User talk:Leasnam

Hello and welcome to Wiktioary. Thanks for your edits to Old English. Personally I find them very interesting. May I ask for the sources of your work? We have another user here gifted in Old English - User:Widsith - I think you and him could help each other. Below is the standard Welcome notice for Wiktionary. --Jackofclubs 00:03, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

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Formatting

Please watch your formatting. Several entries you've created have definition lines that begin with an asterisk, and this is never correct. Definition lines should always begin with a hash (#). --EncycloPetey 01:50, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

contrarywise

You're welcome. There is actually some reasonable amount of evidence for this form on Google Books, so it may well exist, but it seems to be dated or non-standard. Equinox ◑ 23:56, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

hinder-

I usually consider things like this to be hinder as a word component in a compound, rather than a prefix with a separate meaning from the word. --EncycloPetey 16:50, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

---

EncycloPetey, I left you a reply on your discussion page. I didn't know where else it might go Leasnam 16:58, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I saw it, thanks. Here is my question:

Why should a preposition be considered a "prefix" when attached to another word, if a noun is not so considered? If you have a good rationale, I'm eager to hear it. This is a huge issue with Latin, which I regularly edit. I tend to consider the addition of a preposition to the front as a regular feature that doesn't warrant a separate Prefix entry. In other words, in Latin ad + word is not the addition of a prefix, because ad is a Latin preposition. However, an English word formed this way (not from a Latin source word) would be considered to have a prefix (deprecated template usage) ad-, because ad is not a preposition in English. --EncycloPetey 17:01, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Category:Old English affixes

Hi,

Please don't add individual affixes to this category. Affixes should go in the specific category they belong to (e.g., Category:Old English suffixes).

Thanks,
—Ruakh_TALK 22:38, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Also, please don't use {{etyl|ang}} in etymologies of Old English words; that's for etymologies of Modern English words that come from Old English words. Thanks again. —Ruakh_TALK 23:08, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

(f)niezen

In modern Dutch the f is gone: niezen or niezen. I'm not quite sure when that happened, I think I saw the f-form in Weiland's dictionary (1811 or so) but I'm not sure. Jcwf 04:25, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Apparently it was still used in 1840 or so and today it is still used in the Dutch dialects we call Westfries (not: the language of Friesland) vid.

Latin dialect templates

Per WT:RFDO#Dialect etymology templates, the separate dialect templates ({{VL.}}, {{ML.}}, {{LL.}}) will be deleted. Please use the more functional and standard {{etyl}} approach ({{etyl|VL.}}, {{etyl|ML.}}, {{etyl|LL.}}). The template parameters work just the same. Thanks. --Bequw → ¢ • τ 15:16, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

docga

Where on earth did you get this etymology from? The origin of docga is one of the most famous unsolved mysteries in etymology: I've seen many theories (though not this one), but I'm pretty sure there is no consensus. Ƿidsiþ 22:54, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

@Leasnam Although my interest has initially been in the area of Celtic and Pre-Celtic etymology, I am however aware that care is needed in presenting Cornish origins of lexemes, unless their meanings are indigenous to the area, as with gull - as Cornwall, (although that is where I live) is tucked away far from most of England - and hence not likely to be a borrowing source; but your first part of the etymology is one of the most unique and helpful derivations I have seen in Wiktionary - far more likely than the conjectured unfounded assumption that I once had, that its origin was possibly related to Ancient Greek δάκνω (dakno) "to bite"! Kind regards. Andrew H. Gray 09:41, 31 January 2017 (UTC)Andrew talk

scripts

Whenever you add romanised Gothic (or Sanskrit) cognates to the etymology of (Old) English entries, please add {{rfscript|Gothic}} or {{rfscript|Devanagari}}, so that other editors capable of rendering them in the due script, may notice it. The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 17:58, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

crier#Old French

A small thing, instead of {{etyl|la}} you need to put {{etyl|la|fro}} for the correct categorization, otherwise it's listed as an English word derived from Latin. Still, all help appreciated, thanks! Mglovesfun (talk) 18:21, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Linking to unattested terms

Thanks for all the Etymology work. A note, we never link to unattested terms. For instance instead of *''[[bunni#Frankish|bunni]]'' "that which is bound" one should write *{{term||bunni|that which is bound}}. Let me know if you have questions. --Bequw → τ 06:13, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

stound

You've done some great work here, but it needs a bit of cleaning up. The Noun/Verb sections should be nested inside the Etymology sections (you can always have another etymology section for "unknown etymology" if you need). Thanks for your time, you can read WT:ELE for the detailed policy. Conrad.Irwin 13:22, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Wiktionary:About Middle English

Would seem to me like a good idea. See also Wiktionary:About Old English. Mglovesfun (talk) 15:36, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Me too. Let me kick it around in my head and see if we can't get something of quality put out there :) Leasnam 15:40, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

æ, ä

Hello. Whenever you use sources lacking proper Danish letters and diacritical signs such as æ, ø and replacing them with Ersatz-symbols such as ä, ö, please render the proper letters. Do not transmit the incorrect symbol as in this edit. Your collaboration on etymologies is appreciated. The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 20:38, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Sorry about that. The source I was using actually had it wrong; I should have caught it :\ Leasnam 20:55, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

A few minor things

Regarding etymologies, please use primary codes like {{de}} and {{nl}} instead of {{deu}} and {{nld}}. Also, when you copy etymologies from one entry to another (which is fine, I do it very often) please remember to change to language codes, from example from fr to it. It's not a major problems, but we end up with Italian words in [[Category:fr:Latin derivations]], which clearly, is to be avoided. PS see my talk page for hadir. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:52, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Appendix:ISO 639-1 Leasnam 21:15, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Also, please don't use IE for Indo-European as most users won't know what it means. Most of them will think of Internet Explorer. Mglovesfun (talk) 13:18, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

guèder

Where does guèder come from? It looks very suspect - French verbs don't have -èder at the end --Rising Sun talk? contributions 22:58, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I found it on French Wiktionnaire (http://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/gu%C3%A8der) as an obsolete/archaic spelling of guéder Leasnam 23:00, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

OK, I can see a few on Google Books. Looking closely, it seems there was a big spelling change in the 1800s, moving away from è-er to é-er. Good to know --Rising Sun talk? contributions 23:05, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Etymology - formatting

In this series of edits, you have moved etymology glosses out of the {{term}} template.

An example of previous formatting:

• {{term|bewrayen||to betray|lang=enm}}

An example of your formatting:

• {{term|bewrayen|lang=enm}} "to betray, reveal, disclose"

The common practice in English Wiktionary is to enter glosses as parameters of {{term}} instead of moving them out. --Dan Polansky 12:41, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Ok. I have picked up this habit (maybe a bad one) from other users' edits, but I haven't been told hitherto that the practise was necessarily incorrect for the gloss. I kept it because I oftentimes add the earliest cognate with its modern equivalent beside it in this fashion--eg. Old High German ruogen "to accuse" (German rügen "to reprimand"), which looks really odd when both definitions are also in parentheses. But I can stop. Leasnam 14:58, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

(To be honest, I wish you wouldn't do that. By preference, English words should show modern cognates; OHG is better off as a cognate in the Old English entries. Otherwise it just gets overcrowded. Ƿidsiþ 15:05, 11 May 2010 (UTC))

Ok. Makes sense. Leasnam 15:16, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Not only can I stop, but I will remediate them. I don't necessarily like the look, but I'll get over it :) Leasnam 15:06, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Thank you. --Dan Polansky 16:16, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

No problem. As far as the OHG with modern words, I think I may still need them in a few instances, especially when forms are unattested, as in the case with Frankish, otherwise I will forlet the practise. Leasnam 16:54, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Babel box

Hello, would you would put a babel box on your page? See {{Babel}}. --Dan Polansky 08:07, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

More etymology

Hi again Lesnam. Thanks for the continued work you;re doing with OE. Two minor points, can you try and say "cognate with" rather than "akin to". "Akin to" is very old-fashioned phrasing and not used in modern writing. Secondly, can you try and limit cognates to the same forms – for example on (deprecated template usage) flitan just give the relevant verbs in other languages, not the related nouns or adjectives (see how I edited the page). Ƿidsiþ 05:23, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Sure thing. Leasnam 14:21, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks dude. Ƿidsiþ 14:43, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

sceon#Etymology 2

What part of speech is this, also a Verb? Conrad.Irwin 14:07, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

Correct. Leasnam 15:06, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for fixing it! Conrad.Irwin 15:10, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

Wiktionary:Votes/2010-04/Voting policy

Just letting you know of this surprisingly contentious vote. Input from more Wiktionarians such as yourself would be much appreciated. Thanks. – Krun 09:35, 22 May 2010 (UTC)

Old English etymologies

Question: where do you get all the Old English etymologies from? Is there a specific book or books you use? I'm just curious for myself. 140.160.111.134 21:43, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

I use a variety of online sources, the great majority of which bear back to Bosworth & Toller's Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, which I find it to be a very trustworthy source. Leasnam 20:11, 3 June 2010 (UTC)

But for the Proto-Germanic origins of Old English? 140.160.126.184 20:38, 3 June 2010 (UTC)

Why not just move it?

