January and May不是“一月和五月”，那是啥？

January and May

我們都知道，在英語中，January是一月，May是五月，合在一起的“January and May”可不是“一月和五月”的意思哦。該短語的正確意思是指

A marriage between a young and a much older individual.

一個年輕人和一個年長很多的人之間的婚姻。

This disparity was called January and May by Chaucer, January standing for the hoary frosts of old age and May for the young breath of spring.

這種年齡有差異的婚姻被喬叟稱為一月和五月，一月代表如白霜般年老，五月代表春天的新鮮氣息。

In Chaucer’s The Merchant’s Tale the young girl, May, marries January, a baron aged sixty. This fourteenth-century idea was transformed into December and May by the early 1600s (although January and May survived as well). December, of course, is not only cold but also comes at the end of the calendar year and so may provide a better analogy for late in life.

在喬叟的商人故事裏，年輕的女孩，梅，嫁給了詹紐瑞，一個60歲的男爵。這個14世紀的故事在17世紀早期被轉變為12月和5月(儘管1月和5月也保留了下來)。十二月，當然，不僅是寒冷的，而且是在日曆年的末尾，所以可能為晚年提供了一個更好的類比。

例：

He is 17 years older than her. It's a January and May marriage.

他比她大17歲，因此可以説他們是老夫少妻了。

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