woman的词源

英文词源

woman

woman: [OE] A woman is etymologically a ‘wife-man’ – that is to say, a ‘female person’. The word was compounded in the Old English period from wīf ‘woman’ (source of modern English wife) and man ‘person’ (source of modern English man). Already by the end of the Old English period the f of wifman was disappearing, giving wiman, and the influence of the w sound started to turn this into woman in the 13th century. Woman did not finally oust the two more ancient words for ‘female person’, wife and the now obsolete quean, until the end of the Middle English period.
=> man, wife

woman (n.)

"adult female human," late Old English wimman, wiman (plural wimmen), literally "woman-man," alteration of wifman (plural wifmen) "woman, female servant" (8c.), a compound of wif "woman" (see wife) + man "human being" (in Old English used in reference to both sexes; see man (n.)). Compare Dutch vrouwmens "wife," literally "woman-man."

It is notable that it was thought necessary to join wif, a neuter noun, representing a female person, to man, a masc. noun representing either a male or female person, to form a word denoting a female person exclusively. [Century Dictionary]

The formation is peculiar to English and Dutch. Replaced older Old English wif and quean as the word for "female human being." The pronunciation of the singular altered in Middle English by the rounding influence of -w-; the plural retains the original vowel. Meaning "wife," now largely restricted to U.S. dialectal use, is attested from mid-15c. Woman-hater "misogynist" is from c. 1600. Women's work is from 1660s. Women's liberation is attested from 1966; women's rights is from 1840, with an isolated example in 1630s.

中文词源

woman：女人

缩写自古英语wifman,女人，wif-,女人，词源同wife,man,人。

该词的英语词源请访问找单词词源英文版：woman 词源，woman 含义。

woman：妇女

妇女何以在英语中作woman，向来有各种各样的说法。1576年英国诗人、剧作家盖斯科因（George Gascoinge, 1525-1577）认为，woman一词系由woe-man演变而来，因为女人往往是男人苦恼（woe）之源。1619年英国一位游记和探险作品的编纂者珀切斯（Samuel Purchas, 1577-1626）说，woman即womb-man（有子宫的人），mother之古英语形式modor亦有子宫之意。

其实，woman源于古英语wīfmann，其中wīf意为wife或female，现代英语的wife即由此演化而来，而mann则意为human being，即是现代英语的man，换言之，man原本乃是中性词，可指“男人”，也可指“女人”。到了中古英语时期，wīfmann因其中f受m的同化而演变为wimman，复数形式作wimmen。这很可能是当今英语中woman的复数形式women读作/ˈwɪmɪn/的原因。

woman：女人

缩写自古英语 wifman,女人，来自 wife,女人，man,人。