non-metallic element, 1814, formed by English chemist Sir Humphry Davy from French iode "iodine," which was coined 1812 by French chemist Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac from Greek ioeides "violet-colored" (from ion "the violet; dark blue flower;" see violet) + eidos "appearance" (see -oid).
Davy added the chemical suffix -ine (2) to make it analogous with chlorine and fluorine. So called from the color of the vapor given off when the crystals are heated.
of flower blossoms, "fully open," 1640s, from full (adj.) + blown "that has blossomed," from Old English geblowenne, past participle of blow (v.2) "to bloom." Figuratively "complete, fully developed" from 1650s. Full-blown also was used 17c.-18c. in reference to cheeks, sails, bladders, "fully distended" (by or as if by wind), in this case from blow (v.1), and the figurative sense might also be from or influenced by these.
"drinking-cup or bowl," early 14c., from Anglo-French chalice, from Old French chalice, collateral form of calice (Modern French calice), from Latin calicem (nominative calix) "cup," similar to, and perhaps cognate with, Greek kylix "cup, drinking cup, cup of a flower," but they might both be loan-words from the same non-IE language. Old English had it as cælic, an ecclesiastical borrowing of the Latin word, and earlier Middle English caliz is from Old North French.
"one who destroys flowers," 1841, from Latin floris, genitive of flos "flower" (see flora) + -cide "killer."
[S]urely there is cruelty and gross selfishness in cutting down for our own fleeting gratification that which would have ministered to the enjoyments of all for weeks or months. Frankly do I confess that I dislike a wanton floricide. He has robbed the world of a pleasure; he has blotted out a word from God's earth-written poetry. [New Monthly Magazine, April 1847]
"a type of violet, popular as a garden flower," mid-15c., pense, from Old French pensee. pencee "a pansy," literally "thought, remembrance," from fem. past participle of penser "to think," from Latin pensare "consider," a figurative use of a frequentative of pendere "to hang, cause to hang; weigh; pay" (from PIE root *(s)pen- "to draw, stretch, spin"). So called because it was regarded as a symbol of thought or remembrance.
Meaning "effeminate homosexual man" is recorded by 1929. Related: Pansified (1941) "over-adorned, affectedly effeminate."
"pollen-bearing organ of a flower," 1660s, from Modern Latin (1625, Spigelus), from Latin stamen "stamen" (Pliny), literally "foundation in weaving, thread of the warp" in the upright loom (related to stare "to stand"), from PIE *sta-men- (source also of Greek stēmōn "warp in the upright loom," also used by Hesychius for some part of a plant, Gothic stoma, Sanskrit sthaman "place," also "strength"), from root *sta- "to stand, make or be firm." The usual English plural is stamens because of the special use of the classical plural, stamina.
genus of plants native to Mexico and Central America, 1804, named 1791 by Spanish botanist Antonio José Cavanilles for Anders Dahl (1751-1789), Swedish botanist and pupil of Linnaeus, who discovered it for science in Mexico in 1788.
The likelihood that a true blue variety of the flower never could be cultivated was first proposed by French-Swiss botanist Augustin Pyramus de Candolle, and noted in English by 1835; hence blue dahlia, figurative expression for "something impossible or unattainable" (1843).
1620s, "young, youthful," from Latin iuvenilis "of or belonging to youth, youthful," from iuvenis "young man, one in the flower of his age" (in Roman use, the period just beyond adolescence, from age 21 or 25 to 40), noun use of an adjective meaning "young" (source also of French jeune; see young (adj.)).
Meaning "pertaining to or suited to youth" is from 1660s. As a noun, "a young person," from 1733. Juvenile delinquency first recorded 1816; Juvenile delinquent the following year. Slang shortening juvie/juvey is recorded from 1941 as "juvenile delinquent," 1967 as "juvenile detention."
flowering plant genus, 1550s, from French anemone (16c., corrected from Old French anemoine) and directly from Latin anemone, from Greek anemonē "wind flower," literally "daughter of the wind," from anemos "wind" (cognate with Latin anima, from PIE root *ane- "to breathe") + -one feminine patronymic suffix.
According to Asa Gray it was so called because it was thought to open only when the wind blows. Klein suggests the flower name perhaps originally is from Hebrew (compare na'aman, in nit'e na'amanim, literally "plants of pleasantness," in Isaiah xvii.10, from na'em "was pleasant").
In zoology, the word was applied to a type of sea creature from 1773 (probably short for sea anemone, which is by 1742). Related: Anemonic. Greek akalēphē "sea-anemone," also "stinging nettle," is of uncertain origin.
Sea anemones are eaten, fried in oil, throughout the Mediterranean and in northern France, under such names as cul de cheval, cul d'âne, pisseuse, etc. ... The Abbé Dicquemare (Phil. Trans. lxv, p. 219, 1775) considers the large A. crassicornis the best of its kind; it should be boiled in sea-water, when it becomes firm and palatable and tastes like warm crab. It fetched a high price in Bordeaux in Rondelet's time. [D'Arcy Thompson, "A Glossary of Greek Fishes"]
masc. proper name, from Latin Antonius, name of a Roman gens (with an unetymological -h- probably suggested by many Greek loan words beginning anth-, such as anthros "flower," anthropos "man").
St. Anthony (4c.), Egyptian hermit, was patron saint of swineherds, to whom one of each litter was usually vowed, hence Anthony for "smallest pig of the litter" (1660s; in condensed form tantony pig from 1590s). St. Anthony's Fire (1520s), popular name for erysipelas, is said to be so called from the tradition that those who sought his intercession recovered from that distemper during a fatal epidemic in 1089.