Why not just move the entry you just marked for deletion to one without the dotted g? Razorflame 17:36, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

You can do that? Usually, when this happens, I copy the contents of it, then paste them into a new page. I have opened one up already, but if moving it is easier...let me try that. I have never "moved" anything before. I'm still new. :) Leasnam 17:39, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

O My Gawd. that was awesome! Thank you for sharing that with me. You just saved me tons of time. Leasnam 17:41, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

No problems. Cheers, Razorflame 17:51, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

RFV

I think you already know this, but dictionary citations don't qualify for CFI, only actual "uses". Mglovesfun (talk) 22:04, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

ISO templates

Please do not insert ISO templates (like {{da}}) into etymologies. These templates should never be used unless they are subst'ed. --EncycloPetey 21:49, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

What is the workaround, just type out the language name the long way (i.e. "Danish")? Leasnam 21:58, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

It depends on what you want to do. Usually, a language name is part of the etymology, and is placed in an {{etyl}} template. --EncycloPetey 22:01, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Okay, but I have been using the code sans etyl template just to render the name as a short-cut method, usually only for cognates. I mean, this isn't a problem. It will take some getting used to, but if I must that's cool. Leasnam 22:03, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

That shouldn't be done. Use the {{etyl}} template for that. --EncycloPetey 22:06, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Oh, okay, so the etyl|da|- is still fine to use Leasnam 22:07, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Yes, the hyphen turns off the etymological categorization. --EncycloPetey 22:08, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

K, done :) Leasnam 22:09, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Length of etymologies

This is not 'policy' or anything, but I sometimes find your etymologies a bit long. Cognates are interesting, sure, but listing a dozen or so IMO is excessive. And FWIW we're trying to cut back on dictionary-style abbreviations like voc. (vocative) neut. (neuter) et al. I'm not accusing you of using them, just letting you know so you replace them with the full English words when you find them. Mglovesfun (talk) 14:23, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

k. I will continue to scale back. And I will spell out any abbreviations as I come across them. Leasnam 15:38, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

enwrap

I'm assuming this isn't really from Modern English en- +‎ wrap. Do you have more to offer? Mglovesfun (talk) 20:13, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

It comes from Middle English enwrappen, first attest c. 1382, formed as above (en + wrappen) Leasnam 20:20, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

it also means "to envelop", and "to be absorbed or engrossed in (something)" Leasnam 20:22, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

bisen

If bisen is attestable as an alternative form of bysen, it should have a full entry. You created it as a redirect, and we don't do redirects for spelling variants. This was probably when you knew less about Wiktionary policy, don't worry about it. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:58, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Ah, it might have happened when I moved the page just recently. The original entry was created as bisen, but bysen is actually the more conservative form. Anyway, I will keep this in mind. Leasnam 16:18, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

moss cognates

I have slightly edited this change of yours. We don't generally consider Old English words to be "cognate" with modern English when the Old English is etymologically ancestral. --EncycloPetey 23:02, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Old English templates

I moved your question to User talk:Mglovesfun as it wasn't a bot-related question. Cheers, Mglovesfun (talk) 08:53, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

noun forms

While there are no clearcut rules, we don't usually use 'noun forms' for languages with few inflection such as English, Middle English and Scots. For languages where there are a lot of inflections like Latin, Russian (etc.) we do. Mglovesfun (talk) 17:56, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

k. use the triple tick (e.g. word) instead? Leasnam 17:58, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

ok, I see infl|en|plural. Leasnam 18:04, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Template:enm-conj

I've started this template as Middle English conjugation is a bit too complex to have all in {{enm-verb}}. My Middle English isn't all that good, and Wikipedia (surprisingly) has no help at all. I'll need to add some clever isvalidpagename stuff once we have the initial parameters right. Cheers for your help. Mglovesfun (talk) 12:22, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

It looks good. I like how you added the alts. to the 2nd and 3rd singular present. The only things more I would add are the other moods: imperative, subjunctive; and some further elaboration on the past tense. || For the imperative singular we should use the first person singular (this will help when the stem ends in -v); imperative plural can use stem + -eth/-eþ || Subjunctive singular is same as first person singular for all persons (1, 2, 3); plural is same as indicative (all end in -en) || In the simple past it's probably best to show like this: I talkede / thou talkedest / he talkede / we, ye, thei talkeden; for past subjunctive it is: I talkede / thou talkede / he talkede / we, ye, thei talkeden. Leasnam 21:47, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Ah yes, take me back to A-Level English lessons in 2001 and 2002, that. These shouldn't be difficult changes to make, just I'm moving house and I don't know when I will have stable Internet again. I have the local library at worst. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:53, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Only entry that uses it right now is serven. Play around with the template; if you make a mistake, no biggie. Just don't do the same thing with a template used on 10 000 pages. I've learnt how to use templates purely by copying from other templates, and guessing/experimenting. Trick is to never try anything if you can't fix it easily. And since only one entry uses this template, that's the case. Mglovesfun (talk) 22:19, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

k. this is kewl. Leasnam 22:30, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Template:enm-noun/new

Hi, I've created this to replace the old enm-noun which was simply a copy-and-paste job from {{en-noun}}. The new version allows a gender, up to two plurals and up to two gentives, as well as an uncountable option. Is the word 'genitive' correct in this circumstances? For example goddes is used in Chaucer as the 'genitive' of god. I'm not sure {{Latinx}} is really necessary, as Middle English uses fewer characters of the Latin extended range than Old English does. Mglovesfun (talk) 13:38, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, genitive is the case involving what we today know as possessive and most contstructions involving the proposition of. Since we are having genitive, I would suggest also adding a dative. As in the case with the verbs, very little change happened between the Old English and Middle English noun declension. So, the headword would be the Nominative and Accusative, then there would be a Genitive, and a Dative; for singular and plural. If this is too involved, that is ok. Just a Genitive is fine. Leasnam 19:32, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Hmm not really, that would go in a 'declension table' just like for Old English nouns. The only change I want to make now is to have a default -s plural rather than only having a plural when specified. At some point I'll need to study some Early Middle English, as Chaucer is Late Middle English. I don't know if there's anything other than nominative and genitive in Chaucer, excluding pronouns. Anyway, check enm-noun/new in about 30 minutes when I've finished, hopefully without screwing up what's already there. I'll make the switch over from enm-noun to enm-noun/new whenever I have the Internet at home - as early as Weds. Mglovesfun (talk) 13:20, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Middle English verbs

Hi, do they all end in -en apart from the few that end in -n (like seyn). Browsing Category:Middle English verbs, some of these seem to be verb forms, not verbs. Mglovesfun (talk) 10:10, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

The thing with Middle English is that there is so much variation, due to date and dialect. There are ME infinitives in the North that do not end in -en (NDialect to sing). In the North the infinitives typically have no ending, in the Midlands they typically end in -en, and in the South it is -e (or no ending, e.g. to do). -en is the one "officially" cited as the ending, and is used in most ME dictionaries. Leasnam 17:39, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

So if I'm reading Chaucer and it says thou lokest, can I safely enter the infinitive as loken, or what? Mglovesfun (talk) 17:41, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Correct. loken (or variant lokien) should be used. Looking at them I see some that should be verb forms (like chave). Others like enforme should be normalised to enformen. Leasnam 17:43, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

That's what I mean. For account, I have some doubts. Mglovesfun (talk) 17:45, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

There was a ME accounten "to reckon, value", more often accompten, but the former does exist. Leasnam 17:49, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Oh yes, as a verb account should be moved. Leasnam 17:50, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Ok, I think they're all done. Leasnam 19:09, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Proto-Germanic edits

I've undone some of the edits you've done to Proto-Germanic entries, so I think I should explain why here.

The subjunctive in -au is not a Gothic innovation. Why would you innovate on a more irregular form? That goes against common sense as well as common linguistic developments. In any case, the earlier outcome of the reconstructed PIE ending -oyh₁m̥ should in first instance have been -ajun. However, there was a sound change that eliminates -j- between vowels unless -i- precedes. So -ajun > -aun.

You added 'biranan' as alternative form of 'beranan', but what is that based on? PIE has -e-, all Germanic languages have -e-, even Gothic has -ai- before r. There is no language with -i- in that word, anywhere.

You changed all the endings for strong verbs into the weak voiceless alternants. While that works fine for West Germanic, North and East Germanic have generalised the voiced alternants (Old Norse z > r in the second person, Norse word-final þ and d merge into ð). Gothic appears not to, but there are a few instances where -uh has been attached to a verb, and the ending -iþ changes to -iduh (so the þ is just underlying d being devoiced word-finally, as is normal in Gothic). D. Ringe argues that unsuffixed presents have the voiced alternants (regular sound change outcome from PIE), and suffixed (j-presents, weak verbs) have the voiceless ones (also regular sound change outcome due to PIE suffixal accent). So that's what I've followed, and it also seems plausible because how else would West Germanic and North/East Germanic have a plausibly common source to generalise one or the other variety?

The source of Gothic -ts is a merger of Germanic -diz and -þiz, both becoming -ts by Gothic devoicing. Other sources of apparently retained -þs are due to analogical restoration within a paradigm: godaz > godz > gots > goþs (þ restored because of other forms with d [ð]).

The source of the additional suffix -a on some Gothic verbs is unknown to Ringe, but he does state that it is clear that it is a Gothic innovation, as no other Germanic language has it, anywhere. And in any case, a Germanic word-final -a would've disappeared altogether in Gothic, just like -an (a-stem accusative singular) has. So even if it did exist in Germanic, it can't be -a. —CodeCat 10:31, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

For the -au subjunctive I refer to Lehmann; it depends on who you're citing, as there are certainly to be variations that will differ. Consistency with one is more important. biranan is usually the correct form of PGmc "bear" as PIE e > PGmc i, and then becomes e again in all daughter languages (Gothic ɛ). It is the same verb class as sitanan (sit), itanan (eat), displaying the ablaut sequence i;a/ē;e (sitanan; sat/sēt-; setan-). This is a good example to use, as it shows how we have maintained the original i in "sit", but have changed to e in "eat"; "bear" as well. I am really alright with the reverts, however, there are a few that I would like to get clarification on if I may. Third person singular -idi; and third person plural in -andi - are we certain that the endings are not -iþi, -anþi (I see -nd only in sind), as the Old English -eþ, -aþ could not have come from -idi, -andi. Also, present participle -andz, OE -ende would require -anþj-. Are these all due to the strong vs weak conjugation mentioned above, or to West Gmc developments? This makes sense though and I should have considered this. My bad. Also, do you differentiate in PGmc between biranan (to bear offspring) vs biranan (to carry)? Leasnam 17:13, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

One more question, the past subjunctives using -ī-, I have also seen these represented as -ē- (procluding i-mutation). In Old English, the past subjunctives do not show i-mutation, as also in Old High German. In OHG these later become -i- and produce i-mutation in Modern German (ich wäre). What are your thoughts? Leasnam 17:23, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

PIE e only becomes PGmc i in three specific cases: 1. In an unstressed (i.e. non-initial) syllable, 2. Before a following i or j (aka umlaut or i-mutation), 3. Before syllable-final n (as in 'bindanan'). 'sitanan' is actually 'sitjanan', and the -j- is responsible for umlauting the e there. compare ON sitja, and also OE sittan where the characteristic West Germanic gemination of the -t- gives the former presence of a -j- away. The Gothic form is a regularisation, to bring it in line with other strong verbs which also have no -j-, same happened in Gothic 'ligan'.

