Template:etymon/documentation

Uses Lua:

• Module:etymon
• Module:etymon/styles.css

This template may be used in Wiktionary entries to indicate a term's immediate ancestor. Note that generally, an "etymon" can refer to any kind of etymological ancestor, but on this page, "etymon" will be used specifically for an immediate ancestor. For example, the etymon of English nexus is Latin nexus, and the etymon of Latin nexus is Latin nectō. Terms can have multiple etymons, so the etymons of English toothbrush are both tooth and brush. Even if the etymology of a term is completely unknown, this template may still be useful.

Current features: automatic categorization, tree generation, text generation (experimental).

Usage

Suppose that the etymon of English pay is set to Middle English payen, and the etymon of payen is set to Old French paiier. The template is then able to intelligently connect pay and paiier, even though they are two steps apart. The template thus reduces duplication across entries by making it unnecessary to manually specify that pay and paiier are connected.

To do this, the etymology ID must be specified at every step along the away. Otherwise, there is ambiguity between homographs: when we write pay is from paiier, we really mean pay in the sense "to give money", not "to cover the bottom of a vessel with tar or pitch" (which has a completely different origin). The only way to ensure that the template is able to traverse these etymological chains without getting confused is to ensure that both senses of pay are given unique IDs which allow them to be distinguished. This mirrors the practice of the OED, which identifies these two pays as 1139292520 and 4272270366, respectively. However, unlike in the OED, the identifier should be a word or short phrase which summarizes the definition of the term rather than a meaningless string of numbers. In the case of pay, the two IDs might be give money and smear.

Parameters

The template takes the following parameters:

|1= (required)

The language code of the current entry.

|id= (required)

The etymology ID. This parameter also creates an anchor to the current section. For example, if the template at English father is {{etymon|en|id=male parent}}, this etymology section is directly linked to by father#English: male parent. The ID must have at least two characters and must not be the same as the page title.

|title=

This parameter manually overrides the current page title. For example, if an etymology tree is created at Latin pōnō (located at pono) it is necessary to specify |title=pōnō to ensure that the macrons are displayed.

|pos=

Indicates the part of speech of the current entry, which allows descendants to intelligently categorize themselves. Current allowed values are: prefix, suffix, interfix, infix, root.

|exnihilo=

If set to anything, adds the entry to the category <language> terms coined ex nihilo.

|tree=

If set to anything, displays an etymology tree.

|text= [EXPERIMENTAL]

If set to anything, displays some text describing the etymology. The text modes are: 1 (all steps, no glossary links; the default), - (single step, no glossary links), + (single step, glossary links), and ++ (all steps, glossary links).

|2=, |3=, ...

These are the etymon parameters. Each etymon parameter can be either an etymon, a confidence keyword, or a derivation keyword. There can be any number of etymon parameters.

Etymons

Etymons must be written using the following format: languagecode>term>id. For example: en>pay>give money represents English pay (etymology 1). As a shortcut, it is possible to omit the language code (i.e., just writing pay>give money). In this case, the template will assume that the language is the same as the one set in |1=. Note that if a given word lacks a page entry, the ID ? may be passed in to avoid throwing an invalid ID error.

Confidence keywords

Each confidence keyword applies to all the etymons that follow it. A confidence keyword is reset by another confidence keyword or a derivation keyword.

• conf: (default) short for "confident".
• unc: short for "uncertain". Note that discredited, dubious, or speculative etymologies should not be added to the template at all.

Derivation keywords

Each derivation keyword applies to all the etymons that follow it. A derivation keyword is reset by another derivation keyword. For example, |inh|etymon1|etymon2|bor|etymon3|etymon4 means that a term is inherited from both etymon1 and etymon2 and also borrowed from both etymon3 and etymon4.

