c. 1300, "fabulous man-like creature of enormous size," from Old French geant, earlier jaiant "giant, ogre" (12c.), from Vulgar Latin *gagantem (nominative gagas), from Latin gigas "a giant," from Greek Gigas (usually in plural, Gigantes), one of a race of divine but savage and monstrous beings (personifying destructive natural forces), sons of Gaia and Uranus, eventually destroyed by the gods. The word is of unknown origin, probably from a pre-Greek language. Derivation from gegenes "earth-born" is considered untenable.
In þat tyme wer here non hauntes Of no men bot of geauntes. [Wace's Chronicle, c. 1330]
It replaced Old English ent, eoten, also gigant (from Latin). The Greek word was used in Septuagint to refer to men of great size and strength, hence the expanded use in modern languages; in English of very tall and unusually large persons from 1550s; of persons who have any quality in extraordinary degree from 1530s. As a class of stars, from 1912. As an adjective from early 15c. Giant-killer is from 1726.
实用例句
1. A giant wildcat is being hunted after 58 lambs were butchered.
一只大野猫在捕杀了58只羊羔后遭到猎捕。
来自柯林斯例句
2. The result has been a giant leap in productivity.
其结果是生产力的大幅提高。
来自柯林斯例句
3. Fewer than a thousand giant pandas still live in the wild.
只有不到1,000只大熊猫仍然在野外生活。
来自柯林斯例句
4. A whole valley of boulders tossed higgledy-piggledy as though by some giant.
整个山谷里巨石翻滚，就像有巨人在狂扔乱掷。
来自柯林斯例句
5. Overhead cranes were lifting giant sheets of steel.
