porcupine: [14] The porcupine is etymologically a ‘spiny pig’. Its name was coined in Vulgar Latin as *porcospīnus from Latin porcus ‘pig’ (source of English pork) and spīnus ‘spine’. It came to English via Old French porc espin. It underwent all sorts of traumas (portpen, porpoynt, porpentine – the form used by Shakespeare: the ghost of Hamlet’s father speaks of the ‘quills upon the fretful porpentine’ – porkenpick, porpin, etc) before finally settling down in the 17th century to porcupine, and around 1700 the fanciful variant porcupig was coined. => pork, spine
porcupine (n.)
c. 1400, porke despyne, from Old French porc-espin (early 13c., Modern French porc-épic), literally "spiny pig," from Latin porcus "hog" + spina "thorn, spine" (see spine). The word had many forms in Middle English and early Modern English, including portepyn, porkpen, porkenpick, porpoynt, and Shakespeare's porpentine (in "Hamlet").
双语例句
1. A porcupine is covered with prickles.
箭猪身上长满了刺.
来自《简明英汉词典》
2. A little porcupine made a house by the side of the river.
小刺猬在小河边上造了一幢小房子.
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3. One of the sharp hollow spines of a porcupine or hedgehog.
豪猪或刺猬身上硬而中空的保护刺.
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4. There is a philosophy parable, call philosophy of porcupine.
有一个哲学寓言, 叫豪猪的哲学.
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5. It is the Kookaburra ( Porcupine ) and Skunk Kingdoms that greet you today.