graze: [OE] There is no difficulty about the etymology of graze ‘feed on grass’: it was formed in Old English times as a derivative of the noun gr?s (modern English grass). But what about graze in the sense ‘scrape lightly’, first recorded in the 17th century? In the absence of any convincing alternative candidates, it is usually taken to be simply a special use of graze ‘feed on grass’, in the sense ‘remove grass close to the ground’, as some animals do in grazing – like a ‘close shave’, in fact. => grass
graze (v.1)
"to feed on grass," Old English grasian, from gr?s "grass" (see grass). Compare Middle Dutch, Middle High German grasen, Dutch grazen, German grasen. Transitive sense from 1560s. Figurative use by 1570s. Related: Grazed; grazing.
graze (v.2)
"to touch lightly in passing," c. 1600, perhaps a transferred sense from graze (v.1) via a notion of cropping grass right down to the ground (compare German grasen "to feed on grass," used in military sense in reference to cannonballs that rebound off the ground). Related: Grazed; grazing. As a noun from 1690s, "an act of grazing."
雙語(yǔ)例句
1. Five cows graze serenely around a massive oak.
5頭奶牛在一棵大橡樹(shù)旁悠閑自在地啃著青草。
來(lái)自柯林斯例句
2. Nothing serious. Just a graze.
沒(méi)關(guān)系, 就破了一點(diǎn)皮.
來(lái)自《現(xiàn)代漢英綜合大詞典》
3. There is good grassland here for your cattle and horses to graze on.
這里有很好的草地供你們放牧牛馬.
來(lái)自《現(xiàn)代漢英綜合大詞典》
4. A bullet from one of the pistols had graze his hip.