purchase: [13] To purchase something is etymologically to ‘hunt it down’. It comes from Old French pourchacier ‘pursue’, hence ‘try to obtain’, a compound verb formed from the intensive prefix pour- and chacier ‘pursue’ (source of English chase). It arrived in English meaning ‘obtain’. This sense had virtually died out by the end of the 17th century, but not before it had evolved in the 14th century to ‘buy’. => chase
purchase (v.)
c. 1300, "acquire, obtain; get, receive; procure, provide," also "accomplish or bring about; instigate; cause, contrive, plot; recruit, hire," from Anglo-French purchaser "go after," Old French porchacier "search for, procure; purchase; aim at, strive for, pursue eagerly" (11c., Modern French pourchasser), from pur- "forth" (possibly used here as an intensive prefix; see pur-) + Old French chacier "run after, to hunt, chase" (see chase (v.)).
Originally to obtain or receive as due in any way, including through merit or suffering; specific sense of "acquire for money, pay money for, buy" is from mid-14c., though the word continued to be used for "to get by conquest in war, obtain as booty" up to 17c. Related: Purchased; purchasing.
purchase (n.)
c. 1300, purchas, "acquisition, gain;" also, "something acquired or received, a possession; property, goods;" especially "booty, spoil; goods gained by pillage or robbery" (to make purchase was "to seize by robbery"). Also "mercenary soldier, one who fights for booty." From Anglo-French purchace, Old French porchaz "acquisition, gain, profit; seizing, plunder; search pursuit, effort," from Anglo-French purchaser, Old French porchacier (see purchase (v.)).
From early 14c. as "endeavor, effort, exertion; instigation, contrivance;" late 14c. as "act of acquiring, procurement." Meaning "that which is bought" is from 1580s. The sense of "hold or position for advantageously applying power" (1711) is extended from the nautical verb meaning "to haul or draw (especially by mechanical power)," often used in reference to hauling up anchors, attested from 1560s. Wif of purchase (early 14c.) was a term for "concubine."
双语例句
1. Purchase tax was not payable on goods for export.
出口商品不需要交购买税。
来自柯林斯例句
2. Investors can borrow an amount equal to the property's purchase price.
投资者可以获得与房产购买价格相等的借款额。
来自柯林斯例句
3. When her deal is done, the client emerges with her purchase.
交易完成后，委托人会出现并将她购买的东西交给她。
来自柯林斯例句
4. I couldn't get any purchase with the screwdriver on the damn screws.
我用螺丝刀拧那些该死的螺丝钉时一点也使不上劲儿。
来自柯林斯例句
5. Some of the receipts had been for the purchase of cars.
