| 释义 |
▪ I. nil1 Now rare or Obs.
Also 7 nill.
[a. Arab. and Pers. nīl: see anil.]
1. The indigo plant; indigo dye.
1598W. Phillip tr. Linschoten i. lxix. 117/2 Annil or Nil..hath sky coloured leaves. 1625Finch in Purchas Pilgrims I. iv. iv. 428 The first of Nouember I was sent to buy Nill or Indico at Byana. 1640Parkinson Theat. Bot. 602 Else it was a worser kind of that Nil or Anil that grew in Turkey. 1753Chambers Cycl. Suppl. s.v., This is to be always understood as meaning that nil which is used in dying. 1846–50A. Wood Class-Bk. Bot. 442 Flowers..of a clear blue color (whence its specific name, Anil or Nil, Indigo).
2. A species of convolvulus with blue flowers.
1597Gerarde Herbal ii. ccciv. 715 There be also other sorts of Bindweeds,..which no doubt may be kinds of Nil. 1640Parkinson Theat. Bot. 170 The great blew Bindweede..is taken by most to be the Nil of Avicen and Serapis. 1753Chambers Cycl. Suppl. s.v., It is probable that the convolvulus, or bindweed, called nil, obtained this name only from its flowers being of the same colour with the fine blue pigment obtained from the other nil, or woad.
▪ II. ‖ nil2|nɪl|
[L., contracted f. nihil.]
1. a. Nothing.
1833Edin. Rev. Oct. 14 Such a return from all the population..would be nil. 1849Kingsley Misc. (1859) I. 404 Such attempts at it as we yet have seen, may be considered nil. 1899Allbutt's Syst. Med. VII. 889 The locomotor effects of the spasms is either nil or but very slight. 1936A. W. Clapham Romanesque Archit. i. 5 Of all the various structures referred to or described by Isidore of Seville..the surviving remains are almost nil. 1952C. Day Lewis tr. Virgil's Aeneid viii. 172 Visibility was reduced to nil. 1955Times 6 July 4/4 The British Isles Rugby Union tourists beat South West Africa by nine points to nil in their match here to-day.
b. ? = nichil 2.
1811in 2nd Rep. Rec. Irel. 132 The Originalia of Process, called the Schedules of Nils from the Pipe. Ibid. 141 The Process lodged by the Sheriffs..is of no further use after the Tots and Nils are discharged.
2. Comb., as nil-grade Philol., the most reduced form of weak ablaut grade, in which the vowel disappears; nil norm Econ., during a wage-freeze a standard under which no wage increases are normally allowed.
1922–3Modern Philology XX. 197 The *nil-grade of the root vowel is represented by OE -tyllan (in fortyllan ‘to seduce’). 1928Language IV. 163 It follows that šd is the nil-grade of **sed- ‘sit’. 1935Mod. Lang. Notes L. 523 Pre-English uncontracted Lāamkô (with nil-grade of the k-suffix). 1972Language XLVIII. 9 The difficulty disappears if we start from a root kwerp, whose nil-grade developed into Aryan kr̥p- and Goidelic kri.
1966Sunday Times 14 Aug. 8 For all the traditional wage demands some principle does need to be hammered out to establish who will be permitted to breach the *nil norm. 1967Economist 23 Dec. 1204/1 Britain is still supposed to be operating in conditions of a ‘nil norm’ for wage increases. 1968Manch. Guardian Weekly 1 Feb. 8 The {pstlg}1 a week rise would not qualify as an exception to the nil norm laid down in the summer.
b. Passing into adj., containing, reporting, or consisting of nothing.
1959Punch 27 May 704/3 The thoughtless might suppose that hail-watching was dull work, with long blank intervals offering nothing better than a nil return. 1972Guardian 14 Mar. 2/8 They..returned because of nil visibility. 1974L. Lamb Man in Mist ix. 55 In view of my constable's nil report, could it be that nothing ever happened?
▪ III. nil
var. nill n.; obs. f. nill v. |