pity: [13] Latin pius ‘pious’, an adjective of unknown origin which gave English expiate and pious, had a noun derivative pietās. This has come into English in three distinct forms. First to arrive, more or less contemporaneously, were pity and piety [13], which were borrowed from respectively Old French pite and piete. These both developed from Latin pietās, and were originally synonymous, but they became differentiated in meaning before they arrived in English.
The Italian descendant of the Latin noun was pietà, which English took over in the 17th century as a term for a ‘statue of Mary holding the body of the crucified Christ’. Vulgar Latin *pietantia, a derivative of pietās, meant ‘charitable donation’. It has given English pittance [13]. => expiate, piety, pious, pittance
pity (n.)
early 13c., from Old French pite, pitet "pity, mercy, compassion, care, tenderness; pitiful state, wretched condition" (11c., Modern French pitié), from Latin pietatem (nominative pietas) "piety, loyalty, duty" (see piety). Replaced Old English mildheortness, literally "mild-heartness," itself a loan-translation of Latin misericordia. English pity and piety were not fully distinguished until 17c. Transferred sense of "grounds or cause for pity" is from late 14c.
pity (v.)
"to feel pity for," late 15c., from Old French pitier and from pity (n.). Related: Pitied; pitying.
双语例句
1. She summoned up all her pity for him, to smother her self-pity.
她抑制着心中的自怜，将满腔的怜悯之情都倾注在了他的身上。
来自柯林斯例句
2. Leo went on, his dark eyes wide with pity and concern.
利奥接着说下去，他的黑眼睛瞪得大大的，充满怜悯和关切。
来自柯林斯例句
3. Supposedly his last words to her were: "You must not pity me."
据说他对她说的最后一句话是：“别怜悯我。”
来自柯林斯例句
4. She knew that she was an object of pity among her friends.
她知道自己是朋友们同情的对象。
来自柯林斯例句
5. The pity of it was that the Americans didn't play cricket.