英文词源
- mild
- mild: [OE] Mild goes back ultimately to Indo- European *meld-, *mold-, *mld-, which denoted ‘softness’ and also produced English melt and Latin mollis ‘soft’, source of English mollify and mollusc. From it was derived the Germanic adjective *milthjaz, whose modern descendant has shown remarkable formal stability: German, Dutch, Swedish, Danish, and English all share the word mild.
=> melt, mollify, mollusc, smelt - mild (adj.)
- Old English milde "gentle, merciful," from Proto-Germanic *milthjaz- (cognates: Old Norse mildr, Old Saxon mildi, Old Frisian milde, Middle Dutch milde, Dutch mild, Old High German milti, German milde "mild," Gothic mildiþa "kindness"), from PIE *meldh-, from root *mel- "soft," with derivatives referring to soft or softened materials (cognates: Greek malthon "weakling," myle "mill;" Latin molere "to grind;" Old Irish meldach "tender;" Sanskrit mrdh "to neglect," also "to be moist"). Originally of persons and powers; of the weather from c. 1400, of disease from 1744. Also in Old English as an adverb, "mercifully, graciously."
Mild goes further than gentle in expressing softness of nature; it is chiefly a word of nature or character, while gentle is chiefly a word of action. [Century Dictionary]
中文词源
mild：温和的，温柔的，轻微的
来自PIE*mel,软的，词源同mill,meld,melt.引申词义温和的，温柔的，轻微的等。
该词的英语词源请访问趣词词源英文版：mild 词源，mild 含义。
