核心畫面

Put something heavy in your hands and lift it. Everything this word does is in that one moment. The arms work, so heft means to lift a heavy thing. The hand reads the weight, so heft means to lift something just to find out how heavy it is. And the weight itself has a name: the heft of a good knife, of an old camera. Then the same feeling moves off the hand and into the mind — a report with heft is one nobody can wave away. Both English and Chinese take the same walk here, from 重量 to 份量.

把一樣重的東西放進手裡,抬起來。這個字所有的意思,都在那一個動作裡。手臂在出力,所以 heft 是「吃力地搬起」。手更多收起把一樣重的東西放進手裡,抬起來。這個字所有的意思,都在那一個動作裡。手臂在出力,所以 heft 是「吃力地搬起」。手掌在讀重量,所以 heft 也是「掂一掂、試試多重」。而那個重量本身也有名字:好刀的份量、老相機的份量。接著同樣的感覺離開手掌,走進心裡——一份有 heft 的報告,別人揮不掉。中文和英文在這裡走的是同一條路:從手上的「重量」,走到說話的「份量」。

From the word’s history

Formed from heave ('to lift with effort') plus a -t ending, on the pattern of weave to weft and thieve to theft. The effort was in the word from the start.

由 heave(使勁抬)加上 -t 構成,造法和 weave 變 weft、thieve 變 theft 一樣。「費力」這件事從造字的時候就在裡面了。

Wiktionary etymology 1 supplied in this packet (source_ref kaikki:3f6f69a190036ae4:878012415:18789)

One branch

手臂在出力:把重的東西抬起來

這一支看的是動作本身:重量被手臂舉起來,不是被搬走,就是被讀出來。

verb · C1

To lift or move something heavy, using real effort.

吃力地舉起、搬動

原始詞典資料22 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。

heftnoun詞源 1/hɛft/

  • 1

    The feel of the weight of something; heaviness.

    • A high quality hammer should have good balance and heft.
    • But Durindan at laſt fell vvith ſuch heft, / Full on the circle of Rogeros ſhield, / That halfe vvay through the Argent byrd it cleft, / And pierſt the core of male [i.e., mail] that vvas vvithin, / And found a paſſage to the verie skin.
  • 2

    dialectalThe force exerted by an object due to gravitation; weight.

    • The man had been carried out of the yard while the fire was still burning; […] Public opinion was much divided, some holding that it would go hard with a man of his age and heft; but the common belief seemed to be that he was of that sort "as'd take a deal o'killin'," and that he would be none the worse for such a fall as that.
    • "Look at the heft of 'n [a baby]," said the proud father, "entirely drags ye down, Miss Sybil, 'e do."
  • 3

    Graveness, seriousness; gravity.

    • He's got a good voice, and reads well; but come to a sermon—wal, ain't no gret heft in't.
  • 4

    Importance, influence; weight.

    • Put more baldly, the reason why Republicans and British Conservatives started giving each other copies of Atlas Shrugged in the 80s was that [Ayn] Rand seemed to grant intellectual heft to the prevailing ethos of the time.
  • 5

    datedinformalThe greater part of something; the bulk, the mass.

    • The turkey's nest was islanded with a fragrant swath,—the "heft" of the crop noted and rejoiced over,—[…]
    • He run to South America or somewheres, taking the heft of the firm's money with him.
  • 6

    dialectalAn act of lifting; a lift.

    • Deigning no answer, the sturdy parson seized the bigger of the two ash staves, and laying the butt of the other for a fulcrum, gave the stuck wheel such a powerful heft, that the whole cart rattled, and the crates began to dance.
    • It was a tremendous heft to raise the boat on to the wall and push it over, but somehow she managed it; […]
  • 7

    obsoleteAn act of heaving (lifting with difficulty); an instance of violent exertion or straining.

    • [I]f one preſent / Th'abhor'd Ingredient [a spider in a drink] to his eye, make knovvne / Hovv he hath drunke, he cracks his gorge, his ſides / VVith violent Hefts: I haue drunke, and ſeene the Spider.
    • The socket of the rim lock tore off to one good heft of the shoulder, and we were in.

heftverb詞源 1/hɛft/

  • 1

    dialectalinformalTo lift or lift up (something, especially a heavy object).

    • He hefted the sack of concrete into the truck.
    • […] Bevis was to "heft" his gun to the shoulder, and only to press it there sufficiently to feel that the butt touched him.
  • 2

    dialectalinformalTo test the weight of (something) by lifting.