• from: (default) unspecified derivation type within a language. Corresponds with {{from}}, as well as a wide variety of miscellaneous derivations including {{clipping}}, {{deverbal}}, {{back-formation}}, and others.
• der: short for "derived". Used when a term is borrowed from another language, but may have been altered in some way. Corresponds with {{derived}}.
• bor: short for "borrowed". Used when a term is borrowed from another language directly. Corresponds with {{borrowed}}.
• lbor: short for "learned borrowing". Used when a term is borrowed from another language directly, but done intentionally rather than through normal language contact. Correponds to {{learned borrowing}}.
• slbor: short for "semi-learned borrowing". Used for a learned borrowing which is reshaped somewhat. Corresponds with {{semi-learned borrowing}}.
• obor: short for "orthographic borrowing". Used for orthographic borrowings. Corresponds with {{orthographic borrowing}}.
• inh: short for "inherited". Used when a term comes directly from the parent language unchanged. Corresponds with {{inherited}}.
• calque: used for calques. Corresponds with {{calque}}.
• sl: used for semantic loans. Corresponds with {{semantic loan}}.
• af: short for "affix". Used for compounds, affixation, and any other template where a "+" is involved. The keywords af and afeq are unique in that the order matters: |af|etymon1|etymon2 means etymon1 + etymon2, while |af|etymon2|etymon1 means etymon2 + etymon1, which would be an entirely different word. Corresponds with {{affix}}, {{compound}}, and others.
• blend: used for blends. Corresponds with {{blend}}.
• afeq: short for "equivalent affix". For example, English childhood is from Middle English childhode, but is equivalent to child +‎ -hood. Any etymons associated with this parameter are ignored entirely, besides categorization. Corresponds with {{affix}}, {{compound}}, and others.
• influence: used when a term is influenced in some way by another. For example, the modern meaning of English discomfit is influenced by the unrelated word discomfort. This does not correspond with any existing template.

Using a keyword not on this list will produce an error.

Trees

If the parameter |tree=1 is set, an etymology tree is inserted.

Per an April 2024 vote, each language community decides when it is appropriate to show a tree on a particular entry. Additionally, trees should not be displayed for clear open compounds like United States of America.

Examples

{{etymon|en|id=male parent|inh|enm>fader>father}} (on English father)

This means: father is inherited from Middle English fader.

{{etymon|ine-pro|id=father|af|unc|*peh₂->protect|*-tḗr>agent noun}} (on Proto-Indo-European *ph₂tḗr)

This means: *ph₂tḗr might come from *peh₂ + *-tḗr. In this case, the etymons are associated with both the derivation keyword "af" and the confidence keyword "unc". Note that since the language is not specified for either etymon, the template assumes that the two etymons are ine-pro (Proto-Indo-European).

{{etymon|pl|id=floor|podłożyć>put}} (on Polish podłoga)

This means: podłoga comes from Polish podłożyć. Currently, there is no keyword specifically designating a deverbal. This may be changed in the future.

See Template:etymon/testcases for test cases and more examples of use.

Categorization

The template generates various categories depending on how it is used, including the ones within:

• Category:Entries referencing etymons with invalid IDs by language
• Category:Entries with etymology trees by language
• Category:Entries with etymology texts by language

as well as various standard etymology categories (e.g. Category:English terms borrowed back into English) depending on what entries exist in the tree.

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TemplateData

This is the TemplateData documentation for this template used by VisualEditor and other tools.

TemplateData for etymon

This template may be used indicate a term's immediate ancestor(s).

Template parameters[Edit template data]

This template prefers inline formatting of parameters.

Parameter		Description	Type	Status
Language	1	The language of the current entry. Example en	String	required
Etymology ID	id	The ID of the current etymology section. Example male parent	String	required
Title	title	The title of the current entry (if different from the page title) Example father	String	optional
Etymon parameter #1	2	The first etymon parameter. Typically for derivation keyword. Example der, alternatively - enm>fader>father	String	optional
Etymon parameter #2	3	The second etymon parameter.	String	optional
Etymon parameter #3	4	The third etymon parameter.	String	optional
Etymon parameter #4	5	The fourth etymon parameter.	String	optional
Etymon parameter #5	6	The fifth etymon parameter.	String	optional
Etymon parameter #6	7	The sixth etymon parameter.	String	optional
Etymon parameter #7	8	The seventh etymon parameter.	String	optional
Etymon parameter #8	9	The eighth etymon parameter.	String	optional
Tree	tree	Set this to "1" to display a tree. Example 1	String	optional
Text	text	Automatically generates some text (experimental, see documentation). Example 1	String	optional