存放東西的櫃子
這一組最貼近原本的畫面：一個把東西關起來的小空間，只是縮成了一件家具。
cabinet (cupboard) · noun · B2
A cupboard you keep or display things in, with doors and shelves or drawers.
櫥櫃
核心畫面
Picture a small closed space where you keep the things that matter and shut the door on them — a case with a lock, a little private room. Two very different modern meanings grow out of that one picture: the piece of furniture you still open every day, and the small group of ministers who used to meet behind that closed door.
可以想成 cabinet 最原本的畫面比較像「一個關得起來的小空間」——把重要的東西放進去，然後把門闔上。可能是一個…更多收起
可以想成 cabinet 最原本的畫面比較像「一個關得起來的小空間」——把重要的東西放進去，然後把門闔上。可能是一個上鎖的箱櫃，也可能是一間不讓外人進去的小房間。今天兩個差很遠的意思，都是從這一個畫面長出來的：一個是你每天都在開的那個櫃子，一個是以前躲在那扇門後面開會的那幾個人。From the word’s history
From French cabinet 'small room', a diminutive of Old French cabane 'cabin' (ultimately Latin cavea 'stall, cage, den'). In the 1540s English used it for a 'secret storehouse, case for valuables', which gradually came to mean the piece of furniture that does that job. Around 1600 the 'private room where advisers meet' sense appeared, and by the 1640s the word had shifted from the room to the group of people meeting in it — probably shortened from 'cabinet council'.
cabinet 來自法文 cabinet「小房間」，是古法文 cabane（小屋）的指小詞，再往前是拉丁文 cavea「圈欄、籠子」。1540 年代進到英文時指「藏貴重物品的密櫃」，慢慢就變成今天那件有門有抽屜的家具。大約 1600 年前後，它多了「顧問們私下開會的小房間」這個意思；到了 1640 年代，這個字乾脆從房間跳到房間裡的那群人身上（可能是 cabinet council 的簡稱）——所以「櫥櫃」和「內閣」不是兩個碰巧同音的字，是同一個字走了兩條路。
Online Etymology Dictionary (etymonline.com), entry 'cabinet'
Two branches
政府的核心決策小組
從「小房間」跳到「在小房間裡的那群人」。英文常這樣搬家：the board（董事會）本來也是開會的那張桌子，後來變成圍著桌子的那些人。所以櫃子和內閣不是巧合同名，是同一個畫面的兩個結果。
cabinet (government) · noun · B2
The group of the most important members of a government, who meet to make big decisions.
內閣
原始詞典資料14 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，原文照列，我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的；有些用法可能上面已經講過了。
cabinetnoun/ˈkæb.ɪ.nɪt/
- 1
A storage closet either separate from, or built into, a wall.
- 2
A cupboard.
- ‘[…] There's every Staffordshire crime-piece ever made in this cabinet, and that's unique. The Van Hoyer Museum in New York hasn't that very rare second version of Maria Marten's Red Barn over there, nor the little Frederick George Manning—he was the criminal Dickens saw hanged on the roof of the gaol in Horsemonger Lane, by the way—’
- 3
A museum display case.
- Here I obtained the rare and beautiful swallow-tail butterflies, Papilio aenomaus and P. liris; the males of which are quite unlike each other, and belong in fact to distinct sections of the genus, while the females are so much alike that they are undistinguishable on the wing, and to an uneducated eye equally so in the cabinet.
- 4
A source of valuable things; a storehouse.
- It is a perfect cabinet of faithful, valuable, and extensive information; and it ought to have a place on the shelves of the most select and compact library, and be in the possession of every private family, as a work both of valuable reference.
- 5
The upright assembly that houses a coin-operated arcade game, a cab.
- 6
historicalA size of photograph, specifically one measuring 3⅞" by 5½".
- Holmes took a note of it. “One other question,” said he. “Was the photograph a cabinet?”
- 7
A group of advisors to a government or business entity.
- 8
governmentpoliticsIn parliamentary and some other systems of government, the group of ministers responsible for creating government policy and for overseeing the departments comprising the executive branch.
- Lincoln had a great deal of trouble with his Cabinet because some of them got it into their heads that they, and not the President, were the policy-makers. James K. Polk had the same difficulty with his Cabinet. Franklin Roosevelt never had any difficulty with his Cabinet for the simple reason that he himself, in my opinion, spent too much time doing the work that should have been delegated to the Cabinet.
另外 6 個記錄的用法
- 9
governmentpoliticsIn parliamentary and some other systems of government, the group of ministers responsible for creating government policy and for overseeing the departments comprising the executive branch.
- The executive branch of Kentucky state government is structured on a program cabinet system consisting of 14 program cabinets, each headed by a secretary, who is appointed by the Governor. The program cabinets listed below and the agencies within each cabinet are designated in the statutes.
- 10
archaicA small chamber or private room.
- Philip passed some hours every day in his father's cabinet.
- 11
A collection of art or ethnographic objects.
- 12
dialectalMilkshake.
- One of Rhode Island's most famous beverages is the Awful Awful, an enormous 32-ounce, rich, creamy milk shake sold at the Newport Creamery stores, a soda fountain and casual restaurant chain. This ultra-thick cabinet is "awful big and awful good," thus the name.
- 13
obsoleteA hut; a cottage; a small house.
- Hearken a while from thy green cabinet, / The rural song of careful Colinet.
- 14
An enclosure for mechanical or electrical equipment.
資料來源：英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary（CC BY-SA 4.0）。 原文照列，未經改寫。