英語四六級詞匯復習技巧：8天攻克8000詞匯(六)

　　CHEMISTRY: a search for gold

　　The early alchemists spent most lf their time trying to find a way to turn baser metals into gold; and atomic fission is showing Us that they weren’t as stupid as we thought . When the Arabs invaded Europe , they brought with them the idea for their type of research and also introduced the name of it , al-kimia , which eventually became alchemy . The word chemist was coined by shortening alchemist , and the term chemistry followed .

　　DEAN: he led ten

　　The dean of your university is a descendant of the Roman decanus who was a commander of a division of ten . Late on this became a church term and was the title of the ecclesiastic who was at the head of ten monks in a monastery . By the time the colleges borrowed the title decanus , it was spelled dean , and now he can be the head of as many as he wants . Decanus is derived from decem , the Latin word for ‘ten’ .

　　DISSECT: cut it apart

　　When a biologist dissects a frog he dis-, ‘a(chǎn)part,’ and seco , ‘cut,’ or ‘cuts’ it ‘a(chǎn)part .’ In geometry we bisect a circle ,or ‘cut’ it in ‘two .’ A road that intersects another ‘cuts’ ‘in between .’ And a section is something ‘cut off .’

　　ELECTRICITY: the beaming sun

　　The Greeks knew that when you rubbed amber, it would become magnetic and begin to draw feathers and strings and other light objects to it. Little more than this was known about electricity until comparatively recent times. The ancients used to make love amulets out of amber, and guaranteed that the wearing of one would attract a lover . Since friction can make amber give off sparks , the Greeks named it electron , from elektor, ‘the beaming sun.’ This word into Latin as electrum, was turned into the adjective electritcus, whence our electric and electricity.

　　ELIXIR: of magic powers

　　With us an elixir is usually a panacea or life-giving potion, as: ‘The book is full of a veritable elixir of spiritual vitality.’ In the earliest days, Eastern alchemists continually tried to turn base metals into gold.There was an imaginary substance that they thought would do the trick, and they called it al-iksir, literally ‘the dry power.’ This entered Medieval Latin as elixir,still a word of magic, for in medieval times the boys were looking for an elixir vitae or ‘elixir of life’ that would bring eternal youth . Ponce de Leon sought the elixir in Florida , and Faust searched for this imaginary cordial in his laboratory . Even today elixir retains a magic meaning .

　　ENTOMOLOGY: cut up

　　This is the branch of zoology that treats of insects. The word is based on the Greek entomos which means ‘cut up.’ If we examine an ant or a similar insect, we will see that their bodies are indented and appear to be ‘cut up’ in to sections. The word ‘insect’ from the Latin insectum, ‘cut up,’ is simply a Roman rendering of the Greek idea.

　　INOCULATE: a gardening term

　　When the doctor inoculates you, he ‘plants’ in your body a small seedling of the virus or germ that causes the disease in order to make your immune to attack. But at first the word inoculate was a purely horticultural term and meant to insert an eye or bud in a plant for propagation. It came form the Latin in, ‘into,’ and oculus, ‘eye.’ Its present use dates form the time of the first inoculate against smallpox.

　　LAW: something laid down

　　When we lay down the law to someone, we are almost saying the same thing twice over. In the early days of our language law was spelled lagu in the pural and lagu is so closelyrelated to the word ‘lay’ we can safely say the law was something ‘laid down.’ A statute, on the other hand ,is quite the opposite. The grandparent of this word is the Latin statutes which simply means something ‘set up.’ We ‘set up’ laws on the books.