queen的词源
英文词源
- queen
- queen: [OE] Queen goes back ultimately to prehistoric Indo-European *gwen- ‘woman’, source also of Greek guné ‘woman’ (from which English gets gynaecology), Persian zan ‘woman’ (from which English gets zenana ‘harem’), Swedish kvinna ‘woman’, and the now obsolete English quean ‘woman’. In its very earliest use in Old English queen (or cwēn, as it then was) was used for a ‘wife’, but not just any wife: it denoted the wife of a man of particular distinction, and usually a king. It was not long before it became institutionalized as ‘king’s wife’, and hence ‘woman ruling in her own right’.
=> gynaecology, quean, zenana - queen (n.)
- Old English cwen "queen, female ruler of a state, woman, wife," from Proto-Germanic *kwoeniz (cognates: Old Saxon quan "wife," Old Norse kvaen, Gothic quens), ablaut variant of *kwenon (source of quean), from PIE *gwen- "woman, wife" supposedly originally "honored woman" (cognates: Greek gyné "a woman, a wife;" Gaelic bean "woman;" Sanskrit janis "a woman," gná "wife of a god, a goddess;" Avestan jainish "wife;" Armenian kin "woman;" Old Church Slavonic zena, Old Prussian genna "woman;" Gothic qino "a woman, wife; qéns "a queen").
The original sense seems to have been "wife," specialized by Old English to "wife of a king." In Old Norse, still mostly of a wife generally, as in kvan-fang "marriage, taking of a wife," kvanlauss "unmarried, widowed," kvan-riki "the domineering of a wife." English is one of the few Indo-European languages to have a word for "queen" that is not a feminine derivative of a word for "king." The others are Scandinavian: Old Norse drottning, Danish dronning, Swedish drottning "queen," in Old Norse also "mistress," but these also are held to be ultimately from male words, such as Old Norse drottinn "master."
Used of chess piece from mid-15c. (as a verb in chess, in reference to a pawn that has reached the last rank, from 1789), of playing card from 1570s. Of bees from c. 1600 (until late 17c., they generally were thought to be kings; as in "Henry V," I.ii); queen bee in a figurative sense is from 1807. Meaning "male homosexual" (especially a feminine and ostentatious one) first certainly recorded 1924; probably here an alteration of quean, which is earlier in this sense. Queen Anne first used 1878 for "style characteristic of the time of Queen Anne of Great Britain and Ireland," who reigned 1702-14. Cincinnati, Ohio, has been the Queen City (of the West) since 1835.
中文词源
英语单词queen常常被译为“王后”或“女王”。该单词来自古英语cwen，原本仅仅表示“妻子”，专指“国王的妻子”，因此衍生出“王后”的含义。后来，由于在英国历史上，曾经有女性担任国家元首即“女王”一职，而英语中又没有与king（国王）对应的阴性词，因此女性国家元首也被称为queen，该词也就产生了“女王”的含义。在印欧语系中，只有英语和北欧语言等少数语言缺乏与“国王”对应的阴性词。
在需要严格区分时，英语通过以下词组来区分与queen相关的各种头衔：
queen regnant（女王）：执掌政权的女性君主。
queen consort（王后）：男性君主的妻子，consort表示“配偶”
queen regent（摄政太后）：未成年君主的母亲，临时执掌政权。
有意思的是，国王的妻子被称为queen consort，虽然不执掌权力，但享有与国王一样的待遇和级别，而女王的丈夫却很少被称为king consort，而是被称为prince consort，对应中文是“亲王”，所享受的待遇和级别都比女王低。
queen：[kwiːn] n.王后，女王，皇后，蜂后vt.使……成为女王或王后vi.做女王
该词的英语词源请访问找单词词源英文版：queen 词源，queen 含义。
来自古英语cwen,女人，妻子，王后，女王，来自PIE*gwen,女人，通常指比较高贵出身的 女人，词源同gynecology,gynarch.
词源角度讲，queen只是王（king）的女人。比较一个类似单词吧：quean [kwiːn] n. 妓女；轻佻女人。根据格林定律，这个queen与希腊词根gyn-同源，gyn-表女人，如polygyny [pə'lɪdʒɪnɪ] n.一夫多妻。