    • [H]e took up a root or two [potatoes] here and there, and "hefted it," (that is to say, poised it carefully to judge the weight, as one does a letter for the post) and then stroked the sleek skin lovingly, and put it down gingerly for fear of any bruise.
  • 3

    dialectalinformalTo test the weight of (something) by lifting.

    • Sim's ben to college, and he's putty smart and chipper. Come to heft him, tho', he don't weigh much 'longside o' Parson Cushing.
  • 4

    dialectalinformalTo have (substantial) weight; to weigh.

    • "[I]t's yellow! is it gold?" / "My!" exclaimed his mother, weighing it in her hand, "I do believe it is. Brass never would heft so much, and would be green. Bless me, Wat, this is a find! Where ever did you come by it? In the gutters, do you say?"

heftnoun詞源 3/hɛft/

  • 1

    dialectalinformalagriculturebusinesslifestyleA piece of pastureland which farm animals (chiefly cattle or sheep) have become accustomed to.

    • [S]he came to fetch her [bairn] out of ill haft and waur guiding.
  • 2

    dialectalinformalagriculturebusinesslifestyleA flock or group of farm animals (chiefly cattle or sheep) which have become accustomed to a particular piece of pastureland.

heftverb詞源 3/hɛft/

  • 1

    dialectalinformalagriculturebusinesslifestyleTo accustom (a flock or group of farm animals, chiefly cattle or sheep) to a piece of pastureland.

    • For I had been "hefting" (as the business is called in our Galloway land) a double score of lambs which had just been brought from a neighbouring lowland farm to summer upon our scanty upland pastures. Now it is the nature of sheep to return if they can to their mother-hill, or, at least, to stray farther and farther off, seeking some well-known landmark. So, till such new-comers grow satisfied and "heft" (or attach) themselves to the soil, they must be watched carefully both night and day.
  • 2

    dialectalinformalagriculturebusinesslifestyleTo establish or settle (someone) in an occupation or place of residence.

    • [I]t may be as well that Alan and you do not meet till he is hefted as it were to his new calling.
  • 3

    dialectalinformalagriculturebusinesslifestyleTo establish or plant (something) firmly in a place; to fix, to root, to settle.

    • […] I hae heard him say, that the root of the matter was mair deeply hafted in that wild muirland parish than in the Canogate of Edinburgh.
  • 4

    dialectalinformalagriculturebusinesslifestyleOf a thing: to establish or settle itself in a place.

heftverb詞源 4/hɛft/

  • 1

    dialectalinformalagriculturebusinesslifestyleTo cause (milk) to be held in a cow's udder until the latter becomes hard and swollen, either by not milking the cow or by stopping up the teats, to make the cow look healthy; also, to cause (a cow) to have an udder in this condition.

    • You also see the impropriety of hefting or holding the milk in cows until the udder is distended much beyond its ordinary size, for the sake of shewing its utmost capacity for holding milk, a device which all cow-dealers, and indeed every one who has a cow for sale in a market, scrupulously uses. […] [E]very farmer is surely aware, or ought to be aware, that the person who purchases a hefted cow on account of the magnitude of its udder exhibited in the market, gains nothing by the device; because, when the cow comes into his possession, she will never be hefted, and, of course, never shew the greatest magnitude of udder, and never, of course, confer the benefit for which she was bought in preference to others with udders in a more natural state. If, then, purchasers derive no benefit from hefting, because they do not allow hefting, why do they encourage so cruel and afterwards injurious practice in dealers?
    • The heavy udders of hefted cows trailed on the ground, dripping milk on the greensward. Stray cattle ate the rich grass.
  • 2

    dialectalinformalagriculturebusinesslifestyleTo cause (urine) to be held in a person's bladder.

heftnoun詞源 5/hɛft/

  • 1

    dialectalinformalagriculturebusinesslifestyleA number of sheets of paper fastened together, as to form a book or a notebook.

  • 2

    dialectalinformalagriculturebusinesslifestyleA part of a serial publication; a fascicle, an issue, a number.

    • Such an organ is now to be published by the house of J[oseph] Ricker, in Giessen, Ephemeris für Semitische Epigraphik, edited by Dr. Mark Lidzbarki.^([sic]) […] The size of the "hefts" will depend on the material requiring attention, and the annual volume is to cost about 15 marks.

這個拼法也被記錄為下列字的變化形:

資料來源:英文維基詞典 English WiktionaryCC BY-SA 4.0)。 原文照列,未經改寫。