Now about the endings. Through Verner's law, þ became d, s became z etc. when preceded by an unstressed (in PIE) syllable. After that, stress shifted to the first syllable. Since the stress patterns of the different verbs was rather variable, this would've given some verbs with voided consonants in the endings, and some with voiceless ones. Etymologically speaking, the vast majority of strong verbs would have had the voiced ones, and most weak verbs except about half of weak class 1 would've had the voiceless ones; there were exceptions in both groups though. It's not really surprising that people couldn't remember all that and will tend to regularise things by following the patterns they know: strong is voiced, weak is voiceless. So after a while those patterns were generalised. The situation you see in the various daughters of Germanic is the next step of generalisation: either the voiceless ones or the voiced ones were generalised to ALL verbs. West Germanic generalised the voiceless ones, North and East Germanic generalised the voiced ones. So it's just a matter of random chance in this case. And as for the participles, that seems to have been an exception, since there are no known examples with voiceless -þ- in a participle, except for 'kunnanan'. The ending -aþ in OE is likely to be from the original voiceless ending -anþi becoming -āþi because of the Anglo-Frisian nasal-spirant law (the same that turned tanþ- into tōþ-).

'beranan' meaning to bear offspring is really just the sense of 'carry' (a child) being extended to 'giving birth' after having carried a child. Not really a long shot if you ask me.

Past subjunctives in OHG always have -i- as far as I know, and they do in Old Norse and Gothic as well. In MHG and ON they also have umlaut; the apparent absence of umlaut in OHG is just a matter of lacking a fitting spelling system to indicate it. Why Old English lacks umlaut in past subjunctives I'm not sure, but it might just be a matter of generalising non-umlauted stems throughout the entire past. It's not really that surprising, as similar things happened in German as well (modern German only has a few umlauted past subjunctives). —CodeCat 17:50, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Ok. One of the sources I use shows PGmc biranan (to bear young) from PIE bherə- (id.) and biranan (to carry) from PIE bhere-, bhrē- (to carry). But undoubtedly, one is obviously a derivative of the other (probably bherə-). For the particple, I meant to say present particple. Otherwise, I'm good. Thank you for the explanation. Leasnam 19:19, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

One other thing, I have been using PGmc forms with i as opposed to more traditional e (e.g. biuzán rather than beuzán "beer"). Is this going to be a problem? Could we extend the template to use a linking form separate from the display form, as with other templates (like {{term}} )? Leasnam 19:23, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Was PGmc sitjanan a strong verb even though it shows a j (the j being part of the stem and not an ending)? I had seen both as sitanan and sitjanan, but assumed the latter was the weak form, somehow coalescing in OE sittan by gemminating the t from one and preserving the strong conj. from the other. Interesting. Leasnam 19:35, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

(going back to level 1 cause we're moving rather far to the right here :P ) {{proto}} doesn't support something like that I'm afraid, but I think it's best to link to the form as it would appear in the appendix anyway. So if in doubt you should link to a form with e, though beware of words where e appears from older a through umlaut in North and West Germanic.

I guess the main issue is that people have different conceptions on what Proto-Germanic is, and not everyone knows all the details about the chronology. A form like biuzán for example implies that the stress in on the last syllable. And while it originally was, Proto-Germanic is generally assumed to have the stress on the first syllable in all words. A form like that would be considered 'Pre-Proto-Germanic', which would be an unattested and unreconstructable stage of the language sometime before the Proto-Germanic stage. Proto-Germanic is by definition the latest stage common to all Germanic languages.

As for sitjanan, yes there were a few strong verbs with -j-. Those are called j-presents, and they retained that suffix from PIE. PIE distinguished mostly between basic (underived) and derived verbs, but there were certainly plenty of basic verbs with suffixes of various kinds. It seems that a few of them became class 1 weak verbs some time in the history of Proto-Germanic, but those can be recognised because the past tense lacks the linking vowel -i- that is otherwise common to class 1 weak verbs.

In any case, you should remember that every language has its oddities and irregularities; just because Proto-Germanic is reconstructed doesn't mean it wasn't a living language much like our own. Each language has innovations that set it aside from older stages, but each language also has archaic traits that have been retained as small irregular 'relics'. It is no surprise that it's usually those odd relics that disappear fairly quickly, but that's not an iron law. Just look at the verb 'to be' which kept its anomalous past tense 'were' for over a thousand years. And there is of course the fact that they disappear only in some Germanic languages, or leave traces behind, which allows us to recognise their previous existence. —CodeCat 19:57, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

spay

Please provide proper edit summaries for actions like this in future, so as to prevent things like this from happening. — Raifʻhār Doremítzwr ~ (U · T · C) ~ 20:49, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Oh, yes. Sorry. I was rushing and didn't think. Leasnam 21:00, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

'S OK. — Raifʻhār Doremítzwr ~ (U · T · C) ~ 21:25, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

spayen

Hi Leasnam. Firstly, please see User talk:Mglovesfun#Middle English spay. Regarding spayen:

1. Are you sure that the conjugation line for that Middle English verb is as it should be? I.e., is it both sufficiently accurate and complete?
2. Is there a more exhaustive conjugation table that can be added to the entry?
3. Do those quotations you've given support that spelling, or one of its alternative forms (both lack a (deprecated template usage) y)?
4. Citations:spay lists three Middle English quotations which feature this term; should they be moved to Citations:spayen or elsewhither?
5. Please provide more accurate referencing information for those quotations (as the ones at Citations:spay have).

Thanks. — Raifʻhār Doremítzwr ~ (U · T · C) ~ 14:37, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Hello. The quotations I have provided at spayen are secondary--they were obtained from a Middle English dictionary's citing of the usage found here [[1]]. I see that they are the selfsame quotes (give or take the spellings). The conj line doesn't look complete. I will add to it. There is a new conj table that can be applied. Let me see if it is ready to use. I think we can merge/move the citations from spay to spayen. Leasnam 15:17, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I've moved the Citations: page. Do you reckon we should substitute or supplement the quotations you added to the entry for spayen with the ones I added to Citations:spay? — Raifʻhār Doremítzwr ~ (U · T · C) ~ 19:25, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

We could. I have no problem doing that. Leasnam 19:26, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

OK. I think substitution would be better; the quotations seem to come from different manuscripts, so it would be incorrect to try to merge them somehow. — Raifʻhār Doremítzwr ~ (U · T · C) ~ 19:31, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Done. Leasnam 19:29, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Good job. :-)  — Raifʻhār Doremítzwr ~ (U · T · C) ~ 19:36, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

mouette

Um, Category:fr:Germanic derivations is "meant for French borrowings from Germanic languages that cannot be precisely sourced to individual Germanic languages". But in this case the source is very clear. It's already in categories for OE and Proto-Germanic derivations, so this seems unnecessary. Ƿidsiþ 05:54, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Ok. I took liberty from the "generally" part of that statement. I suppose I can use the Proto-category if I need to view them all at once. This is the only purpose for me using the {{etyl|gem-pro}}/[[Category:fr:Germanic derivations]] template (i.e. to see them). Leasnam 13:25, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

In a recent Beer Parlour discussion, there was a pretty strong consensus (among those who commented) to categorize things like Category:Old High German derivations in Category:Germanic derivations, instead of directly in Category:Etymology. Mglovesfun (talk) 16:10, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

I can see the reasoning behind this. Regardless if it is a known or unknown Germanic form, there should be a place where all are grouped together. Some may not derive from Proto-Germanic (like those that are borrowed from Latin, Greek, Celtic, etc.) Leasnam 16:13, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Alternative spellings

We no longer used the header Alternative spellings, only Alternative forms. If you use it, a bot will replace it eventually, but it's better just to not use it at all, ever. Apart from appendices, user pages (etc). Mglovesfun (talk) 16:07, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

k. I changed it besides, as I added a couple more that were certainly more than simple spelling variations. And, Good to see you back! Did u get moved in alright? Leasnam 16:09, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I quite like it here, I'm nearer to town. Mglovesfun (talk) 16:11, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Proto-Romance

Just to let you know that Proto-Romance has been merged into [[Category:Vulgar Latin derivations]]. Cheers, Mglovesfun (talk) 20:28, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

awesome! Thanks for the heads-up. Leasnam 20:29, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

tr= in {{term}}

This should only be used for transliterations. Nadando 22:46, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

(sigh), okay...I do like the flexibility it gives when needing to add a notation at that very spot...is there something else that is available for such a use? Leasnam 22:52, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

If not, I would suggest us adding one. I can certainly understand not using the tr= though. Leasnam 22:53, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

That's a good idea- I'll see about adding a note parameter. Nadando 22:57, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

Thank you!!!:) Leasnam 23:00, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

gloss= is ok. Mglovesfun (talk) 18:36, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Eel is not attested as IE

Err, since Indo-European is wholly unattested, what's the point of this edit summary? Mglovesfun (talk) 21:26, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps "attested" is not the correct word. It is not cited, or sourced as being a word of IE derivation. In fact, concensus is that it is an isolated term, uniquely occurring in Germanic. Leasnam 21:29, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Actually, attest is the right word, in the sense of "certified or held to be valid", but not in it's linguistic sense of "being evidenced". I'm a bit feverish today, so I'm a little slower than normal. Leasnam 21:39, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

to-

This is no longer a formative prefix in English. Your entries should be marked as (obsolete) or similar, or else included only in Middle English or Old English, when the prefix was still in use. The examples you've given for its use all predate Modern English. --EncycloPetey 00:16, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

I placed both the (obsolete) and non-productive qualifiers...oh, but maybe only for the first Etymology. I will add to the other. Leasnam 00:19, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Even though it is officially dead, the prefix does still have some vitality in quirky constructions seen from tim to time like toweek (= this week), tomonth, and toyear. These are non-standard of course, and I am not citing these as reasons why the prefix should remain. Leasnam 00:25, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

ambassade, etc.

