| 释义 |
intervale Now Amer.|ˈɪntəveɪl|
Forms: 4 entervale, 7 intervale, -vail; (sense 3) 7 entervail(e, -vale, intervayle, 8 intervail, 7– intervale.
[In former English use, only a rare variant or collateral form of interval: cf. OF. entreval and entrevale, -valle, and the 14–16th c. Eng. intervalle. But by Lithgow in 1632, and from 17th c. in New England, associated with vale, in the specific American sense 3.
It is not clear whether the association with vale, valley, was, in the first place, one of popular etymology, favoured perhaps by the partial survival of the old variant form in -vale (cf. intervail in sense 2), or whether this was in New England a natural development of the sense, arising from the fact that the chief intervals in the primaeval forest were the bottoms of the river valleys, and giving rise to an association with vale, as used in English in such names as the Vale of Clwyd, Vale of Llangollen, Vale of the Yarrow, etc. It is possible that both principles operated together; and it is to be noted that, in this specific sense, intervale has not, even in American use, ousted interval.]
†1. Of time: = interval n. 1. Obs.
13..[see interval n. 1]. a1661Fuller Worthies i. (1662) 65 In that intervale after the Sun is set..and before candles are set up. 1682Conn. Col. Rec. (1859) III. 113 This Court in the intervales of the Generall Court doe desire and impower the Governour and Assistants [etc.].
†2. Of space: = interval n. 3. Obs.
1683New Jersey Archives (1880) I. 431 Be sure that..no Street be laid close to the back of another without an Intervale of at least a pair of Butts. 1684Scanderbeg Rediv. vi. 144 The Army in Three Lines, all closed, without any Intervails.
3. In N. America: A low level tract of land, esp. along a river; = interval n. 4. Also attrib.
Orig. in New England, but now used in some other parts of U.S. and in Canada. The sense is the same as that of haugh in Scotland.
[1632Lithgow Trav. viii. 365 This City of Fez is situate upon the bodies and twice double devalling faces..of two hills..; the intervale, or low valley betweene both..being the Center.] 1653Early Rec. Lancaster, Mass. (1884) 27 Thirty acors of uppland and fortie acors of Entervale land. 1659in Nourse Hist. Harvard (1894) 16 Still Riuer farm bounded Southwest by the enteruail. a1704W. Hubbard Hist. New Eng. iii. (1815) 18 Fruitfull spots of land, such as they call intervail land, in levells and champain ground..neere the banks of great rivers. 1792J. Belknap Hist. New Hampsh. III. Pref. 6 Another word..which perhaps is not more known in England, viz. intervale..is well understood in all parts of New-England to distinguish the low-land adjacent to the fresh rivers, which is frequently overflowed by the freshets. 1794S. Williams Vermont 35 By intervales we mean those low lands which are adjacent to the rivers. 1856Whittier Mary Garvin i, From the heart of Waumbek Methna, from the lake that never fails, Falls the Saco in the green lap of Conway's intervales. 1884Dawson Handbk. Dom. Canada 108 The spring freshets flood these wide valleys, and produce what is called ‘intervale’ land of great fertility. |