| 释义 |
▪ I. history, n.|ˈhɪstərɪ|
Also 4 histoire, 5 hystorye, 5–6 historye, 6–7 historie.
[ad. L. historia narrative of past events, account, tale, story, a. Gr. ἱστορία a learning or knowing by inquiry, an account of one's inquiries, narrative, history, f. ἵστωρ, ἵστορ- knowing, learned, wise man, judge :—*ϝίδτωρ, f. ϝιδ-, ἰδ- to know. (The form histoire was from F.) Cf. story, an aphetic form of history.]
†1. A relation of incidents (in early use, either true or imaginary; later only of those professedly true); a narrative, tale, story. Obs. (exc. as applied to a story or tale so long and full of detail, as to resemble a history in sense 2.)
1390Gower Conf. III. 48, I finde in a boke compiled To this matere an olde histoire, The which comth now to my memoire. 1484Caxton Fables of æsop vi. xiii, The carpenter told thystory to his felawes. 1551T. Wilson Logike (1580) 77 Wee read a notable historie of a yong childe in Rome, called Papirius. 1563W. Fulke Meteors (1640) 25 b, Which may be verified by an History that Plutarchus in the life of..Flaminius reporteth. 1632Lithgow Trav. vi. 248 Heere Dives the rich Glutton dwelt..this I suspend..for all hold it to bee a Parable, and not a History. 1700T. Brown tr. Fresny's Amusem. Ser. & Com. 119 A Mounte⁓bank on the Stage..gave them a History of his Cures. 1834Medwin Angler in Wales II. 183 Byron had some excellent pairs of pistols, about most of which there were histories.
2. spec. A written narrative constituting a continuous methodical record, in order of time, of important or public events, esp. those connected with a particular country, people, individual, etc.
Chronicles, annals, are simpler or more rudimentary forms of history, in which the events of each year, or other limited period, are recorded before passing on to those of the next year or period, the year or period being the primary division; whereas in a history, strictly so called, each movement, action, or chain of events is dealt with as a whole, and pursued to its natural termination, or to a convenient halting-point, without regard to these divisions of time.
drum-and-trumpet history, a contemptuous term for a history that gives undue prominence to battles and wars.
1485Caxton Paris & V. (1868) 206 The brave deeds which our ancestors accomplished. I have undertaken to draw the history for you. 1557More's Wks. (title) The history of King Richard the thirde. 1563Winȝet Wks. (1890) II. 49 Quhow worschipful wes he..the historiis declaris, quhilkis schawis that the mother of Alexander the Empriour callit him in hir cumpanie. 1577Holinshed (title) The Historie of Scotland; conteining the Beginning, Increase, Proceedings, Continuance, Acts, and Gouerment of the Scottish Nation, from the original thereof to the yeere 1571. 1685Baxter Paraphr. N.T., Matt. i. 1, I begin this History of Christ, with the Genealogy or Catalogue of his Ancestors. 1688Shadwell Sqr. Alsatia ii. Wks. 1720 IV. 44 How can there be a true History, when we see no Man living is able to write truly the History of the last Week? 1753W. Smith Thucyd. i. (R.), Thucydides, an Athenian, hath compiled the history of the war between the Peloponnesians and the Athenians. 1803Med. Jrnl. X. 517 Some important dates and circumstances towards the history of the Influenza. 1822Miss R. Mangnall Hist. & Misc. Quest. Pref. 5 Opportunities of perusing the best English, Grecian, and Roman histories. 1823Mrs. Markham [Eliz. Penrose] Hist. Eng. Advt. 3 In putting a History of England into the hands of their children. 1857Buckle Civiliz. I. xiii. 711 Mezeray..was also the first who saw that a history, to be of real value, must be a history, not only of kings, but of nations. a1872Maurice Friendship Bks. vi. (1874) 177 They profess to be Histories—that is, records of the actual growth and unfolding of a particular nation. 1874Stubbs (title) The Constitutional History of England in its Origin and Development. 1874Green Short Hist. Pref. 5 Whatever the worth of the present work may be, I have striven throughout that it should never sink into a ‘drum and trumpet history’. 1928Daily Tel. 14 Aug. 5/3 We have had enough of drum-and-trumpet history. 1967Listener 16 Mar. 349/2 This is only one more step away from the older type of ‘drum-and-trumpet’ history.
3. (Without a or pl.) That branch of knowledge which deals with past events, as recorded in writings or otherwise ascertained; the formal record of the past, esp. of human affairs or actions; the study of the formation and growth of communities and nations.
