wick: [OE] Wick ‘burning fibre in a candle or lamp’ has West Germanic relatives in German wieche and Dutch wiek, but its ultimate ancestry is uncertain (a connection has been suggested with Old Irish figim ‘I weave’). The wick of get on someone’s wick ‘annoy someone’, incidentally (first recorded in 1945), is probably a different word. It appears to be short for Hampton Wick, rhyming slang for ‘prick, penis’ (Hampton Wick is a district in southwest London; its wick means historically ‘village, town’, and is the same word ultimately as the -wich, -wick of English place-names).
wick (n.1)
"bundle of fiber in a lamp or candle," 17c. spelling alteration of wueke, from Old English weoce "wick of a lamp or candle," from West Germanic *weukon (cognates: Middle Dutch wieke, Dutch wiek, Old High German wiohha, German Wieche), of unknown origin, with no known cognates beyond Germanic. To dip one's wick "engage in sexual intercourse" (in reference to males) is recorded from 1958, perhaps from Hampton Wick, rhyming slang for "prick," which would connect it rather to wick (n.2).
wick (n.2)
"dairy farm," now surviving, if at all, as a localism in East Anglia or Essex, it was once the common Old English wic "dwelling place, lodging, house, mansion, abode," then coming to mean "village, hamlet, town," and later "dairy farm" (as in Gatwick "Goat-farm"). Common in this latter sense 13c.-14c. The word is from a general Germanic borrowing from Latin vicus "group of dwellings, village; a block of houses, a street, a group of streets forming an administrative unit" (see vicinity). Compare Old High German wih "village," German Weichbild "municipal area," Dutch wijk "quarter, district," Old Frisian wik, Old Saxon wic "village."
双语例句
1. The Professor was beginning to get on Molly's wick.
教授快要把莫莉惹毛了。
来自柯林斯例句
2. She's always talking about herself — she gets on my wick.
她总是在谈论自己,这真让我恼火.
来自《简明英汉词典》
3. It's very hard to turn the wick up and down.
这灯芯很难旋上旋下.
来自《简明英汉词典》
4. The boss gets on my wick with his everlasting complaints about timekeeping. And he thinks nothing of rolling up to the office at ten o'clock himself.
上司总是抱怨说我们不守时,真令我烦透了. 可是他对自己10点钟才到办公室却一点也不在乎.
来自《简明英汉词典》
5. At once I turn up the wick of my kerosene lamp.