| 释义 |
cucumber|ˈkjuːkʌmbə(r)|
Forms: 4–8 cucumer, 5 cocumber, 6 cocomer, (?) concummer, cocomber, cucumbre, 6–8 coucumber, cowcumber, cowcomber, 7 cowcummer, 6– cucumber.
[In Wyclif's form cucumer, app. directly from L.; in cocomber, cucumber, etc., a. obs. F. cocombre (in 13th c. coucombre, now concombre) = Pr. cogombre, It. cocomero, early ad. L. cucumer-em (nom. cucumis) cucumber.
The spelling cowcumber prevailed in the 17th and beg. of 18th c.; its associated pronunciation |ˈkaʊkʌmbə(r)| was still that recognized by Walker; but Smart 1836 says ‘no well-taught person, except of the old school, now says cow-cumber..although any other pronunciation..would have been pedantic some thirty years ago’.]
1. A creeping plant, Cucumis sativus (family Cucurbitaceæ), a native of southern Asia, from ancient times cultivated for its fruit: see 2.
1382Wyclif Baruch vi. 69 Where cucumeris, that ben bitter herbis, waxen. 1398Trevisa Barth. de P.R. xvii. xliv. (Tollem. MS.) Cucumer..is an herbe, of þe whiche Isidor spekeþ. 1551Turner Herbal i. (1568) M iv b, The fruyte of the cucumbre is for the most part yelow and long. 1584R. Scot Discov. Witchcr. xiii. viii. 246 The cowcumber loveth water. 1630J. Levett Ord. Bees (1634) 57 Wormwood, Woad, wilde Cucumers, Mayweed. 1688R. Holme Armoury ii. 103/2 [Of] Cowcumber, or Cucumber, the branch traileth on the ground. 1713Phil. Trans. XXVIII. 229 The Juice of the Leaves of Cowcomber bruised. 1846J. Baxter Libr. Pract. Agric. (ed. 4) I. 181 The cucumber is a tender annual, introduced into this country in 1573, from the East Indies.
2. a. The long fleshy fruit of this plant, commonly eaten (cut into thin slices) as a cooling salad, and when young used for pickling (see gherkin).
c1400Lanfranc's Cirurg. 275 Of erbis he schal ete fenel..melones, cucumeris. 1535Coverdale 2 Kings iv. 39 Then went there one in to the felde..& gathered wylde Cucumbers. 1582N. Lichefield tr. Castanheda's Conq. E. Ind. 61 a, [They] brought to sell many gourds and cowcombers. 1646Sir T. Browne Pseud. Ep. vii. i. 339 Resembling..in taste a Melon or Cowcumber. 1697Dryden Virg. Georg. iv. 182 Cucumers along the Surface creep, With crooked Bodies, and with Bellies deep. 1732Arbuthnot Rules of Diet. i. 248 The Juice of Cucumbers is too cold for some Stomachs. 1860Delamer Kitch. Gard. (1861) 115 In England the first cucumbers fetch high prices.
b. Phr. cool († cold) as a cucumber (humorous): perfectly ‘cool’ or self-possessed; showing no excitement or disturbance of feeling. Hence cucumber-cool.
a1732Gay Poems, New Song on New Similies iii, I..cool as a cucumber could see The rest of womankind. 1760Gray Lett. Wks. 1884 III. 47 It was dry as a stick, hard as a stone, and cold as a cucumber. 1838De Quincey Greek Lit. Wks. 1890 X. 318 Thucydides..is as cool as a cucumber upon every act of atrocity. 1851D. Jerrold (title), Cool as a Cucumber. 1955Auden Shield of Achilles iii. 75 In his New Jerusalem even chefs will be cucumber-cool machine minders.
c. slang. Used with some obscure reference to a tailor. Hence cucumber time, cucumber season: see quots.
a1700B. E. Dict. Cant. Crew, Cucumbers, Taylers. Cucumber-time, Taylers Holiday, when they have leave to Play, and Cucumbers are in Season. 1720Roxb. Ball. (1891) VII. 471 Here a scratch, there a stitch, And sing Cucumber, Cucumber ho! a1777Foote Sir J. Jollup in Hone Every-day Bk. II. 848 This cross-legg'd cabbage-eating son of a cucumber. 1865Pall Mall G. 4 Sept. 16/2 Tailors could not be expected to earn much money ‘in cucumber season’..‘Because when cucumbers are in, the gentry are out of town’.
3. a. Applied to other plants allied to or in some way resembling the common cucumber: as bitter cucumber, the Colocynth, Citrullus Colocynthis; Indian cucumber = cucumber-root (see 4); one-seeded, single-seeded, or star cucumber, the genus Sicyos; serpent or snake cucumber, Trichosanthes colubrina and T. anguina, also Cucumis flexuosus (from the appearance of the fruit); spirting or squirting cucumber, Ecbalium agreste (formerly called Momordica Elaterium), the fruit of which when ripe separates from the stalk, and expels the seeds and pulp with considerable force.
