amaze

vt. 使吃惊

中文词源

amaze 惊奇

前缀a-, 此处加强语气。maze, 迷宫。

amaze: amaze: [OE] Old English āmasian meant ‘stupefy’ or ‘stun’, with perhaps some reminiscences of an original sense ‘stun by hitting on the head’ still adhering to it. Some apparently related forms in Scandinavian languages, such as Swedish masa ‘be sluggish’ and Norwegian dialect masast ‘become unconscious’, suggest that it may originally have been borrowed from Old Norse.

The modern sense ‘astonish’ did not develop until the end of the 16th century; Shakespeare was one of its earliest exponents: ‘Crystal eyes, whose full perfection all the world amazes’, Venus and Adonis 1592. By the end of the 13th century both the verb and its related noun had developed a form without the initial a-, and in the late 14th century the word – maze – had begun to be applied to a deliberately confusing structure.
=> maze
amaze (v.): early 13c., amasian "stupefy, make crazy," from a-, probably used here as an intensive prefix, + -masian, related to maze (q.v.). Sense of "overwhelm with wonder" is from 1580s. Related: Amazed; amazing.

1. Neil's ability to utter banalities never ceased to amaze me.: 每次我都很惊讶，尼尔怎么能讲出这么索然无味的东西。

4. The Riverside Res-taurant promises a variety of food that never ceases to amaze!: 滨河饭店总能提供品种繁多、令人称奇的食物。

5. The arrogance and selfishness of different interest groups never ceases to amaze me.: 不同利益集团的傲慢和自私总是会让我大吃一惊。