Mysteries of vernacular: Miniature - Jessica Oreck

Transcriber: Andrea McDonough Reviewer: Bedirhan Cinar

譯者: Jephian Lin 審譯者: Geoff Chen

Mysteries of Vernacular

字源探秘：

Miniature,

miniature（縮樣、縮圖）

something distinctively smaller

──指某類東西裡的 明顯縮小品。

than other members of its type or class.

──指某類東西裡的 明顯縮小品。

Miniature traces its roots to the Latin, <i>minium</i>,

英文字 miniature 源自拉丁文 minium，

which meant, "red lead".

意思是「鉛丹」。

Minium referred, in particular, to a compound of lead

鉛丹特別是指一種鉛的化合物，

used as a pigment in Medieval times.

它在中世紀被用來當作一種顏料。

In those days, because there were no printing presses,

在當時，因為沒有印刷技術，

groups of scribes were tasked with

抄寫員必須

painstakingly copying all books by hand.

煞費苦心地用手抄書。

Whenever they needed to denote a chapter break

每當他們要標註一個章節結尾、

or a division of text,

或是要將文字分開時，

scribes would switch from standard black

抄寫員就會從標準的黑色顏料

to the red pigment, minium.

換成紅色顏料，也就是鉛丹。

Another important visual device used to increase

另外一種讓某部份文字變明顯 的重要視覺圖樣

the prominence of certain portions of text

另外一種讓某部份文字變明顯 的重要視覺圖樣

was to set them off

是將它們用

with large, ornate, and colorful capital letters,

較大又有裝飾的 彩色大寫字母來書寫，

often surrounded by tiny, detailed paintings.

旁邊通常還有小巧精美的圖案。

The Italians began to refer

義大利人開始把

to these elaborate and diminutive paintings

這些小巧精美的圖畫

as <i>miniatura</i>, illuminations.

稱作 miniatura， 意思是「起首字母的花邊」。

Because of the necessarily small size of the paintings,

由於這種圖樣總是很小，

miniatura began to be associated with all things wee

miniatura 開始和所有小東西 連結在一起，

and spawned to other words with the same base,

並且衍生出其他類似的字，

like the Latin <i>minimum</i>, for least.

像是拉丁字 minimum， 意思是「最小」。

Miniatura was transmuted into English

在 16 世紀，miniatura 被轉換 成英文 miniature，

in the 16th century as the word, <i>miniature</i>,

在 16 世紀，miniatura 被轉換 成英文 miniature，

and since that time,

而從那時候起，

it has had the exact same meaning we use today.

它的語法字義就跟今日一模一樣了。