- shirt
[shirt 词源字典] - shirt: [OE] A shirt, like a skirt, is etymologically a ‘short’ garment, one that stops at or just below the waist rather than reaching down to the knees or beyond. In common with Swedish skjorta and Danish skjorte, it comes from the prehistoric base *skurt-, source of English short. Shirty ‘angry’ [19] was inspired by the now defunct expression get one’s shirt out ‘lose one’s temper’ (the opposite keep one’s shirt on ‘remain calm’ survives).
=> share, shear, short, skirt[shirt etymology, shirt origin, 英语词源] - shit
- shit: [14] The verb shit is an alteration (due to the influence of the past participle shitten) of an earlier shite [OE]. This, like German scheissen, Dutch schijten, Swedish skita, and Danish skide, goes back to a prehistoric Germanic base *skīt-, which in turn was descended from Indo- European *skheid- ‘split, divide, separate’ (source of English schism and schist – the underlying notion being of ‘separation’ from the body, and hence ‘discharge’ from the body. The noun shit, a derivative of the verb, is first recorded in the 16th century.
=> schism, schist, schizophrenia - shiver
- shiver: Shiver ‘tremble’ [13] and shiver ‘sliver, fragment’ [12] are different words. The former was originally chiver, which may have been an alteration of an earlier chevel ‘shiver’. This in turn was derived from the Old English noun ceaft ‘jaw’ (source of English jowl), and so etymologically denoted the ‘chattering of the teeth’. Shiver ‘fragment’ may have been borrowed from Low German (Middle Low German had schever). It goes back ultimately to the prehistoric Germanic base *skif- ‘split’.
=> jowl - shoal
- shoal: English has two distinct words shoal. ‘Shallow area’ [16] is descended from the Old English adjective sceald ‘shallow’, which in turn came from prehistoric Germanic *skaldaz. (English shallow [15] is related, although it is not clear precisely how.) Shoal of fish [16] is simply a reborrowing of Middle Dutch schōle, which had earlier been taken over as school.
=> school - shock
- shock: English has two words shock in current general usage. Shock ‘heavy blow, unpleasant surprise’ [16] was borrowed from French choc, a derivative of the verb choquer ‘strike’, whose origins are unknown. Shock ‘thick shaggy mass of hair’ [19] is a nominalization of an earlier adjective shock ‘thick and shaggy’ [17], but it is not clear where this came from. It has been linked with the obsolete shough, which referred to a sort of dog, and another possibility is that it is connected with the now little used shock ‘stack of sheaves of corn’ [14]. This was probably borrowed from Middle Dutch or Middle Low German schok.
- shoe
- shoe: [OE] Shoe is a strictly Germanic word, with no living relatives in other branches of the Indo- European language family. It comes from a prehistoric Germanic *skōkhaz, which is probably descended ultimately from the Indo- European base *skeu- ‘cover’. Its cousins are German schuh, Dutch schoen, and Swedish and Danish sko. Until the early modern English period shoon vied with shoes as its plural; and the archaic past form of the verb, shod, still survives.
=> shod - shoot
- shoot: [OE] Like sheet, shout, shut, and perhaps skit [15], shoot goes back ultimately to the prehistoric Germanic base *skeut-, *skaut-, *skut- ‘project’. This formed the basis of a verb *skeutan, which evolved into German schiessen, Dutch schieten, Swedish skjuta, and Danish skyde as well as English shoot. The noun shot comes from the same source.
=> sheet, shot, shout, shut - shop
- shop: [13] The word shop had humble beginnings. It goes back to a prehistoric Germanic *skoppan, which denoted a small additional structure, such as a lean-to shed or a porch. There is one isolated example of an Old English descendant of this – sceoppa, which denoted a ‘treasury’ – but this does not appear to have survived. The modern English word was borrowed from Old French eschoppe ‘booth, stall’, which in turn had got it from Middle Low German schoppe.
German dialect schopf ‘shed, shelter’ comes from the same source. The verb shop originated in the 16th century, in the sense ‘imprison’ (reflecting a now obsolete slang use of the noun shop for ‘prison’). This is the ancestor of modern British slang shop ‘inform against’. The sense ‘visit shops to buy things’ emerged in the mid 18th century.
- shore
- shore: English has two words shore. The one meaning ‘land at the water’s edge’ [14] was borrowed from Middle Dutch or Middle Low German schōre, which probably came from the Germanic base *skur- ‘cut’ (source also of English score, shear, etc). Shore ‘support’ [14], as in ‘shore up’, comes from Middle Dutch schōren ‘prop’, a word of unknown origin.