This is an interesting one. A couple of things, Old French doesn't (or does not seem to) use the x apart from plurals. For example, erm 'example' is spelt essample (etc.). Also Old Occitan is the same as Old Provençal, which is {{pro}}. We should have a template for Old Italian, if we don't we should probably make one. PS these aren't criticisms, I'm just discussing things. Mglovesfun (talk) 18:35, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

I thought it odd too about the x, but that's what the source says (1352-1356 ambaxade « mission auprès d'un personnage éminent, d'un souverain » (Jean Le Bel, Chronique, I, 122 ds Chronique de Jean Le Bel, éd. J. Viard et E. Déprez, Paris, [1904-1905]). I wasn't aware of {{pro}} and Old italian (though I have been desiring those for quite some time). I will add them :) Leasnam 18:39, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

yeah, I still don't see one for Old Italian Leasnam 18:43, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Actually, the Old French is spelt both ways: ambassade as well as ambaxade. I think the former is better to use, as it is probably the more direct word from which it drew. Leasnam 18:46, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

I deleted Template:oit as I created {{etyl:roa-oit}}, where roa stands for Romance and oit for Old Italian. When a template is prefixed with etyl: it means it can only be used in combination with {{etyl}}. Unless we (someone?) considers Old Italian to be a language separate to Latin or Italian, it's not valid as a language, but it can be valid as an etymological category (see Category:Old Northern French derivations, where the same is true). So just use {{etyl|roa-oit}}. Thanks. Mglovesfun (talk) 23:56, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

sort

The point of sort= is that French dictionaries treat e, é, ê, è as the same letter with respect to alphabetical order. If I ever figure out how to do it by bot, I'd do it for every French word. Open a French dictionary if you don't believe me. Mglovesfun (talk) 00:50, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

lol, I believe you! I thought it was a mispelling...my bads Leasnam 00:52, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

Reflexives in Old English/Frisian

I was always under the impression that the Ingvaeonic languages completely lost all reflexive pronouns and adjectives. Did Old English really retain the reflexive possessive as sin? —CodeCat 22:23, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Yes. It was in dialectal use, and later replaced by the normal forms: his, hiere, hiera, etc. The true reflexive *sik ("oneself") was completely absent from Ingvaeonic, but the possessive form *sīn was present (cf. West Frisian syn "his"). Leasnam 22:27, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Allright, thanks, makes sense. Just keep in mind that West Frisian might have borrowed it from modern Dutch. Would you mind if I put a {{dialectal}} stamp on the Old English word? —CodeCat 22:30, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Yes, that's perhaps true, however there is the Old Frisian sīn ("his") as well. Not cited as being a loan from another tongue. Leasnam 22:37, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Not at all. It might also need a Usage note stating it was rarely used in prose. Leasnam 22:32, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

I have added this. Leasnam 22:49, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

I'm not clear on the details myself, but it's not uncommon for languages that lost a word to re-borrow it from a related language at a later stage. Dutch for example borrowed zich (the reflexive!) and treffen from High German after it had lost its own cognates (which would have been *zij and *drepen today, had they survived). Modern Frisian in particular is known to have been heavily influenced by its neighbours, and has re-gained several features that were missing in Old Frisian. The infinitive in -n being a prominent example. —CodeCat 22:42, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

I understand. Leasnam 22:44, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

dailiz

I'm a bit confused about the various descendants of this term. The genders and declensions don't seem to match up. It is neuter in modern Dutch and German, but masculine in Old English and Old Frisian. In OHG and OS the declensions seem to have been variable, either masculine a- or i-stem, or neuter a-stem. In Gothic it's a feminine i-stem. Can you make any sense of this? —CodeCat 11:18, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

I was aware that Old High German was masculine and/or neuter, figuring that the Modern form was a confluence of the twain. This would seem to connect at least part of the word. In Old English the declension was variable, being an i-stem (pl. dǣle) or -a stem due to levelling (dǣlas). Not certain at this point about Old Frisian, but I wager that the same process affecting Old English levelling may have also affected Old Frisian, Old Frisian being attested somewhat later than OE in most respects (i.e. we may have lost the original OFs i-stem forms). The Gothic form is feminine, and this is why I labelled *dailiz as masculine or feminine (g=m, g2=f). I knew there was no way to correctly include Norse. Perhaps we might end up splitting this entry into 3: one for English/Frisian/and OHG teil (m.); one for Dutch and Old English dāl and German Teil (n.); and one for Old Norse. I am certainly open to thoughts from you in this regard, as I know you have substantial knowledge in this field. I was only attempting to consolidate as much as could be to limit endless entries for each variant form. Leasnam 17:11, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Do you have a clue on what the gender of Old Dutch deil is? Leasnam 19:34, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Nevermind. Got it. It was masculine (Koebler). Leasnam 20:29, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Back to the Gothic feminine, Koebler seems to link this to the PGmc masculine, as if stating the Gothic was an alteration in gender from the original Masc type. If so, then we should remove the g2=f and leave it as masc. Leasnam 20:42, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

The strange thing about this situation is really that the word theoretically has three genders and there are three distinct stem formations. But they don't match up, and I'm not really sure how to reconcile that with the attested forms. It seems we have dailiz which can be masculine or feminine, dailǭ which is feminine, and dailą which is neuter. I don't think it's that hard to join the second one with the Old Norse form. But how to fit in the other two is harder. And I can't help but wonder why a language would have three words derived from the same stem, for the same thing... —CodeCat 21:09, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

I agree with you on that. It is superfluous, not to mention other closely related forms like Icelandic deild "division" (<PGmc *dailiþō) and deila (deverbal < PGmc *dailjanan). I would like to keep this as onefold as possible. But how does the current layout strike you? It is satisfactory? Leasnam 21:18, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Maybe they had different meanings, like in modern German? 194.166.205.232 19:34, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Lemma forms versus article names

Currently, we have adapted most of the conventions listed in Wiktionary:About Proto-Germanic when it comes to spelling and notation. However, there is one point where there is still a difference and that is in article names. We use ogoneks in the articles themselves, but the articles are still named with final -n. Do you think we should change that, and use ogoneks in the article names? —CodeCat 12:27, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

I like the idea of a consistency between the article name and the lemma form. Is there any good reason why we can't or shouldn't use ogoneks in the titles? Leasnam 16:52, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Mostly because the use of ogoneks is rare in literature, only Ringe has ever used them from what I can tell. Most etymologies on Wiktionary link to the final-n form, and other sources usually do the same. So those are likely the forms people will be looking for on Wiktionary. And as for consistency, it's not really that much of an issue if you compare it to the use of macrons in words that weren't originally written that way, like in many old Germanic languages or in Latin. I think if we decide to use ogoneks, we should have redirects from all final-n names just to make sure. —CodeCat 20:14, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

That sounds like a good idea. I agree, more people are familiar with the -n form. I personally have never seen them used for PGmc, and they certainly don't bother me. Leasnam 20:22, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Gothic script

Here is a nice little website I found that can convert what you type into Gothic script. I think it might be useful! :) http://marnanel.org/gothic —CodeCat 09:13, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz23

𐌰𐌱𐌸𐌳𐌴𐍆𐌲𐌷𐌹𐌾𐌺𐌻𐌼𐌽𐍉𐍀𐌵𐍂𐍃𐍄𐌿𐍈𐍅𐍇𐍅𐌶𐍁𐍊 (abþdēfghijklmnōpqrstuƕwxwz??)

{{I added another class VII verb. Can you please advise on the 2nd person past *bebautt? Should it rather be *bebautat? Leasnam 07:43, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

*bebaust would be the proper form. bt, pt, ft > ft; dt, tt, þt > st; gt, kt, ht > ht. —CodeCat 09:57, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Okay thanks. That makes sense. It's seen in words like mōtan, witan, etc. It's all becoming clear to me! :) Leasnam 17:31, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Well, in those words there is actually an older change tt > ss. The st found in the 2nd person past of strong verbs had its t restored by analogy with other verbs. —CodeCat 00:14, 23 December 2010 (UTC)}}

A few PG grammar tips

Because of the w:Germanic spirant law, the 2nd person singular past of strong verbs often has a consonant change. In Template:termx for example the form is ōht, because the cluster kt is not allowed in Germanic. You can specify this with the past2sg= parameter.

Secondly, there is also the difference between -j- and -ij- in many words. This difference is purely based on the length of the preceding syllable(s) and is completely predictable through a rule called w:Sievers' law. The rule says that a stem is short if it has a short vowel followed by one consonant at most (Template:termx). If it contains a long vowel (Template:termx), diphthong (Template:termx) or two or more consonants after the vowel (Template:termx) then it is long. Short stems get -j-, or -i- in cases where -ji- > -i-. Long stems get -ij-, or -ī- where -iji- > -ī-. This behaviour has actually been attested in some early runic inscriptions, and is also shown in Gothic where short stems have -ji- (regularised from earlier -i-) and long stems have -ei- (-ī-) in some forms (-ij- is consistently spelled -j- however). In the West Germanic the evidence is indirect, though the w:West Germanic gemination which geminated consonants preceding -j- but not -ij-. —CodeCat 10:27, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Okay. Good to know. Yeah, I totally missed the *ōkt, but I will watch out for it in future verbs with -k, -g, etc. Leasnam 15:43, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

As far as the long syllable, I was not aware of that. I had seen both forms (-janan vs. -ijanan), but only took it for the stem addition. Now I know why. Thank you! Leasnam 18:18, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

quack

Are you sure this existed in Middle English? The OED's first citation is late-16th century. Ƿidsiþ 23:51, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I only have Webster and Century on this. I did a light search for queken but wasn't able to turn up anything as yet. Leasnam 23:52, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

OK, I'm away from my references right now, but if it's not better sourced I may end up just replacing the recent edits with something uncontroversial like "Imitative.", with just a note of similar forms in other Germanic languages. Ƿidsiþ 23:57, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

ok. I'll keep looking too. Leasnam 23:59, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

There is a ME queken, but that is a form of "quick/quicken". According to Koebler, PGmc *kwak- is attested only for Old Norse, Middle Dutch (quacken & queken), and New High German. Bosworth includes English "quack" among these relations, but shows no evidence of origin or borrowing. I believe the previous Etymology had "imitative". Leasnam 00:15, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I have found something concrete. It is here [2]. It shows ME queken v., partly from ME quek, queke, quack, ke(c)k(e), whec- intj. (an interjection which is imitative) and partly from MD quacken "to croak or quack". I trust this source. It is heavily supported by actual attested excerpts from a variety of sources. Leasnam 06:30, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

• I have been looking into this too. It seems that the OED distinguishes between (deprecated template usage) queck (going back to ME) and (deprecated template usage) quack (a later variant, or new imitative formation). Since they very recently revised these entries, I am inclined to follow them on this. Ƿidsiþ 13:05, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

That's fine. "Immitative" (the original etymology, I believe), and leave the earlier ME form, along with others, for comparison? Somehow, I am inclined to believe that the existence of the earlier forms paved the way for the new variation to take root--i.e. people assuming it was just a variation of the existing word...Leasnam 18:09, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

ben#Dutch

That's quite interesting, I wasn't aware of that etymology. But it seems very plausible. Do you think it's going too far to post a suppletive athematic verb *beunan, with forms *biumi, *biusi, *biuþi, *beumaz, *beuþ, *biunþi and so on? —CodeCat 00:02, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Not at all. Based on the forms that do remain, including those of Old English, which fully utilised the word, I think it would be acceptable. Since we believe beunan existed, it had to be conjugated at some point. And if so, we could show it. Leasnam 00:05, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

