Краткий курс лекций по лексикологии английского языка для студентов неязыковых вузов. Москалёва Е.В. - 71 стр.

                  1) the material of which an object is made may become
            the name of the object, e.g. a glass, boards, iron etc;
                  2) the name of the place may become the name of the
            people or of an object placed there, e.g. the House – members of
            Parliament, Fleet Street – bourgeois press, the White House – the
            Administration of the USA etc;
                  3) names of musical instruments may become names of
            musicians, e.g. the violin, the saxophone;
                  4) the name of some person may become a common
            noun, e.g. “boycott” was originally the name of the Irish family
            who were so much disliked by their neighbours that they did not
            mix with them, “sandwich” was named after Lord Sandwich who
            was a gambler. He did not want to interrupt his game and had his
            food brought to him while he was playing cards between two
            slices of bread not to soil his fingers;
                  5) names of inventors very often become terms to denote
            things they invented, e.g. “watt”, “om”, “rentgen” etc;
                  6) some geographical names can also become common
            nouns through metonymy, e.g. holland (linen fabrics), Brussels (a
            special kind of carpets), china (porcelain), astrakhan (a sheep fur)
            etc.
                  Elevation is a transfer of the meaning when it becomes
            better in the course of time, e.g. “knight” originally meant “a
            boy”, then “a young servant”, then “a military servant”, then “a
            noble man”. Now it is a title of nobility given to outstanding
            people, “marshal” originally meant “a horse man” now it is the
            highest rank etc.
                  Degradation is a transfer of the meaning when it becomes
            worse in the course of time. It is usually connected with nouns
            denoting common people, e.g. “villain” originally meant
            “working on villa” now it means “a scoundrel”.
                  Hyperbole is a transfer of the meaning when the speaker
            uses exaggeration, e.g. “to hate” (doing something), (not to see
            somebody) “for ages”.
                  Hyperbole is often used to form phraseological units, e.g.
            “to make a mountain out of a molehill”, “to split hairs” etc.

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