| 词汇 | maine |
| 词源 | Maine. Maximillian Schele De Vere in Americanisms (1871) says that the name Maine may have been chosen for the Pine Tree State “in compliment to the Queen of England, who had inherited a province of the same name in France.” According to George R. Stewart in Names on the Land (1945): In a New England charter of 1620 the lawyers wrote “the country of the Maine Land,” words which suggest a general description rather than a name. Two years later, however, a charter was granted to two old sea-dogs of the Royal Navy, Sir Ferdinando Georges and Captain John Mason, and in it the word had certainly ceased to be a description. Dated on August 10, 1622, the charter declared that “all that part of the mainland” the grantees “intend to name the Province of Maine.” Some have thought that this name arose because of the greater number of islands off that northern coast, which made men have more reason to speak of “the main.” Others have tried to connect it with the Province, or County, of Maine in France. But again, main as equaling chief or important would have been of good omen, if a little boastful. Moreover, about 1611 Captain Mason had served in the Orkneys, and must have known the name as used there. |
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