vast

英 [vɑ?st] 美[v?st]

反義詞

CET4TEM4IELTS考研TOEFLCET6中頻詞核心詞匯

比較級:?vaster;最高級:?vastest;名詞:?vastness;

vast 遼闊的

來自拉丁語vastus,荒廢的，空無的，引申詞義遼闊的，無垠的，詞源同vain,waste.

vast: vast: [16] Latin vastus originally meant ‘empty, unoccupied, deserted’. The sense ‘huge’, in which English borrowed it, is a secondary semantic development. Another metaphorical route took it to ‘ravaged, destroyed’, in which sense it lies behind English devastate and waste.
=> devastate, waste
vast (adj.): 1570s, "being of great extent or size," from Middle French vaste, from Latin vastus "immense, extensive, huge," also "desolate, unoccupied, empty." The two meanings probably originally attached to two separate words, one with a long -a- one with a short -a-, that merged in early Latin (see waste (v.)). Meaning "very great in quantity or number" is from 1630s; that of "very great in degree" is from 1670s. Very popular early 18c. as an intensifier. Related: Vastly; vastness; vasty.

1. In the cities vast crowds have been demonstrating for change.: 在城市里，大批的人群舉行示威游行，要求進行變革。

2. Portugal and Spain had possessed vast empires that waxed and waned.: 葡萄牙和西班牙都曾是經歷了興衰的大帝國。

3. This vast archive has been indexed and made accessible to researchers.: 這個存量巨大的檔案室的所有文件都已編了索引，可供研究人員使用。

4. The pollution has already turned vast areas into a wasteland.: 污染已經使大片地區淪為不毛之地。

5. Compact discs have brought about a vast improvement in recorded sound quality.: 激光唱片極大地提高了錄音的音質。