• vt. 減輕；使緩和；使平靜

古英語前綴a-, 放下，離開，來自PIE *uz, 詞源同out ，此處受前綴al- 影響俗化. 單詞lay,放置。

allay

allay: [OE] In Old English, alecgan meant literally ‘lay aside’ (-a ‘away, aside, out’, lecgan ‘lay’). The more recent senses ‘relieve, mitigate’ developed from the 13th to the 15th centuries owing to the influence of two formally similar Old French verbs: aleger ‘lighten’ (from Latin alleviāre, source of English alleviate [15]); and al(e)ier ‘qualify, moderate’ (source of English alloy).
=> lay

allay (v.)

Old English alecgan "to put down, remit, give up," a Germanic compound (cognates: Gothic uslagjan, Old High German irleccan, German erlegen), from a- "down, aside" + lecgan "to lay" (see lay).

Early Middle English pronunciations of -y- and -g- were not always distinct, and the word was confused in Middle English with various senses of Romanic-derived alloy and allege, especially the latter in an obsolete sense of "to lighten," from Latin ad- "to" + levis (see lever).

Amid the overlapping of meanings that thus arose, there was developed a perplexing network of uses of allay and allege, that belong entirely to no one of the original vbs., but combine the senses of two or more of them. [OED]

The double -l- is 17c., a mistaken Latinism. Related: Allayed; allaying.

1. He did what he could to allay his wife's fears.

他竭盡所能來消除妻子的各種恐懼。

來自柯林斯例句

2. The police tried to allay her fears but failed.

警察力圖減輕她的恐懼,但是沒有收到什么效果.

來自《簡明英漢詞典》

3. They are trying to allay public fears about the spread of the disease.

他們正竭力減輕公眾對這種疾病傳播的恐懼.

來自《簡明英漢詞典》

4. Despite its condescension toward the Bennet family, the letter begins to allay Elizabeth's prejudice against Darcy.

盡管這封信對班納特家的態度很高傲, 但它開始消除伊麗莎白對達西的偏見.

來自《簡明英漢詞典》

5. Father helped to allay her fears.

父親幫助她消除恐懼.

來自辭典例句