One question remains though--what to do about the past tense? We could show what it would have been according to the verb class, even though it may have used suppletive forms. I just do not know when those suppletive forms would have been adopted, in PGmc or in PIE. Leasnam 00:17, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

A really good source I consult, especially for Dutch etymologies, is the Nederlands etymologisch woordenboek By Jan de Vries, F. De Tollenaere. It's available online (in partial view) here [3] Leasnam 00:22, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

I've created the page and supplied the verbal paradigm for as far as I could figure it out: Template:termx. I have taken the past tense from Template:termx since Old English does the same. This root is part of a suppletive paradigm in many IE languages, so it's not unlikely that it lacked a proper past tense (that is, a PIE perfect) at all. And since we have no more evidence, I think this is the best we can do. —CodeCat 00:35, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

SWEEEET. It looks real good. I would also like to create/incorporate the *sī- forms too (I have been pondering this for some time now). Descendats are OE sēon ("to be"), Dutch zijn and German sein. I have OHG sīn, but I have been unable to find anything referencing PGmc *sī(u)nan (?). Gothic has sijum/sijuþ...Leasnam 00:44, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

I don't think any verb like that existed in Proto-Germanic. They are probably back-formations from the present subjunctive forms of Template:termx, just as the Old Norse infinitive vera was taken from a combination of the older vesa and the past plural *vár-. —CodeCat 10:56, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

{{proto}}

Please use this template only in etymologies. If you need to link between Proto-Germanic words or from another page to a Proto-Germanic word when it's not an etymological derivation, use {{lx}} or {{termx}} please. :) —CodeCat 21:20, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Appendix:Proto-Germanic *breustam

Another user added this, but there are multiple issues with the entry from what I can see. I do know that 'breustam' isn't correct in any case. If it were a neuter a-stem it should be 'breustą'. Etymologies seem to differ on the word, some say it's an i-stem, some have o-stem or a-stem, some languages like OHG also have a consonant stem. And the word is represented in all three genders. The fact that OE and ON reflect -eu- while Gothic and southern WG have -u- also leads me to believe these are two distinct words that got mixed up later on. I just can't make sense of all the data. —CodeCat 20:24, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I'll take a look at it. Leasnam 20:28, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

You are correct. This should be at least two entries: one *breustan (<*breustam; Norse, OE, Ofrs, Osax) and *brustiz (Goth, Norse, OFrs, Osax, OHG). Leasnam 20:33, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Wright's OHG primer [4] says this about feminine consonant stems in OHG: buoch, book, was mostly neut. in the sg.,as gen. buoches, dat. buoche; in the pl. it was fem. and declined like naht. burg, borough, city, and brust, breast, were sometimes declined like naht, and sometimes like anst. So it seems that most likely the stem brust- was a feminine consonant stem Template:termx. It fits the pattern of other nouns that we know for sure were feminine consonant stems, in that they are both neuter and feminine in OHG and are sometimes declined as i-stems. A feminine consonant stem would also agree with the Gothic form as far as I can tell. So that solves at least one half of the puzzle. —CodeCat 20:34, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

And it's also possible that since breasts generally occur in pairs, that the PG plural *brustiz became more common and was reanalysed as a new singular. —CodeCat 20:36, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

k. I have moved the page to *breustan and will proceed to clear out the forms which do not belong. we can then proceed to creating a page *brustiz for the lave. Leasnam 20:38, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Order of citations.

Hi Leasnam,

This edit was exactly backward: citations should appear in chronological order, not reverse-chronological order.

Thanks,
—Ruakh_TALK 16:22, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Oh, my bad. I thought most recent was nearer the top, closer to the definition. ok. Leasnam 16:33, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

PG prefixes, prepositions and adverbs

One thing that has always puzzled me is how so many Gothic adverbs and prepositions end with -a. The only sources for unstressed -a in Gothic that I know of are PG -ō and -ai. But the PIE etymologies of most of these words have final -o, which would imply that the PG forms had -a already. Since word-final -a was lost in all attested daughters this clearly can't be true, I thought. But just now it dawned on me... since these words were commonly used as prefixes, they would have been combined with the next word, and therefore the -a would no longer have been final. And in that case, after -a had been lost, the later languages would have been faced with prefixed forms with -a and stand-alone forms without it. It seems reasonable that many cases of lost final -a could have been restored by analogy in that case. What do you think, does that seem plausible? —CodeCat 16:25, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

That seems very plausible to me. What prefixes are affected ( *missa- ?) Leasnam 16:43, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Any of those that end in -a in any of the Germanic languages, more or less. That includes Gothic afta, aftana, aftra, ana, anda, faura, hindana, inna, innana, missa, waila, wiþra, ufta, unþa. I'm not quite sure on the PIE etymology of each one, though. —CodeCat 17:12, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Okay I see what you mean. Yes, I think you are right above. I can find those PIE's if you need. Leasnam 17:18, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Fall

σφαλλω[5] Fallo is usually translated as "mistake" but the right translation is "to fall in an error" (maybe on english this last sentence has not meaning)and it inherited from greek also the other meanings "bring down, destroy, cause to stumble,to fall" ,although the main meanings of Fallo are mistake deceive and so on, it also can mean "bring down, destroy, cause to stumble,to fall"....from Old English feallan (“to fall, fail, decay, die, attack”),...maybe it is only a randomness...or maybe not.--LupusInFabula 17:15, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I believe the words Eng fall and Latin fallo show merely a coincidental similarity, and no true link between the two words exists. They derive from separate PIE roots. The Eng and Grk words are PIE cognates, however. Leasnam 17:33, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Vote

You are now an Admin. —Stephen ^(Talk) 00:48, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Congratulations! —CodeCat 00:53, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Thank you! Leasnam 15:23, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Hi there. I forgot to send you this (my standard) message to new sysops. You have already done the first thing.

Welcome to sysophood. Please add an entry at Wiktionary:Administrators.

May I ask that you always have a second session open on Recent Changes whenever you are editing Wiktionary. You may mark good edits as "patrolled", revert vandalism and stupidity by either deleting new entries or by using the "rollback" function. You may block vandals at your own discretion.

Note: As there are times when no sysop is active, it would be useful if you start your patrolling from the time you last left the system. Cheers. SemperBlotto 15:39, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

The Germanic words for 'sun'

I noticed you added two words, one for North Germanic and one for Old English and Gothic. They only seem to differ in gender, though. So I was thinking and wondered, since this is a common word, and the Indo-European ancestor was neuter, isn't it possible that the Germanic word itself was a neuter consonant stem Template:termx? It might have become feminine in Old Norse because of Template:termx.

And I've always wondered why Germanic had so few consonant stems left, especially neuter ones. But it makes sense if you think about it... most of those would have become identical with neuter a-stems once those lost their nominative ending -ą. So, that probably means that Germanic might have had a lot more neuter consonant stems than history shows. 'sun' could just be one of them. —CodeCat 18:51, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I came to the same conclusion regarding the Old Norse feminine being attracted by *sunnōn, but all of the sources (except one) I've seen list the PG form as feminine (*sōwulō/*sōwilō). Otherwise, I would have put them on the same entry, but I couldn't explain the Gothic neuter, so I concluded that must have been 2 forms. Leasnam 18:54, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Gothic writes long o as au, and long e as ai, when another vowel follows it. You can see the same in saian, waian and such. I think there are actually just two forms here, *sō(wu)l and *sō(w)il, that must have existed side by side. The first is what led to OE and ON sol, the latter is what gave Gothic sauil and Old English sigel. You have to remember that g in OE often represents /j/, so sigel/segel is probably pronounced sijl or sejl. And I think the e might be long, so then it could be simply the old long o after umlaut had taken place: sōil > sēil > sējil.

Perhaps they even formed a single paradigm. If the words for 'fire' and 'water' are any indication, the alternation of the consonant may have been levelled out but the ablaut was not. In that case, the nominative would have been *sō(wu)l but the other forms would have been sō(w)il. I think that reconstruction is the pretty likely, given the different forms in the later languages. What do you think? —CodeCat 19:14, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

That's what I was thinking about OE sigel too, that it was from an earlier *sīegil < sauwil/sowil, but I saw that someone had postulated a PG *suglaz--but of course this may have been backtracking. Your way above makes the most sense though. Still one other form remains--OE swegl ("sun, sky"). Leasnam 19:18, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

The Indo-European stems were *sóh₂wl̥ and *sh₂uén, and the Germanic descendants of those forms would have been *sōwul and *swen/swel. So I think Old English swegl has to come from the second one, there isn't really any other way. But how that fits in with the rest is a mystery to me. —CodeCat 19:34, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

weblebrity

This was initially speedy-deleted by SemperBlotto. You have now wikified it, does that mean you're pretty confident it's attestable per CFI? Mglovesfun (talk) 16:59, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

I found three attests on Google Books: one from 2001, and two from 2010. Two others (one from 2001 and another from 2008) show no preview. Leasnam 17:19, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Couldn't tell what the month s in 2010 were though...Leasnam 17:20, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Well since you're an admin now, I'll let you deal with it [wink]. Mglovesfun (talk) 17:25, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

K ;) Leasnam 17:28, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Etymology of paltry

You seem to be interested in Germanic etymology. Would you per chance feel like entering the etymology of paltry? --Dan Polansky 12:35, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Sure! Leasnam 14:13, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Wow, cool! --Dan Polansky 14:41, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Also "rot" and "rotten" would benefit from Germanic etymology, in case you would be interested in adding it. --Dan Polansky 15:35, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! Would you expand the etymology of "foul"? --Dan Polansky 15:22, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

forþgewiten

Verb form with no corresponding verb. Any input? Mglovesfun (talk) 18:42, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

The entry should probably show 2 definitions, as a verb form (past participle of forþgewīten ("to go forth, pass, proceed, go by; depart, die"), and as an adjective meaning ("departed"), as in forþgewiten tīd ("past tense"), an OE grammatical term. Leasnam 19:09, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

belick

Hi, could you becreate the page belick, I bebeg thee. You seem to belike becreating verbs besuffixed by be-. I have not the skill berequired to betackle such a thing, bethanks. --We9fud 16:21, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

lol, sure Leasnam 16:23, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

stevened

What color is "party"? Nadando 21:43, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Hmm, I don't believe it's a colour per se. to be party-coloured is to be variegated/coloured with different colours. Leasnam 21:46, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Oh. Could you add that sense to party? Nadando 21:47, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Sure thing. Leasnam 21:49, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Etymology of stifle

