词的中古德语ratelen 。 不过无论怎样，ratelen 这个词本来只是作为不及物动词来使用， 如发出嘎嘎声等意思。在中古英语中，“含糊不清地说出”这一及物动词的意思就已存在，该词其它的及物意思，如“使发出嘎嘎声”、“激起，唤醒”“嘎嘎响地急速向前拖”从16世纪开始就形成了。及物意思“使不安，”即“使某人惊慌”首先出现于1869年的美国作品中〔propolis〕from Greek [suburb, bee glue (from the fact that it was originally the name of a structure around the opening into the hive)] 源自 希腊语 [郊区，蜂胶（由于它本来是蜂窝入口的周转结构的名称而得此名）] 〔acrostic〕An acrostic gives the reader two for one,and the etymology of the word emphasizes one of these two.Our word goes back to the Greek wordakrostikhis, "acrostic,” which is a combination of Greekakron, "head,” and stikhos, "row, line of verse.” Literallyakrostikhis means "the line at the head,” emphasizing the fact that an acrostic has in addition to horizontal rows a vertical row formed of the letters at the "head" or start of each line.In ancient manuscripts, in which a line of verse did not necessarily correspond to a line of text,an acrostic would have looked particularly striking, with each of its lines standing by itself and beginning with a capital letter.Our word for this type of composition is first found in English in the 16th century.离合诗一词实际上有两种含义，在此这个词的语源只强调其中的一种。此词可追溯到希腊词akrostikhis “藏头诗”， 是希腊字akron “头，”和 stikhos “诗行”的合并。 akrostikhis 本来指“在开头的诗行”， 强调一首离合诗除了水平方向的行数外，还有由每一行的“头”或起首词组成的垂直方向的诗行。在古代的作品中，一诗行并不一定要和文章中的一行相对应。一首离合诗，当其每一行单列出来，且以一大写字母开头， 那就非常引人注目了。在英语中首次用藏头诗一词表示这种作品是在16世纪〔blatant〕 Certain contexts may admit either word depending on what is meant:a violation of international law might be eitherblatant or flagrant. But writers who refer tothe blatant torturing of animals or the flagrant liberal bias of the media have implied something other than what they presumably intended. In the first case, the writer is probably more troubled by the enormity of the mistreatment of animals than by the failure to conceal it,so thatflagrant would have been the better choice. In the second case, by contrast, the writer probably wants to draw attention to a moral failing in the media's unapologetic refusal to hide its bias,rather than to the iniquity of the bias itself,an implication that would have been conveyed more successfully byblatant. Blatant should not be used to mean simply "obvious,”as inthe blatant danger of such an approach. 某些语境下两个词都可以用，但意思不同：对国际法律的违反既可能是blatant（公然的） 也可能是 flagrant（无耻的）。 但是提到the blatant torturing of animals（肆无忌惮地虐待动物） 或者 the flagrant liberal bias of the media（媒体公然的、不严谨的偏见） 的作者已经暗示了他们本来意图以外的意思。 在第一种情况下，作者可能对大量虐待动物的行为所困扰而不是为隐藏这种行为的失败而困扰，因此flagrant 应该是更好的选择。 相反地，在第二种情况下，作者可能是要着重指出新闻媒介对其偏见一概否认的这种道德上弱点，而不是针对偏见本身的不公正性，这种含义若由blatant来表达的话会更加正确。 Blatant 不应仅仅表示“明显的”，就象在the blatant danger of such an approach（这种方法明显的危险性）中。 〔epiphysis〕The end of a long bone that is originally separated from the main bone by a layer of cartilage but that later becomes united to the main bone through ossification.骺：长骨末端本来由一软骨层与主骨隔开，但尔后由于骨化而与主骨相连〔need〕Note also that the use ofneed as an auxiliary is often accompanied by a presupposition that the activity in question has in fact been performed.The boys needn't have spoken frankly implies that they did in fact speak frankly, whereas the sentenceThe boys did not need to speak frankly does not; only the latter could be followed by a clauselikethey conveyed their meanings by indirection. 还需注意need 用作助动词时经常伴随一个先决条件， 质问的动作事实上已经完成了。那些男孩们本来不需要坦诚相告的 意味着他们事实上已经坦率地说了， 然而这个句子男孩们不需要坦诚地说话 就没有这个意思； 只有后者可以在其后跟这样一个句子，如他们间接地表达他们的意思 〔spa〕The wordspa, taken from the name of the famous mineral springs in Spa, Belgium, has become a common noun denoting any place with a medicinal or mineral spring.Less well known is its regional sense, "soda fountain,”probably an allusion to the carbonated or "mineral" waterthat is a staple ingredient of many soda fountain concoctions.单词spa 是由比利时著名的矿泉胜地斯帕而来的， 现已成为一普通名词用来指任何有药泉或矿泉的地方。这个词本来的意思“碳酸水”鲜为人知，可能暗指充满二氧化碳的水或“矿物”水，它是碳酸饮料的主要成份〔loblolly〕Loblolly is a combination of lob, probably an onomatopoeia for the thick, heavy bubbling of cooking porridge, and lolly, an old British dialect word for "broth, soup, or any other food boiled in a pot.” Thus, loblolly originally denoted thick porridge or gruel, especially that eaten by sailors on board ship. In the southern United States, the word is used to mean "a mudhole; a mire,” a sense derived from an allusion to the consistency of porridge. The name loblolly has become associated with several varieties of trees as well, all of which favor wet bottomlands or swamps in the Gulf and South Atlantic states. Lobolly 是 lob ，可能是模仿熬粥时沉重的冒泡声，和意为“锅里煮着的清汤、浓汤或其他任何食物”的古英语方言 lolly 的结合。这样， loblolly 本来表示稠粥或稀粥，尤指船上水手们所喝的粥。在美国南部，这个词用于表示“泥坑；泥沼”，这个含义是以粥的浓稠性这一暗示而来。 loblolly 这一名称也与几种树木有关，这些树都适于生长在墨西哥湾及南大西洋各州的潮湿洼地或沼泽里 |
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