=> share, shear, short - short
- short: [OE] Etymologically, something that is short has been ‘cut off’. The word’s immediate Germanic ancestor was *skurtaz, which was descended from an extension of the Indo- European base *sker- ‘cut’ (source also of English score, share, shear, etc). Another version of the base, without the s, was the source of Latin curtus ‘short’, which has produced English curt and curtail, and also supplied the word for ‘short’ in the other Germanic languages (German kurz and Dutch, Swedish, and Danish kort), as well of course as the Romance languages (French court, Italian and Spanish corto, and Romanian scurt).
The shirt and the skirt are etymologically ‘short’ garments.
=> curt, curtail, score, share, shear, shore, short, skirt - shot
- shot: [OE] Shot goes back to a prehistoric Germanic *skutaz, which was derived from the same base that produced English shoot. It used to mean ‘payment’ as well as ‘act of shooting’, a sense shared by its Old Norse relative skot, which provided English with the scot of scotfree [16] (etymologically ‘without having to pay’).
=> scot-free, shoot - should
- should: [OE] Should started life as the past tense of shall. It preserves the word’s original connotations of ‘obligation’ which have all but disappeared from shall.
=> shall - shoulder
- shoulder: [OE] Shoulder is a general West Germanic word, with relatives in German schulter and Dutch schouder (it was also borrowed into Swedish and Danish as skuldra and skulder respectively). It goes back to a prehistoric *skuldr-, but where this came from is not clear. One suggestion is that it is distantly related to English shield, and originally denoted ‘shoulder-blade’ (the underlying meaning being ‘flat piece’).
- shout
- shout: [14] The origins of shout are disputed. One school of thought traces it back to the prehistoric Germanic base *skeut-, *skaut-, *skut- ‘project’ (source of English sheet and shoot), as if its etymological meaning were ‘throw one’s voice out forcibly’, while another views it as a borrowing from Old Norse skúta ‘taunt’, which may be a distant relative of Greek kudázein ‘abuse’.
- shove
- shove: [OE] Shove was originally a perfectly respectable, neutral verb for ‘push forcefully, thrust’, but over the centuries it has come down in the world, acquiring connotations of rudeness. In common with German schieben and Dutch schuiven it goes back to a prehistoric Germanic *skeuban. This was formed from a base which also produced English scuffle [16], sheaf [OE], shuffle [16], and indeed shovel [OE] (etymologically an ‘implement for shoving’), and may be distantly related to Lithuanian skubus ‘quick’ and Old Church Slavonic skubati ‘pull’.
=> scuffle, sheaf, shovel, shuffle - show
- show: [OE] Show originally meant ‘look at’. Its modern senses – basically ‘cause to look at’ – did not begin to develop until the early Middle English period. It comes from a prehistoric West Germanic *skauwōjan, whose German descendant schauen still means ‘look at’ (and whose Flemish descendant scauwen gave English scavenger). This in turn was derived from the base *skau- ‘see, look’, source also of English sheen and German schön ‘beautiful’.
And the ultimate ancestor of *skau- was an Indo- European base which also produced Greek keein ‘observe’ and Latin cavēre ‘beware’ (source of English caution [13] and caveat [16]).
=> caution, caveat, scavenger, scone, sheen - shower
- shower: [OE] Shower comes from a prehistoric West Germanic *skūra, which also produced German schauer and Dutch schoer. Its ultimate ancestry is uncertain.
- shrapnel
- shrapnel: The term shrapnel commemorates the name of General Henry Shrapnel (1761–1842), a British artillery officer who in the course of the Peninsular War, at the beginning of the 19th century, invented an exploding shell that sent bullets flying in all directions
- shred
- shred: [OE] A shred is etymologically a ‘cut’ piece. The word comes ultimately from the prehistoric West Germanic base *skraud-, *skreud-, *skrud- ‘cut’, source also of English shroud. From it was formed the noun *skrautha, which has evolved into German schrot, Dutch schroot, and English shred, and has also, via a circuitous route, given English scroll.
=> scroll, shroud - shrewd
- shrewd: [14] Shrewd originally meant ‘wicked, dangerous’. Its modern sense ‘astute’ did not develop (via a less approbatory ‘cunning’) until the 16th century. It was derived from shrew ‘wicked man’ (a sense now obsolete). This is generally assumed to be the same noun as shrew the animal-name [OE], a word of uncertain origin. Shrews were formerly thought to have a poisonous bite, and were held in superstitious fear – hence the term’s metaphorical application. The move from ‘wicked man’ via ‘bad-tempered abusive complainer’ to ‘nagging woman’ began in the 14th century.
=> shrew
