- 1（古語）少女、年輕女子，常指女僕、酒館女侍；也曾帶有輕蔑、指風塵女子的意思。現在只出現在古典文學、奇幻／海盜題材，或朋友間開玩笑，實際稱呼女性會冒犯人。
'Wench' is an old word for a girl or a young woman, very often one working as a servant — a kitchen wench, a serving wench in an inn. You will meet it in Shakespeare, in old ballads, and in historical novels, and in Shakespeare's time it could be , the way an older person might say 'lass' or 'my girl'. It has not been ordinary English for a very long time. Today it survives in three places: in old texts you read at school; in fantasy games, pirate films, and medieval-themed restaurants, where 'serving wench' is part of the costume; and in joking modern use between friends, where a man might call a woman 'wench' as a deliberate old-fashioned joke. That last one is risky. Alongside 'young woman', the word also carried the meaning of a woman of low morals or a prostitute, and it treats a woman as a servant and as something to look at. Even said in fun, plenty of women dislike it. Read it, understand it, enjoy it in Shakespeare — but a should not use it to address a real person.
組成A shortened form of Middle English 'wenchel', meaning a child, from Old English 'wenċel' (child, servant). The older root idea is of something unsteady or wavering — a child being seen as weak or not yet steady.
原始詞典資料9 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，摘錄並精簡格式，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。
wenchnoun/wɛnt͡ʃ/
- 1
offensivearchaicdialectalA girl or young woman, especially a buxom or lively one.
- Jane played the role of a wench in an Elizabethan comedy.
- I, like a tẽder harted vvench, ſkriked out for feare of the divell.
- 2
offensivearchaicdialectalA girl or young woman, especially a buxom or lively one.
- The woman is a brazen, hard-looking wench, a female pedlar, who hawks needles, thread, cheap looking-glasses, pious pictures, almanacs, hair-pins, ballads, of the most humble pattern, through the country.
- 3
archaicdialectalUsed as a term of endearment for a female person, especially a wife, daughter, or girlfriend: darling, sweetheart.
- When I am dead, good Wench, / Let me be vs'd with Honor; ſtrew me ouer / With Maiden Flowers, that all the world may know / I was a chaſte Wife, to my Graue: [...]
- The mother held her tight, / Saying hard between her teeth—'Why wench, why wench, / The squire speaks to you now—the squire's too good; / He means to set you up, and comfort us. / Be mannerly at least.'
- 4
archaicA woman servant; a maidservant.
- When they had kyndled a fyre in the myddes of the palys / and were sett doune to gedder / Peter alsoo sate doune amonge them. And won off the wenches / as he sate / beholde him by the light and sett goode eyesight on him / and sayde: This same was also with hym. Then he denyed hym sayinge: Woman I knowe hym nott.
- "I fear there is a chase; I think I hear three or four galloping together; I am sure I hear more horses than one." / "Pooh, pooh, it is the wench of the house that is clattering to the well in her pattens; […]."
- 5
archaicA promiscuous woman; a mistress (“other woman in an extramarital relationship”).
- 2 [Friar Bernardine]. Thou haſt committed— / Bar[abas]. Fornication? but that was in another Country; And beſides, the Wench is dead.
- Whilſt Men have theſe Ambitious Fancies, / And wanton Wenches read Romances, / Our Sex will—What? out with it: Lye: / And Theirs in equal Strains reply.
- 6
archaicA prostitute.
- 7
archaichistoricalA black woman (of any age), especially if in a condition of servitude.
- Nancy Basset, 28, likely wench, mulatto / Proved to be free. / Certified free as per General Birch Certificate. / / Patience Jackson, 23, very likely wench, mulatto / Says she was born free Rhode Island. / Certified free as per General Birch Certificate.
- Now, I bought a gal once, when I was in the trade,—a tight, likely wench she was, too, and quite considerable smart— [...]
wenchverb/wɛnt͡ʃ/
- 1
archaicTo frequent prostitutes; to whore; also, to womanize.
- This is ſure ſome hide-bound ſtudent, that proportions his expence by his penſion; and wencheth at Tottenham court for ſtewed prunes and cheeſcakes.
- He [a man under the influence of the planet Mars] hath a marke or ſcar in his face, is broad-ſhouldered, a ſturdy ſtrong body, being bold and proud, given to mocke, ſcorne, quarrell, drinke, game and wench: which you may eaſily know by the Signe he is in; if in the houſe of ♀ he wencheth, if in ☿s he ſteals, [...]
- 2
archaicTo act as a wench.
- λαικάζω (laikázō), to wench
摘錄自 英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary，已精簡格式；依 CC BY-SA 4.0 授權使用，改動後的內容同樣以此授權提供。