ラテン語のprecarius, beg, plead, beg for mercyから、ラテン語のprecari, beg, demand, pleadから、PIE*prek, demand, pleadから、語源的にはdeprecate, prayと同じ。派生語として、寄生的、依存的、不安定、危険など。
英語の語源
precarious
precarious: [17] Precarious comes from Latin precārius (source also of English prayer), which meant ‘obtained by asking or praying’. It was originally used in English as a legal term, in which ‘obtained by asking’ had undergone a slight change in focus to ‘held through the favour of another’. This introduced the notion that the favour might be withdrawn, and that the possession was therefore uncertain, and so the adjective soon came to be used for ‘depending on chance or caprice’ and, in the 18th century, ‘risky’.
Latin precārius was derived from prex ‘prayer’, a close relative of precārī ‘ask, entreat, pray’, from which English gets pray. => pray
precarious (adj.)
1640s, a legal word, "held through the favor of another," from Latin precarius "obtained by asking or praying," from prex (genitive precis) "entreaty, prayer" (see pray). Notion of "dependent on the will of another" led to extended sense "risky, dangerous, uncertain" (1680s). "No word is more unskillfully used than this with its derivatives. It is used for uncertain in all its senses; but it only means uncertain, as dependent on others ..." [Johnson]. Related: Precariously; precariousness.
例文
1. They looked rather comical as they crawled up precarious ladders.
彼らはよろよろしたはしごを伝って登っていくので、とても滑稽に見えます。
2.He earned a precarious living as an artist.
芸術家として朝な夕な生活を送っている。
3.They eke out a precarious existence foraging in rubbish dumps.
彼らはゴミ捨て場でゴミを拾って朝な夕な生活を維持している。
4.A soldier leads a very precarious life.
軍人は非常に危険な生活を送っている。
5.Washington struck me as a precarious place from which to publish such a cerebral newspaper.