Arraign (uh-RAYN)
1. To call or bring a defendant before a court to hear and answer a criminal
charge. 2. To criticize, accuse, or censure. From Old French araisnier, from
Latin rationare (to talk, to reason), from ratio (reason, calculation).
Ultimately from the Indo-European root ar- (to fit together), which also gave
us army, harmony, article, order, read, adorn, arithmetic, rhyme, and
ratiocinate.
The earliest known use of threshold in the English language is
from Alfred the Great's Old English translation of the Roman philosopher
Boethius's De consolatione philosophiae. In this translation, which was written
around 888, threshold appears as þeorscwold (that first letter is called a
thorn and it was used in Old English and Middle English to indicate the sounds
produced by th in thin and this). The origins of this Old English word are not
known, though it is believed to be related to Old English threscan, from which
we get the words thresh, meaning "to separate seed from (a harvested
plant) using a machine or tool" and thrash, meaning, among other things,
"to beat soundly with or as if with a stick or whip."
Bilious is one
of several words whose origins trace to the old belief that four bodily humors
(black bile, yellow bile, phlegm, and blood) control temperament. Just like
phlegmatic ("of a slow and stolid phlegm-driven character"),
melancholy ("experiencing dejection associated with black bile"), and
sanguine ("of a cheerful, blood-based disposition"), bilious suggests
a personality associated with an excess of one of the humors—in this case,
yellow bile. Bilious, which first appeared in English in the mid-1500s, derives
from the Middle French bilieux, which in turn traces to bilis, Latin for
"bile." In the past, bile was also called choler, which gives us
choleric, a synonym of bilious.
Chagrin
(shuh-GRIN)
Distress caused by disappointment or humiliation. From French chagrin (sad,
sorry, shagreen: rough skin).