Would you be interested in adding Germanic etymology to "stifle", "choke", "throttle", and "smother"? (Maybe not all of the listed words have a Germanic etymology.) These words seem rather common and thus worth prioritizing: I have searched for them in Google Ngram, adding "mammoth" to calibrate them against something else. --Dan Polansky 12:12, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

No problem Leasnam 16:39, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

קרעפל etymology

Hi. Could I trouble you, please, to add the etymology of (deprecated template usage) קרעפלעך‎/(deprecated template usage) קרעפלאך (or its singular)?​—msh210℠ (talk) 06:14, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Please see now. Leasnam 07:33, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you!​—msh210℠ (talk) 15:52, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

lead

Hi, Leasnam. A while ago you modified the etymology of lead (lɛd, the element), arguing that plumbum had nothing to do. However, your version significantly departs from that of the OED. Care to mention your source? Cheers, Λεξικόφιλος

Hello. I used Database Query to Germanic Etymology and A Handbook of Germanic Etymology by Vladimir Orel. The relationship to Celtic is only a theory, but is worth noting. I often show alternative etymologies where credible sources disagree. Leasnam 05:30, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

supple

Would you please expand the ety in supple? Would be very nice. Here is ngram of supple vs mammoth, so supple seems fairly common. --Dan Polansky 15:35, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

There is another way of determining the frequency: it can be gleaned from Special:WhatLinksHere/supple: supple is in these lists:

• Wiktionary:Frequency lists/Project Gutenberg 10001-20000
• Wiktionary:Frequency lists/PG/2005/10/1-10000
• Wiktionary:Frequency lists/PG/2005/10/8001-9000
• Wiktionary:Frequency lists/TV/2006/22001-24000

--Dan Polansky

My bad, supple does not have a Germanic etymology. I should pay more attention to what I am doing. --Dan Polansky 17:01, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

It's okay. Although I specialise in Germanic etymologies, I am not solely limited to them. I can still add it :). Leasnam 13:48, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Cool, thank you :). --Dan Polansky 14:05, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

hunt

"Hunt" has a poor etymology in WT, is Germanic, and is in Wiktionary:Frequency_lists/TV/2006/2001-3000, so really common. Any interest in exapnding it? (Of course, feel free to reject any of the numerous requests from me. Goes without saying, I know. ) --Dan Polansky 09:02, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Germanic

Hi Leasnam. It's completely unnecessary to include "of Germanic origin" and the like if you are already including a specific Germanic source language. I used to use "Germanic" in the few cases where the source language was not known. But if you are already putting templates for Frankish and (especially) Proto-Germanic, then the "Germanic" template is totally redundant. Ƿidsiþ 07:50, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Okay. I can abandon the practise (as I think I do it unconsciously now), even though Old Frankish is a likely candidate, for a few words it is still a best guess (between Frankish/Gothic/Old Dutch/OHG). Leasnam 16:22, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

or perhaps another option could be "of Proto-Germanic origin, probably from Old Frankish ..." ? but in any event, I agree, that if Proto-Germanic is present, then it is redundant. I'll stop and revert where I see it. Leasnam 16:27, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

heafod-

I'm not sure that this is a prefix, but rather heafod (“head”) used as the first part of some compound words. Thoughts? --Mglovesfun (talk) 14:42, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

A lot of OE prefixes/suffixes have their origin as combining forms taken from other parts of speech, like nouns in this case (compare -hād (“-hood”) and -lāc (“-lock”), which are also stand-alone words). In sense 1 it can be thought of as a compound; yet in sense 2 in takes on opaque meanings. It is here where it is more like a prefix, especially in words like hēafodbotl (“ancestral seat”), hēafodcwide (“important saying”), where there is no apparent reference to a "head". But what do we consider prefixes? Affixes which have no function when they stand alone? Leasnam 14:52, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

I think a noun that can't stand alone would be an affix, yes. An example would be the development of Template:termx. —CodeCat 14:59, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Ah, yet hād (“condition, state”) is a selfstanding word in OE, as is lāc (“action, play”). Yet we consider these affixes, true? Leasnam 15:03, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

It's kind of a grey area really... haiduz was already used a lot for compounding in Germanic, while "head" wasn't until Old English. —CodeCat 15:48, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, no sure way to tell. --Mglovesfun (talk) 15:52, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Also, there is the frequency with which new compounds are formed with it. If heafod were present in only a few words, with clear reference to a head, then maybe it shouldn't be qualified as a prefix; however, we see it employed manifold times; which, at least to my reasoning, indicates to me that in the minds of its speakers it was treated (behaved itself) as a prefix. Hence the old adage: if it quacks like a duck, and walks like a duck, is it therefore a duck? Leasnam 17:57, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

I'm contemplating starting a Help:Affixes or perhaps WT:Affixes. FWIW I think the 'relating' to the head sense isn't a prefix while the other one may be. Compare headache, is this ache prefixed with head- or head + ache? Mglovesfun (talk) 11:42, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

If headache meant "the most important/chief ache", then I'd say it was a prefix; but in its current meaning, I would say it was a compound. Leasnam 04:39, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Template:ang-decl-noun

Just so you know, this template now calls on {{isValidPageName}} to make links. {{ang-decl-noun/doc}} ought to explain what this means, if it doesn't, please let me know and I will try and explain it better. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:41, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Protection of an entry?

I was curious if there is a way to protect a definition entry. I have just updated the 'santorum' definition. This is a very contentious article currently in Wikipedia, and is potentially subject to vandalism or POV pushing. Not sure how to go about it here. Thanks in advance for any assistance. -- Avanu 16:25, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Protection can be placed on a page against new and unregistered users, or all non-Admin users. I take it that you would prefer the first level of protection? Leasnam 04:27, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm not certain. I haven't seen any of the drama follow from over at Wikipedia yet. It may not in fact be necessary. But I was nervous it might. -- Avanu 04:29, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Let's see if we encounter any. If we do, we can protect it. Leasnam 04:31, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Hi Avanu and Leasnam. Avanu, because of the lack of sourcing for your new definition, I have changed the page back to how it was before, except with the improvements made in the meantime unrelated to the new definition. Gacurr 07:31, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

This is an example of what I mean. Gacurr knows there is a source, I just don't know how to cite things here in Wiktionary. The example sentence I gave in the entry is a direct quotation from a source. -- Avanu 13:34, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

I am not aware of the existence of a source for the definition you have provided. Your example sentence is different from your new sense. Please place your sourcing on the talk page, where it has been requested. Gacurr 15:52, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Gacurr, Having participated extensively in the Santorum Talk page on Wikipedia (Talk:Santorum_(neologism)#Remove_original_research_from_article), you know exactly what the source is that I'm referring to, it is [67] in the article itself. I understand that a cite isn't how its done here, so rather than being tenditious about this, if you know how to add the source, feel free. -- Avanu 16:02, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Please read my comment again. Your example sentence is different from your new sense. Gacurr 16:13, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Have been thinking on the lines of Avanu myself recently, due to the perpetual task of blocking disruptive edits, et cetera; and would be amenable to the second level of protection therefore. In that case any intended edit from registered and unregistered users could be sent directly to named Administrators who would simply only add the edit(s) if appropriate. Andrew H. Gray 09:17, 31 January 2017 (UTC)Andrew talk

Wiktionary:Votes/2011-04/Derivations categories

This vote ends today, and hasn't really received much attention. Since you often work on etymologies, I thought you might be interested. —CodeCat 19:06, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Does "today" end at GMT? Leasnam 19:50, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

The time on the vote says so, yes. —CodeCat 20:21, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Dinkj (Low German descendant)

On "thingan" you wrote "Dinkj" as a descendant of Old Saxon thing. I'm trying to bring order and system into the Low German forms on wiktionary within the next two months. So could you offer a source, so we can assign it to a dialect? Gracious.Dakhart 20:12, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

That comes from a Mennonite dictionary of Plautdietsch by Herman Rempel. Leasnam 22:35, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

winsome and winning#Adjective sense 3

I have occasionally wondered whether the "attractive" sense of "winning" is "really" solely a sense evolution from (deprecated template usage) win. In looking at (deprecated template usage) winsome today, I finally noticed an alternative path to that sense. Does the OED or any other source provide any support for such an influence? DCDuring TALK 22:54, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

That is a very interesting observation, especially in light of other similar words like (deprecated template usage) winly. I don't know of any reference which might suggest an influence, but it is certainly not outside the realm of possibility. You've piqued my curiosity now...will let you know if I find something. Leasnam 00:18, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Appendix:Proto-Germanic/agiþahsijōn

Hi Leasnam,

A question about the Old Dutch reconstruction: *egithassa. Both modern Dutch and modern Frisian have hagedis, retaining(?) the original a or did Dutch go back to 'a' afterwards? Jcwf 20:23, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

Hello! The form haghetisse shows up in Middle Dutch, alongside of eghedisse, and may be an alteration of the latter. I believe I read somewhere that the form(s) with ha- arose due to influence from the word haghe (Modern haag) "hedge", but I cannot for the life of me remember where I read this. Leasnam 20:24, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Quite the same topic

Under stifle you gave Low German "stipel" in the etymology. May I take it all your L.G. entries come from the Plautdietsch dictionary?Dakhart 17:44, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

No, not necessarily. In fact, I do not use the Plautdietsch dictionary all that much. Usually, my LG terms are second hand (i.e. quoted or cited from other dictionaries/works) Leasnam 20:36, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Robert Louis Stevenson

Just curious: what's the nature of your ancestral relationship to RLS? I read Treasure Island as a kid and Jekyll & Hyde and Kidnapped more recently. You've reminded me I'll have to find some more! Equinox ◑ 22:59, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

You know, I am not absolutely sure. My grandmother, I'm sure, knew, but she has since departed. According to my father, my Grandmother's mother's maiden name was Stevenson, and she was a descendant. Beyond that I cannot say. I do not even know what her name was. :| Leasnam 23:07, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

branc

Do you know anything about the etymology of Old French bran/branc/brant? It looks a lot like a Germanic borrowing, which I consider to be one of your specialties. Mglovesfun (talk) 13:49, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Hi Mglovesfun! Yes, branc is an alteration of the more "proper" brant ("sword, sword-blade"), from OHG (i.e. Frankish) brant ("fire-brand, burning iron, sword"), cf. ON brandr ("firebrand, flaming sword"). Would you like me to add a full etymology? Leasnam 23:43, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Wiktionary talk:About Proto-Germanic

I started a discussion there, please comment? —CodeCat 20:44, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

matitjanan?

