timber: [OE] Timber originally denoted a ‘building’ – the Lindisfarne Gospels of around 950 translated Mark 13:1 (‘See what manner of stones and what buildings are here’) as ‘See what stones and what timber’. It comes from a prehistoric Germanic *timram, whose German descendant zimmer ‘room’ has remained closer to its semantic roots (but German zimmermann means ‘carpenter’).
And this in turn went back to Indo-European *demrom, a derivative of the base *dem-, *dom- ‘build’, from which English also gets dome, domestic, etc. The sense ‘building’ gradually developed into ‘building material’, then ‘wood used for building’, and finally ‘wood’ in general. => dome, domestic
timber (n.)
Old English timber "building, structure," in late Old English "building material, trees suitable for building," and "trees or woods in general," from Proto-Germanic *timran (cognates: Old Saxon timbar "a building, room," Old Frisian timber "wood, building," Old High German zimbar "timber, wooden dwelling, room," Old Norse timbr "timber," German Zimmer "room"), from PIE *deme- "to build," possibly from root *dem- "house, household" (source of Greek domos, Latin domus; see domestic (adj.)).
The related Old English verb timbran, timbrian was the chief word for "to build" (compare Dutch timmeren, German zimmern). As a call of warning when a cut tree is about to fall, it is attested from 1912 in Canadian English. Timbers in the nautical slang sense (see shiver (v.2)) is from the specialized meaning "pieces of wood composing the frames of a ship's hull" (1748).
The timber-wolf (1846) of the U.S. West is the gray wolf, not confined to forests but so-called to distinguish it from the prairie-wolf (coyote).
雙語例句
1. These Severn Valley woods have been exploited for timber since Saxon times.
從撒克遜時代起就開始采伐塞文山谷的這些樹林獲取木料。
來自柯林斯例句
2. A natural timber deck leads into the main room of the home.
有一個天然的木制平臺通到房子的客廳。
來自柯林斯例句
3. Half of the north-west's timber land is public property.
西北部的一半林地是公共財產。
來自柯林斯例句
4. It wants timber to come, where possible, from sustainably managed sources.
其要求木材盡可能來自可持續發展林。
來自柯林斯例句
5. They have been bartering wheat for cotton and timber.