grease

英文詞源

grease

grease: [13] Latin crassus meant ‘solid, thick, fat’, and hence ‘gross, stupid’ (English borrowed it in this latter metaphorical sense as crass [16], and it is also the source of French gras ‘fat’). On it was based the Vulgar Latin derived noun *crassia ‘(melted) animal fat’, which passed into English via Old French craisse, later graisse, and Anglo-Norman gresse or grece. Old French craisse was the source of craisset ‘oil lamp’, from which English got cresset [14].
=> crass, cresset

grease (n.)

"oily fat of land animals," c. 1300, from Anglo-French grece, Old French gresse, craisse "grease, fat" (Modern French graisse), from Vulgar Latin *crassia "(melted) animal fat, grease," from Latin crassus "thick, solid, fat" (source also of Spanish grasa, Italian grassa). Grease paint, used by actors, attested from 1880. Grease monkey "mechanic" is from 1920.

grease (v.)

mid-14c., "smear, lubricate, or anoint with grease or fat," from grease (n.). Sense of "ply with bribe or protection money" is 1520s, from notion of grease the wheels "make things run smoothly" (mid-15c.). To grease (someone's) palm is from 1580s. Expression greased lightning, representing something that goes very fast, is American English, by 1832.