1548Turner Names of Herbes 32 Cucumis sylvestris..maye be called in englyshe wylde cucummer or leapyng cucumer. 1578Lyte Dodoens iii. xl. 372 Of the wilde spirting Cucumbre..This Cucumber is called..in Englishe Wilde Cucumber, or leaping Cucumber. 1811A. T. Thomson Lond. Disp. (1818) 143 The Pulp of Coloquintida, or Bitter Cucumber. 1866Treas. Bot. 1168 Trichosanthes colubrina, the Serpent Cucumber or Viper Gourd, is so called from the remarkable snake-like appearance of its fruits, which are frequently six or more feet long, and at first striped with different shades of green.
b. Short for cucumber-tree (U.S.). Also attrib.
1797F. Baily Tour N. Amer. (1856) 178 Elm, oak, cucumber, and other trees. 1835A. Parker Trip to West 47 The timber consists of the various kinds of oak,..cucumber, [etc.]. 1904‘O. Henry’ Cabbages & Kings x. 161 Johnny Atwood..prated feebly of cool water to be had in the cucumber-wood pumps of Dalesburg.
4. attrib. and Comb., as cucumber-bed, cucumber-frame, cucumber sandwich, cucumber-seed, cucumber-slicer, etc.; cucumber-beetle, -bug, flea beetle U.S. (see quots.); cucumber mosaic, one of a group of virus diseases that attack cucumbers and related plants; cucumber-root, (a) the root of the cucumber; (b) the plant Medeola virginica (family Trilliaceæ), from the taste of its rhizomes; cucumber-shin (see quots. 1807, 1849); cucumber-tree, (a) Magnolia acuminata and other American species, the fruits of which resemble small cucumbers; (b) Averrhoa Bilimbi, an East Indian tree with an acid fruit resembling a small cucumber and used for pickling.
1826Miss Mitford Village Ser. ii. (1863) 387 He..made a very decent cucumber-bed in mine host's garden.
1841T. W. Harris Insects of Massachusetts 101 These striped cucumber-beetles..notorious..for their attacks upon the leaves of the cucumber and squash. 1948Ada (Okla.) Even. News 2 July 4/4 A powerful insecticide that will kill such stubborn pests as Cucumber Beetles.
1838Mass. Zool. Surv. Rep. 100 The cucumber-bug..is called Galeruca vittata. At first sight it appears much like the potato-insect.
1807W. Irving Salmag. (1824) 79 His shins had the true cucumber curve.
1877Rep. Vermont Board Agric. IV. 154 The Cucumber Flea Beetle,..a little black beetle.., sometimes attacks the raspberry.
1782Cowper Let. to J. Hill 31 Jan., A man..whose chief occupation..is to walk ten times in a day from the fire-side to his cucumber frame and back again. 1934Wodehouse Right Ho, Jeeves xx. 251 It sounded as if Carnera had jumped off the top of the Eiffel Tower on to a cucumber frame.
1916S. P. Doolittle in Phytopathology VI. 145 The cucumber mosaic disease shows most markedly on the fruits, the first sign being a yellowish mottling near the stem end. Ibid. Plate V (caption) Cucumber mosaic. 1923W. F. Bewley Dis. Glasshouse Plants vii. 144 (heading) Symptoms of Cucumber Mosaic Disease. 1935Jrnl. Min. Agric. XLII. 338 These three diseases [sc. green-mottle mosaic, yellow mosaic, yellow-mottle mosaic], collectively known as ‘cucumber mosaic’, are widespread. 1950N.Z. Jrnl. Agric. Feb. 157/3 Cucumber mosaic..is a virus disease which may cause serious losses in cucumbers, marrows, pumpkins, and squashes. Symptoms consist of stunting of the plants and mosaic mottling of the foliage.
c1420Pallad. on Husb. i. 981 Thi seedes with cocumber rootes grounde Lete stepe.
1896E. Turner Little Larrikin xv. 171 The fates chose that he should be allotted to find a cucumber sandwich for his hostess's sister-in-law. 1899Wilde Importance of being Earnest i. 5 Why all these cups? Why cucumber sandwiches? Why such reckless extravagance in one so young? 1967Listener 23 Mar. 398/1 The kind of smile and soft tone of voice you would connect with cucumber sandwiches and a vicarage lawn.
1607Topsell Four-f. Beasts (1673) 202 Three-and-thirty grains of cowcumber seed.
1849–52Todd Cycl. Anat. IV. 1332/1 That peculiar curved form of the bones of the leg [in Negroes] which gives rise to what is popularly designated as the ‘cucumber shin’.
1884Health Exhib. Catal. 110/2 Cucumber Slicers.
1785Jefferson Notes on Virginia 65 Cucumber-tree. Magnolia acuminata. 1806T. Jefferson Writ. (1830) IV. 63 Can you send me some cones or seeds of the cucumber tree? |