hedge: [OE] Hedge traces its ancestry back to a prehistoric Germanic *khag-, which also produced the haw of hawthorn and possibly haggard and quay too. From it was derived the West Germanic noun *khagjō, which has since become differentiated into German hecke, Dutch heg, and English hedge. The compound hedgehog, an allusion to the animal’s piglike nose, dates from the 15th century (porcupine, literally ‘pig spine’, conveys much the same idea). => haggard, hawthorn, quay
hedge (n.)
Old English hecg, originally any fence, living or artificial, from West Germanic *khagja (cognates: Middle Dutch hegge, Dutch heg, Old High German hegga, German Hecke "hedge"), from PIE *kagh- "to catch, seize; wickerwork, fence" (cognates: Latin caulae "a sheepfold, enclosure," Gaulish caio "circumvallation," Welsh cae "fence, hedge"). Related to Old English haga "enclosure, hedge" (see haw). Figurative sense of "boundary, barrier" is from mid-14c. Prefixed to any word, it "notes something mean, vile, of the lowest class" [Johnson], from contemptuous attributive sense of "plying one's trade under a hedge" (hedge-priest, hedge-lawyer, hedge-wench, etc.), a usage attested from 1530s.
hedge (v.)
late 14c., "make a hedge," also "surround with a barricade or palisade;" from hedge (n.). The sense of "dodge, evade" is first recorded 1590s. That of "insure oneself against loss," as in a bet, by playing something on the other side is from 1670s, originally with in; probably from an earlier use of hedge in meaning "secure (a debt) by including it in a larger one which has better security" (1610s). Related: Hedged; hedging. The noun in the wagering sense is from 1736.
雙語例句
1. Hawker Siddeley tried to hedge its bets by diversifying into other fields.