In this sense often divided, for practical convenience, into Ancient and Modern, or Ancient, Mediæval, and Modern History. These have no very definite chronological limits; but Ancient History is usually reckoned as ending with the fall of the Western Roman Empire in a.d. 476. Mediæval, when separated from Modern History, is usually brought down to the period of the Oceanic discoveries in the 15th c. ‘Ancient History’ is also humorously used in the sense of ‘matters which are out of date, or which no longer form part of practical politics’, and colloq. of comparatively recent events which are regarded as nevertheless far back in a person's experience.
The Muse of History, Clio, one of the Nine Muses, represented as the patroness of History; also often put for a personification of History.
1842Caxton Higden's Polychronicon Proem, Some sothly techyth to lye, but historye representynge the thynges lyke unto the wordes embraceth al utylyte and prouffite. 1611Shakes. Cymb. i. vi. 70 To think that man who knowes By History, Report, or his owne proofe What woman is..will's free houres languish: For assured bondage? 1625N. Carpenter Geog. Del. ii. vii. (1635) 126 Where History is vncertaine, reasonable coniecture must challenge precedency. 1651Hobbes Leviath. i. ix. 40 The Register of Knowledge of Fact is called History. 1735Bolingbroke Lett. Study Hist. ii. (1752) 14, I have read somewhere..that history is philosophy teaching by examples. 1798Jane Austen Northang. Abb. (1870) I. xiv. 85, I can read poetry and plays..But history, real solemn history, I cannot be interested in. 1816Keatinge Trav. (1817) I. 241 We hardly find in classical history any parallel. 1828Macaulay Ess., Hallam ⁋1 History, at least in its state of ideal perfection, is a compound of poetry and philosophy. 1837Carlyle Fr. Rev. I. vii. v, If fame were not an accident, and History a distillation of Rumour. 1838Macaulay Ess., Temple (1865) II. 8/2 There is a vile phrase of which bad historians are exceedingly fond, ‘the dignity of history’. 1855Bain Senses & Int. iii. i. §76 The successions of events and transactions in human life, remembered and related, make History. 1865M. Arnold Ess. Crit. ii. 75 The huge Mississippi of falsehood called history. 1876S. A. Brooke Eng. Lit. vii. 131 History..was raised into the rank of literature in the latter half of the eighteenth century by three men [Hume, Robertson, Gibbon]. 1886Freeman Meth. Hist. Study iii. 117, I should be most inclined..to say that history is the science of man in his character as a political being.
b.1595Auncient Histories [see ancient 3 b]. 1735Bolingbroke Lett. Study Hist. ii. (1752) 36 Modern history shews the causes, when experience presents the effects alone: and ancient history enables us to guess at the effects, when experience presents the causes alone. 1773Mrs. Chapone Improv. Mind x. (1827) 99, I only mean to warn you against mixing ancient history with modern. 1818Hallam Mid. Ages (1878) I. Pref. 4 The subversion of the western empire is manifestly the natural termination of ancient history. 1853C. M. Yonge Landmarks Hist. Mid. Ages i. i. (1868) 1 It is in effect impossible to draw any decided line between the periods of Ancient and Mediæval history. We have chosen to commence the latter from the Battle of Tours [a.d. 732]. 1884Freeman Meth. Hist. Study (1886) 20, I need not tell you..that I acknowledge no such distinction as that which is implied in the words ‘ancient’ and ‘modern’ history,..I have never been able to find out by my own wit when ‘ancient’ history ends and when ‘modern’ history begins. Ibid. 12 Each time that I was appointed Examiner, I had to learn my trade afresh; my experience from the former time had already become a matter of ancient history. 1875Contemp. Rev. XXVI. 870 The mutiny is now becoming an event of ancient history. 1908Busy Man's Mag. Nov. 37/1 ‘Ancient history, governor,’ said Woolford. ‘We knew all that before.’ 1910Belloc Pongo v. 73 He reminded Dolly of the days when Consols were at 92... All that was ancient history. 1939C. Day Lewis Child of Misfortune iii. vi. 350 Already the crisis through which they had passed was beginning to seem ancient history. 1946J. B. Priestley Bright Day x. 320 I'm going to risk telling you something... It's all ancient history, but..we might as well get it straight. 1961P. Spencer Full Term i. 15 You won't get anywhere by fretting about it... It's ancient history by now, anyway. People do odd things in drink.
c.1768Beattie Minstr. ii. xxxiii, The Muse of History unrolls her page. 1848Lowell Fable for Critics 916 Already for each I see History preparing the statue and niche. 1892Edith Thompson York & Lanc. 137 History can hardly be said to know aught of the fate of his two young nephews.
4. transf.
†a. A series of events (of which the story is or may be told). Obs.
