诺贝尔奖、图灵奖、菲尔兹奖的「奖」为什么在英文中分别是 「prize」「award」和「medal」？这三者有何区别？ 第1页

亲，乃不能这样说的……

不是先有的诺贝尔奖、图灵奖、菲尔兹奖再对应的Nobel Prize, Turing Award, Fields Medal；而是国人在将这些奖项从英语翻译到汉语时通通加了一个“奖”字儿来描述这玩意儿是个“奖项”。因为汉语对于某个奖项的表达很简单粗暴呀，就一个“奖”字儿了事儿，通俗易懂！只是变换一下奖前面的那个词儿，就可以变身各种奖了~万变不离其奖宗。

嘛……先弄清楚这个翻译当中的先后关系，咱来看看prize, award和medal的区别：

medal和prize, award的区别度还是很高的—— Fields Medal，全名 The International Medals for Outstanding Discoveries in Mathematics，medal从词义上讲，就是“奖章，勋章”的意思，从这里可以与prize和award做一个区分。一般而言，以xxx medal命名的奖项可能是以奖章作为重要的鼓励形式之一的，奖章在其中占用比较重要的地位；然而这样说也有问题，禁不起推敲，不能逆推做说发了奖章的就一定会是xxx medal（比如诺贝尔奖就包括金质奖章、证书和奖金），所以只是可能理解为在以xxx medal命名的奖项里，那块奖章的地位是比较高的。

Fields Medal 菲尔兹奖奖章

Priestley Medal 普利斯特里奖奖章

区分了容易分辨的，再来看prize和award的区别：

同做名词时的词源：

award: late 14c., "decision after consideration," from Anglo-French award, Old French esguard, from esguarder. Meaning "something awarded" is first attested 1590s.

prize: "reward," prise (c.1300 in this sense), from Old French pris "price, value, worth; reward". As an adjective, "worthy of a prize," from 1803. The spelling with -z- is from late 16c. Prize-fighter is from 1703; prize-fight from 1730 (prize-fighter from 1785).

感觉award在词义上更偏向于“奖励”，由大家评选，给出类拔萃者一个奖励；而prize则更倾向于是“奖赏”，因达成了某件事情而得到相应的回报。

辅助理解：

prize - hard earned,
award - selected by a committee or body among competitors

an award is something you are given based on a judging process by others,
and a prize is something you can earn by meeting pre set requirements....

再贡献一个wiki神器：