What is that the ancestor of? o.o —CodeCat 21:01, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Per some sources (http://www.koeblergerhard.de/germanistischewoerterbuecher/germanischeswoerterbuch/germ-M.doc) and Bosworth & Toller (http://web.ff.cuni.cz/cgi-bin/uaa_slovnik/gmc_search_v3?cmd=formquery2&query=mati&startrow=1), it's the forerunner of ON metja, at least in part?. I'm actually not quite sure what to make of it. Leasnam 21:07, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Why can metja not descend from *matjanan? —CodeCat 21:08, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

My bad, metja can descend from *matjanan. *Matitjanan existed to supply ON *metta, which produced the derivative mettr "sated, full". So it is a relative. Leasnam 21:17, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

It's possible... but a little shaky to be honest. —CodeCat 21:23, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I believe OE mettian(--the more original form?)/metian is also amongst the descendants. Anywho, I leave to your discretion :) Leasnam 21:25, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

As you probably already know, that -itjan- is a suffix, similar to -atjan- (> OE -ettan) Leasnam 21:27, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I didn't know that actually... —CodeCat 21:29, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Its use seems very similar to the modern English -ate, which oddly enough has a similar form. Hence, to "food-ate"/"meat-ate" Leasnam 21:32, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Do you have other examples of -itjan? In Old English, -itjan and -atjan would have both become -ettan so that's not much use... —CodeCat 21:54, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Offhand I do not. It is however found in Gothic leikitjan and OHG lîhhizzen. There is a third form of it as well: *-utjan-. I will look around for it. It's supposedly analogous/cognate with Greek -izein/-azein (English -ise/-ize) Leasnam 22:06, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Found one: Template:termx, Template:termx Leasnam 22:11, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Oh that's interesting, I never realised Germanic had a cognate to that Greek suffix! The phonetics do match as far as I can tell, -tj- would go back to -dj-, and that becomes -z- in Greek if I'm not mistaken (just like in Template:termx > Ζεύς (Zeús)) —CodeCat 23:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

favour

hi Leasnam, can you block this account please. I believe it is being used for relentless vandalism --Itkilledthecat (talk) 21:14, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

Done. Leasnam (talk) 21:40, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

*maikskō

I'm not quite sure about this form, as Grimm's law normally prohibits the sequence -ks-, just as it prohibits -kt-. As a rule, in a sequence of two or more obstruents, the last one is not affected by Grimm's law but the others are. So -sk- would have remained as such. However, if you look at the situation before Grimm, then -ksk- presupposes -gsk-. And that's difficult to reconcile, because the -g- would have been devoiced next to -s- already before Grimm operated, giving -ksk- already before Grimm. Grimm would have then turned it into -hsk- (this is why Template:termx gave Template:termx as a derived noun, the pre-Grimm sequence -gʰt- was devoiced to -kt-, then changed to -ht- by Grimm). In other words, the same rule that turns voiced and voiceless plosives into voiceless fricatives before -t- (the Germanic spirant law) would also apply when -s- follows rather than -t-! —CodeCat 23:25, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

ok, it has an alternate: *maiskō. Leasnam (talk) 23:36, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

ok, all fixed. I had just assumed the -ska- was a suffix appended to the base, which would have been *maik-, resembling the construction of *flaht-skō ("flask") Leasnam (talk) 23:50, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

wharven

In expanding some unnecessary abbreviations ("ppl.", "refl."), I noticed that the headword line of this entry gives its participles as wharvinge and warfte, but its definitions give its participles as hwerefinde and wharrfedd... do you know which are right? - -sche (discuss) 19:22, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

As this is Middle English, and a wide berth of variation in forms exists for such, I would say that the forms indicated as wharvinge and warfte are among the more "normalised", although you could find just about any other possible byforms for these. Leasnam (talk) 14:58, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

easy

Hi Leasnam. I see no justification for splitting this into two etymologies, what's your source? The etymologies as currently given make no sense to me at all! The OED, Ayto's Dictionary of Word Origins, Chamber's....basically every source I can find agrees that this is all the same word. Ƿidsiþ 15:40, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

No contest. I will undo. I agree; there is little support for ease +‎ -y, although I found one obscure source (can't even remember it now it's been so long) Leasnam (talk) 15:55, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

gâcher

Hi, the TLFi isn't too clear on when gâcher replaced gascher. It means 1844 for gâchée as a noun. So I tried tête] which gives 1686 as the first attestation for tête instead of teste. This specifically related to your edit saying that gâcher is from Middle French gâcher, which it isn't as circumflexes weren't used until after that, and probably not widespread use before 1800. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:59, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

thank you! Leasnam (talk) 13:32, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

So, I decided to quickly test my statement. This looks like a legitimate 1556 usage of fâcher, which I previously said didn't exist yet. I've checked the Wikipedia page w:fr:Accent circonflexe en français and it says the first record usage of circumflexes in French is 1531, but not in these sort of situations. The TLFi also isn't particularly helpful on the matter. Mglovesfun (talk) 18:43, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

*fruþgaz

I wonder where this word came from and whether there are other words with a similar formation. But I wonder even more about the cluster -þg-. One of the consonants is voiceless and the other is voiced, so I imagine that there would have been some kind of voicing assimilation. The result was apparently not -þk- because that doesn't explain the voicing in Old English, so I am guessing it was -dg- instead. What do you think? —CodeCat 15:50, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

I just moved the page to the weak form. My mistake. The -gô is a suffix, found in many Old English words (stagga, wicga, docga) used to identify pet-names for cetain animals. Leasnam (talk) 15:52, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

I believe the -gô suffix was also used to a lesser extent in Old Norse, where it appears in the cognate to stagga...but I haven't researched thoroughly. Leasnam (talk) 15:53, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

I have seen the stem also as frud-, fraud- as well. I defer to you on this though, as you are more the expert than I :) Leasnam (talk) 15:58, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

I noticed but I am still curious. Are there any other examples of -dg- turning into -gg-? I know that -bd- turned into -dd- in English and Dutch had, and I even recall one part of the movie 'Men in Black' where someone pronounces Edgar as Eggar, so this change does seem plausible and natural. But it was rare in Germanic for two voiced consonants to come together like that, because in most cases the spirant law intervened and made them both voiceless, or some consonants were dropped out (like in *waskaną < *watskaną). In the case for had and the other class 3 weak verbs, there was a laryngeal between the two consonants which presumably remained in vowel form at least until after Grimm's law took effect (like Ringe says). I wonder if that could have happened to this suffix as well, but it's hard to tell with only Old English words. Do you know of any words in any other Germanic languages that share this formation? —CodeCat 16:02, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

Just read your answer... þ alternating with d is because of Verner's law and it's very common as you probably know by now. Do you know what the Old Norse cognate is? And also... can we be sure it wasn't borrowed from Old English? —CodeCat 16:02, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

Other PGmc uses of this suffix are to be found in *sneg-gô (> Ger Schnecke "snail") < PGmc *sneg-, and it's close relative *snēg-gô ("gnat") from the same PIE root (*snek-). It seems probable that -gô is a suffix due to other forms, like PGmc *sneg-laz (> Eng snail, ON snigill, etc.). The Old Norse word was steggi (< *staggijô) which uses the alt form of *-gô, -gijô. I am searching further. Leasnam (talk) 16:10, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

*derkinōnan

I have my doubts about whether this word is really Proto-Germanic in origin. Firstly there is the umlaut which would have turned e into i, so the two possible forms would have been either *dirkinōnan or *darkinōnan. The OHG word must descend from the second, but Middle English evidently reflects the first. I'm not quite sure what to make of this. —CodeCat 19:02, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

Okay. I wanted to attempt to place all the descendants under the same entry, but if you think it needs to be split into separate *dirkinōnan and *darkinōnan entries I can do that. Just let me know. I definitely do see your point. Leasnam (talk) 15:11, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

I am actually wondering if there is enough evidence to say that these terms existed in Proto-Germanic. The English term is attested relatively late, the Old English term is usually deorcian. And because the suffix itself was still productive in OE and OHG, it's quite likely that the verbs are new formations rather than inherited. —CodeCat 15:17, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Yes, it could go either way. We simply do not know. I leave it at your discretion, as you are the PG Guru :) Leasnam (talk) 15:20, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

The OHG tarchanjan though, looks like an early form, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything... Leasnam (talk) 15:21, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Koebler's dictionary doesn't list that form but it does list tarkenen as a class 1 weak verb. So perhaps tarchanjan is really a mistake and is meant to be a theoretical ancestor of that OHG word. —CodeCat 15:30, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

tarchanjan came from Bosworth & Toller. Leasnam (talk) 16:32, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

*sinwō

I'm wondering about this term. It's known that nw > nn in Germanic, based on the examples that Ringe gives (such as *þunnuz). So that would imply that this word can't have had nw in it, there must have been an intervening vowel. But which vowel? There are only three possibilities:

• i < PIE e - This would account for the i-mutation in the root, but there are no attestations of that vowel aside from Old Frisian.
• a < PIE o - This reflects the vowel in Old Saxon and OHG, but I'm not sure about OE. On the other hand, this vowel would allow for the lack of i-mutation seen in some of the languages.
• u - This one seems unlikely based on comparison with Template:termx, where OS and OHG kept the -u- without shifting it to -a-.

Old Norse (and I believe Old English) regularly lost unstressed medial syllables, so it's not surprising there is no trace of it here either. Both -i- and -a- have some evidence going for them but nothing particularly conclusive. The appearance of i-mutation in only some of the descendants is particularly puzzling. So there seem to be several reconstructable forms: *siniwō, *sinawō, *senawō. Which of them is/are correct, I wonder? —CodeCat 11:42, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Funny you should mention this, as I was battling the same in my mind. Initially I had it as *seniwō and *senawō. Naturally, *seniwō would be mutated to *siniwō, leaving the two endly forms *siniwō and senawō, which explains the variations inthe descendant forms. I was unsure about the medial -i- in *siniwō, whether it had collapsed or not. Should this be the entry form? Should it be split into two entries?Leasnam (talk) 14:37, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm wondering now if there wasn't some kind of grammatical alternation between *senaw- and *siniw-. There is a similar alternation in Template:termx, but of course that is a z-stem whereas this is an ō-stem. I don't know what kind of etymological basis there is for such an alternation in an ō-stem; were there athematic ō-stems in PIE? —CodeCat 14:40, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I do not know. But I do understand what you are referring to. It seems very plausible that it may have, bc rarely does one encounter a single sinew rather sinews, so the sing and plur forms may have become confused. Also, I wonder if the -a- in OHG was not added, like foraha from forha (fir), just to add a syllable (?). There are at least a half dozen ur-forms out there for this word, so we are not the only ones facing this dilema, but what you suggest seems to be the best solution to the problem I've seen thus far. Leasnam (talk) 14:50, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

It may have been added yes, but in this case it must have been original because of the problem with nw > nn. But I don't think it would have been a confusion of singular and plural. Let me explain a bit about the alternations found in Germanic nouns.