1585T. Washington tr. Nicholay (title) Nauigations, Peregrinations, and Voyages made into Turkie..with diuers faire and memorable histories happened in our times. 1608Topsell Serpents (1658) 601 As may appear by this succeeding discourse, of a true history done in England, in the house of a worshipful Gentleman. 1687A. Lovell tr. Thevenot's Trav. i. 186 Many Figures in Bass Relief, representing several sacred Histories.
b. The whole train of events connected with a particular country, society, person, thing, etc., and forming the subject of his or its history (in sense 2); course of existence or life, career. Also in pregnant sense, An eventful career; a course of existence worthy of record. (See also life-history.)
[1608Shakes. Per. v. i. 119 If I should tell my history, it would seem Like lies disdain'd in the reporting.] 1654Whitlock Zootomia 200 For every one..to turn over a new leafe in his own History, and amend his own Erratas. 1715J. Richardson Theory Paint. 98 If there be any thing particular in the History of the Person which is proper to be Express'd. 1852Lynch Brief Medit. in Lett. to Scattered etc. 255 Every man has a moral history. 1860Geo. Eliot Mill on Fl. vi. iii, The happiest women, like the happiest nations, have no history. 1872Yeats Growth Comm. 93 Travelling by sea was a task for which their previous history had not prepared them. 1875Jowett Plato (ed. 2) IV. 272 Our idea of space, like our other ideas, has a history. 1895‘Péronne’ Veil of Liberty x. 209, I know what it is to love and to be parted. I, too, have a history.
c. (Without a or pl.) The aggregate of past events in general; the course of events or human affairs. to make history: to influence or guide the course of history; also, to do something spectacular or worthy of remembrance (see history-maker, -making, sense 9).
1654Whitlock Zootomia 306 Take a turn in the Temple of History, and there meet with instructive Lectures of Providence. 1845Mill Ess. II. 221 It was Lessing by whom the course of history was styled ‘the education of the human race’. 1862Chambers's Jrnl. 1 Mar. 139/1 People engaged in public transactions are sometimes said to be making history, because they occasionally perform actions to which history condescends to impart perpetuity. 1871Smiles Charac. i. 22 History..is but continuous humanity influenced by men of character. 1874Motley Barneveld I. vii. 311 The great tragi-comedy which we call human history. 1889Puck XXV. 133/2 If the hero who thinks he ‘makes history’ could only wake from his sleep after three hundred years and read the works of half-a-dozen..historians, he wouldn't know his own face on their pages. 1890Wilde in 19th Century July 137 Anybody can make history. Only a great man can write it. 1907Edin. Rev. Jan. 4 The average man is of the Centre; and history in the long run is made by the average man. 1915‘I. Hay’ First Hundred Thousand xx. 311 We shall have a chance of making history over this, old man. 1959N. Mailer Advts. for Myself (1961) 208, I had been ready to..publish..at my own expense, and try to make a kind of publishing history.
5. A systematic account (without reference to time) of a set of natural phenomena, as those connected with a country, some division of nature or group of natural objects, a species of animals or plants, etc. Now rare, exc. in natural history.[In this sense following the similar use of ἱστορία by Aristotle and other Greek writers, and of historia by Pliny.] 1567J. Maplet (title) A Greene Forest, or a natural Historie, wherein may bee seene the most sufferaigne Vertues in all the whole kinde of Stones and Mettals; of Brute Beastes, Fowles, Fishes [etc.]. 1600J. Pory tr. Leo (title) A Geographical Historie of Africa. 1608Topsell (title) The History of Serpents. 1615Crooke Body of Man 270 Aristotle in his Bookes of the History and Generation of creatures, doth [etc.]. 1676Ray Corr. (1848) 122 In the ‘History of the Fero Islands’ I find no more species of birds than what I have already inserted. 1774Goldsm. (title) History of the Earth and Animated Nature. 1790Beilby (title) General History of British Quadrupeds. 1797― (title) History of British Birds. 1834Medwin Angler in Wales I. 30 The may-fly..I am curious to know something of the history of this little creature.
6.
†a. A story represented dramatically, a drama. Obs.
b. spec. A drama representing historical events, a historical play.
1596Shakes. Tam. Shr. Induct. ii. 144 Your Honors Players..Are come to play a pleasant Comedie..It is a kinde of history. 1598― (title) The History of Henrie the Fovrth. 1600― A.Y.L. ii. vii. 164 Last Scene of all, That ends this strange euentfull historie. 1602― Ham. ii. ii. 416 The best Actors in the world, either for Tragedie, Comedie, Historie, Pastorall. 1623(title) Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies. 1864Kirk Chas. Bold I. ii. iii. 525 She was entertained with ‘Histories’—a kind of dramatic representation. 1877Dowden Primer Shaks. vi. §15. 97 Both parts of Henry IV consist of a comedy and a history fused together.
