英语词汇boy的起源、历史背景-英语词源词典

boy. The O.E.D. traces boy, which came into the language in the late Middle English period, to the Old French abuie, “fet- tered or chained,” which suggests that the word originally meant a slave. Other sources, however, suggest the Frisian boi, “young gentleman,” the German man’s proper name Boia, and the Old Norse, bofi, “rascal,” among other choices. Nobody re- ally knows. Male American Indians, black slaves, and white in- dentured servants who were little more than slaves, were all called boy in America before the Civil War, and black men were commonly called the same for more than a century after. The term is insulting, however, not because boy here means a male child. This boy is a word dating back to the 13th century that originally meant a low menial servant, deriving from the Latin boiae, “fetters.”

词汇	boy
词源	boy. The O.E.D. traces boy, which came into the language in the late Middle English period, to the Old French abuie, “fet- tered or chained,” which suggests that the word originally meant a slave. Other sources, however, suggest the Frisian boi, “young gentleman,” the German man’s proper name Boia, and the Old Norse, bofi, “rascal,” among other choices. Nobody re- ally knows. Male American Indians, black slaves, and white in- dentured servants who were little more than slaves, were all called boy in America before the Civil War, and black men were commonly called the same for more than a century after. The term is insulting, however, not because boy here means a male child. This boy is a word dating back to the 13th century that originally meant a low menial servant, deriving from the Latin boiae, “fetters.”
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