chair: [13] Chair comes ultimately from Greek kathédrā ‘seat’ (source also of cathedral, of course), which was a compound originally meaning literally ‘something for sitting down on’ – it was formed from katá- ‘down’ and *hed- ‘sit’. It produced Latin cathedra, which in Old French became chaiere, the source of the English word.
The use of chair specifically for the seat occupied by someone presiding at a meeting dates from the mid 17th century, and its metaphorical extension to the person sitting in it, as symbolizing his or her office – as in ‘address one’s remarks to the chair’ – is virtually contemporary (‘The Chair behaves himself like a Busby amongst so many schoolboys’, Thomas Burton’s Diary, 23 March 1658); but its use as a synonym for chairperson, to avoid a distinction on grounds of sex, is a late 20th-century development. => cathedral
chair (n.)
early 13c., chaere, from Old French chaiere "chair, seat, throne" (12c.; Modern French chaire "pulpit, throne;" the more modest sense having gone since 16c. with variant form chaise), from Latin cathedra "seat" (see cathedral).
Figurative sense of "authority" was in Middle English, of bishops and professors. Meaning "office of a professor" (1816) is extended from the seat from which a professor lectures (mid-15c.). Meaning "seat of a person presiding at meeting" is from 1640s. As short for electric chair from 1900.
chair (v.)
mid-15c., "install in a chair or seat" (implied in chairing), from chair (n.); meaning "preside over" (a meeting, etc.) is attested by 1921. Related: Chaired.
例文
1. He sat penitently in his chair by the window.
彼は窓際の椅子に悔しそうに座っていた。
2.Bob slid from his chair and lay prone on the floor.
ボブは椅子から滑り落ち、床に腹ばいになった。
3.Use your lunch hour to have a nap in your chair .
昼食時間を利用して椅子に座って居眠りしましょう。
4.Alistair saw the dim figure of Rose in the chair .
アリステアは椅子に座っているローズのぼんやりした姿を見た。
5.I staggereed and had to clutch at a chair for support.