Talk:sparling

RFM discussion: October 2023–October 2024

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sparling, sperling, spirling, spurling

This, that and the other (talk) 09:58, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

Keep as is. Each entry has some unique definition or other feature. DCDuring (talk) 15:04, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring what makes you think the entries are correct? I find it hard to believe these are four clearly distinguishable terms. This, that and the other (talk) 21:27, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

They must be correct or else you would have challenged one or all of them at RfV. DCDuring (talk) 01:16, 2 October 2024 (UTC)

Well, WF did RFV sparling and spurling, but perhaps he didn't find the other two entries.

Anyway, you've prompted me to do a deeper dive into these words. It gets a little confusing, because smelt and young herring are both primarily of interest as bait fish, but here's what I was able to come up with:

• sparling currently has senses "smelt" (no labels), "young salmon" (no labels) and "tern" (Scotland). The etymology is at this entry. I ran out of time to look for cites of this form.
• sperling currently has senses "smelt" (UK dialect) and "young herring" (US dialect). I can find US/Canada uses where it means "small herring" (e.g. [1] [2] a mention) and Scottish texts where it means "smelt" ([3] [4] [5]) - although this spelling seems rather rare in the Scottish context.
• spirling currently has one sense, "sparling" (UK dialect). I can find US uses where it means "small herring" (e.g. [6] [7]) and Scottish texts where it means "smelt" ([8] [9]).
• spurling currently has senses "tern" (UK dialect, obsolete) and "smelt" (no labels). This one is harder to find, but I can find a US use where it means "smell herring" ([10]) and another unclear use ([11]). In this Scottish text the meaning is unclear ([12]) but this indexer concluded that Robert Chester used it to mean "smelt" ([13]).

For none of the forms did I find anything relating to terns.

All this leads me to conclude that we should just pick one entry as the primary form, and make all others {{alternative form of|en|...}}. This, that and the other (talk) 02:23, 2 October 2024 (UTC)

I think this is  Done. Sparling does not appear to be used in the US, so I made sperling the main form for the latter two spellings. I'm RFV'ing the "young salmon" sense at sparling. This, that and the other (talk) 05:29, 18 October 2024 (UTC)