scavenger的词源

英文词源

scavenger

scavenger: [15] A scavenger was originally a scavager – the extra n is the same as that intruded into messenger, passenger, etc. This was acquired from Anglo-Norman scawager, and it started life as a term for an official whose job was to collect taxes levied on foreign merchants. Etymologically it denoted ‘inspector’, for it was derived from the verb escauwer ‘inspect’, which was borrowed from Flemish scauwen ‘look at’, a relative of English show.

By the 16th century the scavenger had begun to come down in the world, first to a ‘street-cleaner’ and finally to ‘one who gathers or lives on what others have thrown away’. The verb scavenge was derived from it in the 17th century.
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scavenger (n.)

1540s, originally "person hired to remove refuse from streets," from Middle English scawageour (late 14c.), London official in charge of collecting tax on goods sold by foreign merchants, from Anglo-French scawager, from scawage "toll or duty on goods offered for sale in one's precinct" (c. 1400), from Old North French escauwage "inspection," from a Germanic source (compare Old High German scouwon, Old English sceawian "to look at, inspect;" see show (v.)).

It has come to be regarded as an agent noun in -er, but the verb is a late back-formation from the noun. With intrusive -n- (c. 1500) as in harbinger, passenger, messenger. Extended to animals 1590s. Scavenger hunt is attested from 1937.

中文词源

scavenger（食腐动物）：古代对外地商人征收关税的人

英语单词scavenger来自诺曼时代的英国法语scawager，本意是“在大街上对外地商人征收关税的人”。在封建时期，商人到外地经商需要向当地领主缴纳税金，称为scawage，而负责征收scawage的人就是scawager。英语单词scavenger就来源于此。后来，这些人又增加了负责街道清洁的职责，因此scavenger又产生了“清道夫、拾荒者”的含义，后来又产生了“食腐动物”的含义。

scavenger： ['skævɪn(d)ʒə] n.食腐动物，清道夫，拾荒者

该词的英语词源请访问找单词词源英文版：scavenger 词源，scavenger 含义。

scavenger：拾荒者，捡破烂者

来自中古英语 scawageour,伦敦的税务官员，特指对外来商品收取税费的官员，来自盎格鲁 法语 scawage,税收，税费，来自 Proto-Germanic*skau,注视，注意，检查，来自 PIE*skeue, 注视，注意，词源同 show,古义看，检查。因收取税费的同时兼顾打扫街道卫生，引申词义 拾荒者，捡破烂者，后原词义逐渐消失，其引申词义成为主要词义。-enger,人，词源同 messenger,passenger.