核心畫面

A loud black-and-white bird with a very long tail, hopping about with its eye on whatever small thing is lying on the ground — and, people say, carrying the shiny ones home.

magpie 的畫面可以想成一隻黑白分明、尾巴很長的鳥。牠吵,走路一跳一跳,眼睛盯著地上的小東西。傳說牠看到亮晶晶的更多收起magpie 的畫面可以想成一隻黑白分明、尾巴很長的鳥。牠吵,走路一跳一跳,眼睛盯著地上的小東西。傳說牠看到亮晶晶的就想叼回巢裡。這個字後來的用法,可以想成分別抓住了這幅畫的兩個部分:一個是「什麼都撿回家」,一個是「黑白相間的樣子」。

From the word’s history

The name is Mag, an old nickname for Margaret used for a chatterer, joined to pie, the older English word for this bird, from Latin pica. The noisiness is built into the name.

這個名字是 Mag 加 pie。Mag 是 Margaret 的小名,以前拿來指很愛講話的人。pie 是這種鳥的舊名字,來自拉丁文 pica。所以「吵」這件事,本來就寫在名字裡;英文裡偶爾有人用 magpie 形容講個不停,走的就是這條線。

Wiktionary entry 'magpie' (kaikki snapshot 3f6f69a190036ae4), supplied in this packet

Three branches

鳥本身

核心畫面本身,其他所有用法都從這裡分出去。

noun · B1

A loud black-and-white bird with a long tail, from the same family as crows. People often say that magpies pick up small shiny things and carry them off.

喜鵲

什麼都收起來的人和動作

這一組抓住畫面裡「叼東西回巢」那一半,跟顏色無關。

noun · B2

Someone who loves collecting things and keeps piles of small objects, including ones other people would throw away. It can also hint that the person quietly takes small things that are not theirs.

愛收集東西的人

黑白配色帶來的名字

這一組抓住畫面裡「顏色」那一半,跟收集完全無關。

noun · B2

A nickname for a sports club that plays in black and white, and for the players, staff and fans who belong to it. It is usually written with a capital letter, and often in the plural: the Magpies.

喜鵲軍團(黑白球衣球隊的綽號)