nutmeg 的词源

“来自东印度群岛的一种树的果实，坚硬芳香的种子”，大约在公元1300年作为烹饪香料使用，note-mug，源自古北法语或古英语法语的*noiz mugue，再往前追溯到古法语的nois muguete，是nois muscade（“闻起来像麝香的坚果”）的一个不明变化形式，来自nois（“坚果”，源自拉丁语nux，再往前追溯到原始印欧语*kneu-，意为“坚果”；参见nucleus）+ 拉丁语muscada，是muscat（“麝香的”）的阴性形式（参见muscat）。可能受到中世纪拉丁语nux maga的影响（比较未变化的荷兰语muskaatnoot、德语muscatnuß、瑞典语muskotnöt）。

美式英语口语中，wooden nutmeg（“木制肉豆蔻”）意指“任何虚假或欺诈的事物”，首次出现于1827年；康涅狄格州被称为Nutmeg State（“肉豆蔻州”），是因为有传言称那里生产木制肉豆蔻以供出口。[约翰·拉塞尔·巴特利特，《美国俚语词典》，1859年]

At a dinner party, the other day, during a little playful discussion of Yankee character, a bland and benevolent-looking old gentleman at my side informed me that he had come to the conclusion that the wooden-nutmeg story was neither more nor less than a mischievous satire. "For," said he, "there would be such an amount of minute carving required to make a successful imitation of the nutmeg, that the deception would hardly pay the workman. For myself, I do not believe the cheat was ever practised." I thanked him in the name of my country for the justice done her, and assured him that the story of the Yankee having whittled a large lot of unsaleable shoe-pegs into melon seeds, and sold them to the Canadians, was also a base fabrication of our enemies. [Grace Greenwood, "Haps and Mishaps of a Tour in Europe in 1853"]

前几天，在一次晚宴上，期间我们开玩笑讨论了一下“扬基人”的性格。我身边一位面带和蔼笑容的老绅士告诉我，他得出的结论是木制肉豆蔻的故事不过是个恶作剧式的讽刺。“因为，”他说，“要成功模仿肉豆蔻，所需的精细雕刻工作量实在太大，根本不值得工人去做。就我个人而言，我不相信这个骗局曾经存在。”我代表我的国家感谢他对我们的公正评价，并向他保证，那些扬基人把大量卖不出去的鞋钉雕成瓜子，卖给加拿大人的故事，也是我们敌人的恶意捏造。[格雷斯·格林伍德，《1853年欧洲旅行的喜与忧》]