英文词源
- abash
- abash: [14] Abash shares a common ancestry with abeyance [16], although the latter underwent an about-turn in meaning in the 17th century which disguises their relationship. They go back to a Latin verb batāre, meaning ‘yawn’ or ‘gape’. This was borrowed into French as baer, later bayer (it was the source of English bay ‘recessed space’).
The addition of the prefix es- (from Latin ex-) produced esbaer, later e(s)bahir ‘gape with astonishment’, whence, via the present stem e(s)bass-, came English abash, which originally meant ‘stand amazed’ as well as ‘embarrass, discomfit’. (Bashful is a 16thcentury derivative, with elision of the a-, which was first used by the dramatist Nicholas Udall.) Addition of the prefix a- to Old French baer, meanwhile, had given abaer ‘aspire after’, and its noun abeance ‘aspiration, desire’.
In legal terminology, this word was used in French for the condition of a person in expectation or hope of receiving property, but in English the focus quickly became reversed to the property, and its condition of being temporarily without an owner.
=> abeyance, bashful - abash (v.)
- "perplex, embarrass," early 15c., earlier "lose one's composure, be upset" (late 14c.), from Old French esbaiss-, present stem of esbaer "gape with astonishment," from es "out" (see ex-) + ba(y)er "to be open, gape," from Latin *batare "to yawn, gape," from root *bat, possibly imitative of yawning. Related: Abashed; abashing. Bashful is a 16c. derivative.
中文词源
发音释义：[ə'bæʃ] vt. 使困窘；使羞愧；使局促不安
词根分析：abash = a（往外）+bash（张开嘴）→张嘴惊愕→困窘、羞愧。
词源解释：abash←古法语esbaer（张嘴惊愕），es = ex（往外），baer←拉丁语batare（张嘴，打呵欠）。
背景知识：abash表示某人谎言被戳穿、受到突如其来的指责或羞辱等场景下吃惊地张开嘴，形象地刻画出人在羞愧、困窘、局促不安时的面部表情。
同源词：bashful（羞愧的，困窘的）。
该词的英语词源请访问趣词词源英文版：abash 词源，abash 含义。