7. A pictorial representation of an event or series of incidents; in 18th c. a historical picture.
1514Barclay Cyt. & Uplondyshm. (Percy Soc.) p. lxx, All the walles within of fynest golde, With olde historyes & pictures manifolde. 1585T. Washington tr. Nicholay's Voy. ii. xvi. 50 b, A great colomne, in ye which are carved by histories the things memorable, whiche have been done in this Hippodrome. 1670–98R. Lassels Voy. Italy I. 76 In the Sacristy we were shown..the curious back of an altar of Ivory cut into Histories after a rare manner. 1715J. Richardson Theory Paint. 138 When a Painter intends to make a History. 1776Sir J. Reynolds Disc. vii. (1876) 422 A landscape of Claude Lorraine may be preferred to a history by Luca Giordano. 1958Listener 19 June 1024/3 It was a race that..converted the classical ‘history’ into a kind of privileged leg show. 1963Ibid. 28 Feb. 384/3 He [sc. Degas] remains..even when he is no longer a painter of ‘histories’, a profoundly reactionary figure.
¶8. Eccl. = L. historia, liturgically applied (a) to a series of lessons from Scripture, named from the first words of the Respond to the first lesson; (b) to the general order of a particular Office.
Misunderstood and erroneously explained in Rock Ch. of Fathers IV. xii. 124: see Proctor & Wordsworth Sarum Breviary, Index to Fasc. 1, 11.
9. attrib. and Comb., as history-master, history-mill, history-monger, history paper, history-play, history-professor, history-wise, history writer; † history faith, ‘historical’ faith (see historical 2); history-maker, (a) a writer of a history; (b) one who ‘makes history’, i.e. performs important actions which shape the course of history; so history-making a. and vbl. n.; history-painter, one who paints ‘histories’ (sense 7); so history-painting, history-piece.
1531Tindale Expos. & Notes (1849) 154 Let this therefore be an undoubted article of thy faith: not of a *history faith, as thou believest a gest of Alexander.
1895Ld. Wolseley Decl. & F. Napoleon i. 3 The sayings, doings, aspirations, even the villanies of this great *history-maker.
1898‘Mark Twain’ in Harper's Mag. Mar. 538/2 On Thanksgiving Day the sitting was a *history-making one. 1949Wyndham Lewis Let. Apr. 491 Excuse me for breaking in upon your as it were private, and partisan, history-making. 1963Auden Dyer's Hand 278 Man is a history-making creature.
1891W. J. Greenstreet tr. Guyau's Educ. & Heredity iii. 128 The *history-master might have taken us to the National Library.
1889‘Mark Twain’ Connecticut Yankee iv. 39 Sir Kay..began to fire up on his *history-mill, with me for fuel. 1963Times Lit. Suppl. 11 Jan. 29/1 Grist to some history-mill.
1845W. Cory Lett. & Jrnls. (1897) 37, I could get a sure living as a journeyman *history-monger.
1658W. Sanderson Graphice 18 Excellent *History Painters. 1711Shaftesbury Charac. (1737) III. 387 In a real history-painter, the same knowledg, the same study, and views, are requir'd, as in a real poet.
1686W. Aglionby Painting Illustr. Explan. Terms, *History-Painting is an Assembling of many Figures in one Piece, to Represent any Action of Life, whether True or Fabulous, accompanied with all its Ornaments of Land⁓skip and Perspective. 1713Berkeley Guardian No. 49 ⁋8 As I can not go to the price of history painting, I have purchased at easy rates several beautifully designed pieces of landskip and perspective.
1857J. A. Symonds Let. 8 Feb. (1967) I. 90, I was so amused yesterday with hearing the answers of some of the Sixth Form to our *History Paper.
1706Art of Painting (1744) 345 He painted several *history-pieces. 1773Johnson in Boswell 30 Apr., Robertson paints minds as Sir Joshua paints faces in a history-piece.
1957N. Frye Anat. Criticism iv. 283 The Elizabethan secular auto eventually became the *history-play.
1701Wallis in Collect. (O.H.S.) I. 329 An *history-professor.
1571Golding Calvin on Ps. ix. 4 He sheweth in *historywise, that his enemies were overthrowen.
1587― De Mornay viii. 97 Iustine the *Historywriter witnesseth, that the Kings..afore Ninus..were but particular Judges of Controuersies. 1770Armstrong Misc. II. 179 (Jod.) Superior in candour and impartiality to many at least of our modern history-writers.
