toad

英[təʊd]美[tod]

近义词

反义词

复数: toads;

toad 蟾蜍

来自中古英语 tode,蟾蜍，来自古英语 tadie,蟾蜍，词源同 tadpole.

toad: toad: [OE] Toad is a mystery word, with no known relatives in any other Indo-European language. Of its derivatives, toady [19] is short for the earlier toad eater ‘sycophant’ [17]. This originated in the dubious selling methods of itinerant quack doctors. They employed an assistant who pretended to eat a toad (toads were thought to be poisonous), so that the quack could appear to effect a miraculous cure with his medicine.

The toad-eating assistant came to be a byword for ‘servility’ or ‘dependency’, and hence for ‘servile flattery’. Toadstools [14] were named for their stool-like shape, and also because of an association between poisonous fungi and the supposedly poisonous toad.
toad (n.): c. 1300, from late Old English tadige, tadie, of unknown origin and according to OED with no known cognates outside English. Applied to loathsome persons from 1560s. Toad-strangler "heavy rain" is from 1919, U.S. Southern dialectal.

1. He grabbed into the ooze and came up clutching a large toad.: 他把手伸进淤泥里捞摸，结果抓上来一只巨大的蟾蜍。

4. The toad had changed its colour to blend in with its new environment.: 蟾蜍已经变色，和新的环境融为一体。

5. The Toad saw at once how wrongly and foolishly he had acted.: 癞哈蟆现在意识到,他的所作所为实在太荒唐,太愚蠢了.