for-的词源

英文词源

for-

prefix usually meaning "away, opposite, completely," from Old English for-, indicating loss or destruction, but in other cases completion, and used as well with intensive or pejorative force, from Proto-Germanic *fur "before, in" (cognates: Old Norse for-, Swedish för-, Dutch ver-, Old High German fir-, German ver-); from PIE *pr-, from root *per- (1) "forward, through" (see per).

In verbs the prefix denotes (a) intensive or completive action or process, or (b) action that miscarries, turns out for the worse, results in failure, or produces adverse or opposite results. In many verbs the prefix exhibits both meanings, and the verbs frequently have secondary and figurative meanings or are synonymous with the simplex. [Middle English Dictionary]

Probably originally in Germanic with a sense of "forward, forth," but it spun out complex sense developments in the historical languages. Disused in Modern English. Ultimately from the same root as fore (adv.). From its use in participles it came to be an intensive prefix of adjectives in Middle English (for example Chaucer's forblak "exceedingly black"), but all these now seem to be obsolete.

中文词源

for-：离开，相反，完全。

来自PIE *per, 向前，穿过，词源同单词for.

1.向前，离开。见forsake(放弃），forswear(发誓放弃）。

2.离开，相反。见forget(抓不住，忘记）,forswear(发伪誓）。

3.完全相反，最后相反义消失，仅表示强调，完全。见forbear(容忍），forgive(完全许可，原谅）。

备注：由于前缀for- 在词义发展过程中的巨大分歧性与模棱两可性，致使由for-所引出的单词甚至在词源上都存在争议或者不确定，上述给出的例词也并非绝对正确。同时，词根for, 外面，见单词door, foreign, foreclose(关在外面，阻止），其词义也进一步与该前缀相混淆，使理解更加困难或充满争议。

该词的英语词源请访问趣词词源英文版：for- 词源，for- 含义。