▸ the rest is history: the events succeeding those related are so familiar, well-known, or predictable as to need no repetition; no more need be said.
Occas. with qualifying word specifying the sphere of activity to which the events relate.
1877New Orleans Times 12 June 4/1 The [Tammany] ring was broken at last! The rest is history. Harry Genet died miserably. Woodward was caught. Connelly is a homeless wanderer. 1901Science 6 Dec. 875/1 The engagement was quickly made. Rowland was sent to Europe to study laboratories and purchase apparatus, and the rest is history. 1939W. L. Phelps Autobiogr. with Lett. ci. 896 The next year she was ranked third among the women players of the United States, and the year following she was Champion. The rest is history. 1970Federal Suppl. (U.S.) 3111163/1 In his motion to that Court, Miller stated that the cases involved the same questions of law... The rest is history. 1994Fine Cooking Feb.–Mar. 31/3 When the strike ended, the reinstated Danish bakers learned the pastry secrets of the Viennese bakers, and the rest is gastronomic history. 2000J. Caughie Television Drama i. 51 The BBC poached Newman from ABC in 1963 to lead it into its Golden Age, and the rest is history.
▸ colloq. (orig. U.S.). A person or thing that is defunct, dead, gone, finished, or irrelevant. Freq. in you're (also I'm, we're, etc.) history: you (I, we, etc.) have no future.
Freq. used proleptically to suggest imminent or anticipated dismissal, departure, demise, etc.
1937M. Levin Old Bunch iv. iv. 946 During the entire two years, he hadn't been to the Fair, so he'd better take it all in tonight before it was history. 1978T. Sanchez Zoot-suit Murders 220 Five more strikes and this game is history. 1981United Press Internat. Newswire (Nexis) 6 Oct. If Fernando gets two strikes on you, you're history. 1983Playboy (Nexis) Nov. 172/3, I don't care if you're Superman or Superfly, you go on the streets and talk that trash and you're history! 1992D. Adams Mostly Harmless xviii. 217 Everything went swimmingly smoothly for me from then, on up to the very moment that I came up against the totty with the rock, then, bang, I'm history. I'm out of the loop. 1999D. Mitchell Ghostwritten 75 If we don't have the Mickey Kwan gains to offset the upsets in Bangkok and Tokyo, we're history.
▸ history sheet n. a file or sheet recording a person's history in particular context, such as a medical record, a record of benefits claimed, etc.; spec. (chiefly Indian English) a criminal record (cf. rap sheet n. at rap n.2 Compounds).
1887Daily Gleaner (Kingston, Jamaica) 6 Sept. 2/4 They have written up the *history sheets of 132 paupers. 1954J. C. Spencer Crime & Services x. 260 Only rarely..does the ex-Borstal boy complain that his past history follows him into his regiment. He starts with a clean history-sheet. 1967Mod. Asian Stud. 1 367 (note) Speech, appended to history sheet, ‘Disturbances File’. 2002Telegraph (Calcutta) 8 Sept. 8/6 There are records of periodic pulse rates, blood pressure and temperature, admission card, bed tickets, patient's history sheet, treatment card and diet card.
▸ history-sheeter n. Indian English colloq. a person with a criminal record.
1988S. Rushdie Satanic Verses v. 194 Here it is the human race that is the undertrial, and it is a defendant with a rotten record: a *history-sheeter, a bad egg. 2005Indian Express (Nexis) 20 June Policemen checked on the addresses of all wanted criminals and history-sheeters.
▪ II. † history, v. Obs.
[ad. F. historier (14th c. in Hatz.-Darm.), ad. med.L. historiāre (in both senses), f. historia history.]
1. trans. To relate in a history or narrative; to record, narrate, recount.
1475Bk. Noblesse (1860) 13 As in the .39. chapitre of the Actis of the said King Philip more plainly is historied. 1502Ord. Crysten Men Epil. (W. de W. 1526) 426 Newely hystoryed and translated out of Frensshe into Englysshe. 1597Shakes. 2 Hen. IV, iv. i. 203 And keepe no Tell-tale to his Memorie, That may repeat, and Historie his losse, To new remembrance.
2. To inscribe or adorn with ‘histories’ or historical scenes.
1585T. Washington tr. Nicholay's Voy. ii. xvi. 50 b, A great Colomne of Marble historied after the maner of those of Antonin and Adrian..at Rome. 1670–98R. Lassels Voy. Italy I. 127 These doors are all of brass historied into figures containing the remarkable histories of both the Testaments. Ibid. 148 Its three brazen doors are historied with a fine basso relievo. |