"characteristic or suggestive of the writings of George Orwell," 1950 (first attested in Mary McCarthy), from English author George Orwell (pseudonym of Eric Blair, 1903-1950), especially in reference to his novel "Nineteen Eighty-Four" (1949). It has come to be used in reference to the totalitarian systems he satirized and inveighed against.
It is as if George Orwell had conceived the nightmare instead of analyzed it, helped to create it instead of helping to dispel its euphemistic thrall. [Clive James, "The All of Orwell," 2001]
The surname is attested from late Old English, from place names, either "spring by the point" (of land), or "stream of the (river) Orwe," a variant form ofarrow.
denoting a mode or melody in Gregorian music in which the final is in the middle of the compass instead of at the bottom, 1590s, from Medieval Latin plagalis, from plaga "the plagal mode," probably from plagius, from Medieval Greek plagios "plagal," in classical Greek "oblique," from plagos "side" (from PIE root *plak- (1) "to be flat").
"the Second Coming," 1875, a reference to Matthew xxiv.27, from Greek parousia, literally "presence," from para- (see para- (1)) + ousia "essence," from on, genitive ontos, present participle of einai "to be" (from PIE root *es- "to be"). Parusia, from a Modern Latin form of the Greek word, is a term in rhetoric: "the use of the present tense instead of the past or future, for dramatic effect."
also sangfroid, "presence of mind, coolness, mental composure," 1712, from French sang froid, literally "cool blood," from sang "blood" (from Latin sanguis; see sanguinary) + froid "cold" (from Latin frigidus; see frigid). "In the 17th c. the expression was in France often written erroneously sens froid, as if it contained sens "sense" instead of the homophonous sang "blood'." [OED].
"nacreous inner layer of the shell of various bivalve mollusks," c. 1500, translating Medieval Latin mater perlarum, with the first element perhaps connected in popular imagination with obsolete mother (n.2) "dregs." Compare Italian madreperla, French mère-perle, Dutch parelmoer, German Perlmutter, Danish perlemor. It is the stuff of pearls but in a layer instead of a mass.
