英语词汇sponge的起源、历史背景-英语词源词典

sponge. To sponge (from Greek spongos) means “to live like a parasite off someone,” to suck up someone else’s goods and goodness as a sponge sucks up water. Shakespeare used the word in this sense, and our term sponger was recorded as far back as 1677. As their Latin name Porifera (“porebearing”) im- plies, all live sponges are covered with minute openings through which water is drawn by the beating of flagellated cells called lashers, the water passing through a complex sys- tem of canals before it is expelled from several larger exit holes or vents. The sponge’s single purpose in life is to pass water through itself, the water yielding food, minerals, and oxygen to the animal and carrying away waste products. Everyone who is familiar with the natural commercial sponge has no- ticed the numerous canals opening into still larger tubes, which perforate the mass. In life these canals were lined with active cells formed within the skeleton, the whole resembling a gelatinous mass not unlike a piece of liver in consistency. See throw in the towel.

词汇	sponge
词源	sponge. To sponge (from Greek spongos) means “to live like a parasite off someone,” to suck up someone else’s goods and goodness as a sponge sucks up water. Shakespeare used the word in this sense, and our term sponger was recorded as far back as 1677. As their Latin name Porifera (“porebearing”) im- plies, all live sponges are covered with minute openings through which water is drawn by the beating of flagellated cells called lashers, the water passing through a complex sys- tem of canals before it is expelled from several larger exit holes or vents. The sponge’s single purpose in life is to pass water through itself, the water yielding food, minerals, and oxygen to the animal and carrying away waste products. Everyone who is familiar with the natural commercial sponge has no- ticed the numerous canals opening into still larger tubes, which perforate the mass. In life these canals were lined with active cells formed within the skeleton, the whole resembling a gelatinous mass not unlike a piece of liver in consistency. See throw in the towel.
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