• The first is the athematic vowel-and-accent alternation found in most original PIE athematic nouns to some degree. If we assume that all a-stems and some of the ō-stems were thematic, it follows that all the others were athematic, including i-, u-, n-, z-, r- and other consonant stems. ō-stems are divided: some where thematic, others were athematic, but the two types merged in Germanic. Thematic nouns always have fixed accent placement and have no ablaut vowel alternations. Athematic nouns alternate between strong cases (nominative, accusative, vocative) and weak cases (the others): the accent shifts rightward in the weak cases, and so does the e-grade syllable usually. The accent shift naturally causes Verner alternation in those nouns, and the shift in the ablaut grade also causes vowel alternations. However, there are almost no examples (that I know of) of Germanic nouns in which the root syllable alternates in this way, the alternation was usually levelled out in favour of the weak-case stem, such as in Template:termx and all the other PIE nouns in -tis and -tus. On the other hand, alternations in the endings tended to be preserved, and this is the alternation that can be seen quite clearly in the z-, r- and n-stems. Alternations in the endings between a and i (from PIE o and e) in turn tended to lead to secondary alternations in the root syllable through i-mutation (e.g. Template:termx) and those were preserved.
• The second alternation is much rarer, and appears mostly in neuter nouns between the singular and plural. This alternation is caused by the fact that many (if not all) neuter nouns originally had no true plural, but instead formed 'collective' nouns, which were actually distinct nouns and behaved grammatically as singular despite being plural in meaning. The collectives had a different placement of the accent compared to the base noun, so this in turn caused Verner alternation between the singular and plural. This alternation is preserved in Germanic in several nouns such as Template:termx, Template:termx, Template:termx and perhaps Template:termx.

It is doubtful that *sinwō was of the second type, as it is not a neuter, and as far as I know vowel alternation is not a characteristic of the second type of alternation. It could be a neuter plural that was converted into an ō-stem singular (there are other nouns like that in Germanic, and also some outside Germanic) but that would not explain how the accent alternation was preserved if the original singular was lost. So that leaves the first alternation type and this implies that the PIE ancestor of *sinwō was athematic. The most likely direct ancestor of the noun was something nom. sg. *senoweh₂ ~ gen. sg. *seneweh₂(e)s. However, that alternation is unlikely to be a direct continuation of a PIE pattern because PIE nouns generally didn't ablaut in that way (in particular, multiple e-grades are unusual, although not unheard of). It seems almost as if in Germanic times, ō-stem endings have been pasted straight onto to an older, shorter noun with the alternation *senow- ~ *s(e)new-. This word is turning out to be quite a puzzle... @.@ —CodeCat 16:41, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Shall I move this to *siniwō/senawō; split into two (see forecoming); or keep as is? Leasnam (talk) 19:17, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

I think *senawō might be better as there are more descendants with e. Old English and Old Frisian seem to have a regular sound change to change e to i before a single nasal, like niman, so they may count for e as well. —CodeCat 19:26, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

*grellanan

Weak class 4? Where did that come from? Is there any evidence preventing this from being reconstructed as class 1 *graljanan? —CodeCat 15:24, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

Process of elimination (using available templates we have). The lemma is *grell- (> *grellaz "angry"). I have never seen anything which would lead me to think it would ever be *gralj-. Leasnam (talk) 14:33, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

Semantics are also important. Class 4 weak verbs are inchoative, meaning they denote becoming or changing into a state of being, and therefore are intransitive and have no passive forms or a past participle. So, if this is indeed a class 4 verb, it should have those characteristics, and it doesn't seem like it does. What class did it belong to in the descendants? I know that German tended to convert class 4 verbs to class 3, while the other West Germanic languages turned them into class 2 (perhaps via class 3, but class 3 itself was lost to class 2). As for the relationship between this verb and *grellaz, I don't know, but it doesn't seem unreasonable to say that originally a strong verb *grellanan existed from which a weak causative *graljanan or *grallijanan was formed, and that the two merged again in West Germanic under the influence of i-mutation and gemination. In fact, out of the two senses you listed, the second seems like a causative of the first (to anger someone = to get them to shout at you). The adjective *grellaz could perhaps be an old participle (< *gʰrel-nos?) formed directly to the verb root, for which there are countless other examples both inside and outside Germanic. —CodeCat 17:22, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

I Old English, grillan is a weak 1a verb. But perusing through the inventory of weak verbs we have for PGmc, I saw that all of them have -janan. The PGmc form really only indicates the first sense of "to cry loud and sharp; shout". I obtained the second from the daughters as extended senses. Again, I picked class 4 based on what was available. I cannot find any attested examples of the verb in OE outside of the infinitive...which is frustrating me :| Leasnam (talk) 18:04, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

Well, OE has no classes 3 or 4, and class 2 verbs end in -ian, so the infinitive grillan has to be either strong, or weak class 1. We would need other conjugated forms to be sure. What about the other languages? —CodeCat 18:09, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

Unfortunately, OE is the only "Old" language we have attesation for. The others appear in Middle versions, and there seems to be some confusion as to which relations it belongs with (e.g. MD grillen/MHG grellen "be angry"; or Dutch grillen "to shudder", etc.). Leasnam (talk) 18:25, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

Then I think there isn't really enough evidence to reconstruct this verb with confidence. We have a reasonable idea of what it was, but we can't be sure. Do you think it should be deleted or renamed? —CodeCat 18:38, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

I think we should just remove the Conjugation section, along with any information (if any) relating to verb class or type, as this is unknown. We can still deduce the basic sense of the verb in sense 1; but perhaps sense 2 should be removed. ? Leasnam (talk) 19:15, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

That would also include moving it though, because the infinitive ending also depends on verb class. I'm not sure what to move it to, maybe just *grel- for now? We can use the head= parameter in the headword line to list the different possible reconstructions *grellanan, *graljanan, *grallijanan. —CodeCat 19:28, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

Ok, sounds good. Have you by chance found any support for a *gral- base? Leasnam (talk) 19:31, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

There is some indication from Koebler that *grellanan and *grellaz do not descend from the same PIE form (gher- vs. ghel- respectively; but I do not see how *grellaz might have picked up an 'r' unless altered by the other, which he doesn't mention); not even related. AND, Bosworth does tiw the two, BUT indicates a stem *gral making *graljanan possible... Leasnam (talk) 19:37, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

We don't specifically have support for either one, *gral- or *grel-. But since PIE roots are commonly cited in the e-grade, I figure we should do the same here. We can at least be sure that *grel- is the root and not *grell-, because PIE roots never end in double consonants (or even two sonorants, that I am aware). If *grellaz is an adjective and it was actually *graljaz or *grallijaz, then we'd expect the West Germanic descendants to end in -i (or -e for OE/OF), giving *grelli or *grelle. I don't know what attestations there are for that, but if the descendants show an a-stem, then that's what it ought to have been in PG too. —CodeCat 19:43, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

It must have been -a then. Moving... Leasnam (talk) 19:49, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

BTW, I did find some early ME preterite forms for OE griellan, in the form of grulde (i.e. = grülde), which suggests that the ur-form might have been *graljanan or *gruljanan. I know it's not much, but it's something... Leasnam (talk) 01:38, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

periwinkle

I don't know what the true etymology is, but right now periwinkle and *winkilaz contradict each other. Would you be able to fix that? —CodeCat 01:27, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Sure, but I fail to see a contradiction. I assume you mean Periwinkle @ Etymology_2, correct? Leasnam (talk) 01:29, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Oh, I didn't see there were two etymologies. Sorry, never mind! —CodeCat 01:34, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

No problem ;)

*-lingaz

Although this did become a separate suffix in the daughters, are you sure it was separate already in Proto-Germanic? Or was it still just -il-ingaz (and then wouldn't it be -ilingaz?) —CodeCat 20:05, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Well, since it's in Gothic in the endly form -liggs (-lings), I lean toward it at least already having existed in PGmc--the coincidental occurence that it developed independently, though in no way impossible, seems unlikely given the opaque connection it has to at least the first element *-ilaz. I have seen it as *-lingaz only, but perhaps it should be *-ilingaz. Leasnam (talk) 00:34, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

Would you happen to know any Gothic words with that suffix? I can't remember seeing any. —CodeCat 01:11, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

skilliggs (< *skild(u)liggs "small shield"); gadiliggs ("kinsman, cousin"); gadiliggs ("gadfly") Leasnam (talk) 19:43, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

grappil

Just wondering where you found this, presumably in an etymological dictionary. The Godefroy Dictionary here doesn't have an entry for it. But the Godefroy is by no means comprehensive, so it might be used in some text or another. Also is there a link between grab and grapple? As we don't seem to make one, but they're visually and phonologically similar. Mglovesfun (talk) 13:06, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

That etymology I obtained from Century for 'grapple': a Google book search for "grappil" will turn up several hits for the Old French word as well... Although they look similar and have similar meanings, the two words are not thought to be relateed. Grapple is akin to words such as grape, which ultimately meant "hook, something bent" (PIE root *gremb- "crooked"); whilst grab is related to grope, grip, grasp, and gripe (PIE root **gʰreyb- "to grasp"). Leasnam (talk) 00:21, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

Proto-Germanic *skattaz

Hi Leasnam! According to Proto-Germanic *skattaz, the Proto-Germanic skat- stems from a Proto-Indo-European root skat-. But as far as I know, PIE -t- evolves to PGmc -þ- or something similar. Why not here? A typo?

My edition of Kluge ({{R:EWddS}}) says "etymology unknown, maybe borrowed". Do you have some other sources? Greetings --MaEr (talk) 16:48, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

It is not a typo. I have often wondered why some gemminate consonants in PGmc do not seem to undergo what we would normally expect. One theory I have (which I have not tested yet) is that the PGMc root was originally *skaþ-, and the addition of an affix -t caused the change to undergo alteration back to t (þt => tt). this is only my theory though (so far as I know). Leasnam (talk) 16:52, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

My aplogies, the source I used for this is Gerhard Koebler's Proto-Germanic dictionary. Leasnam (talk) 16:54, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

The combination -þt- would not have become -tt-, but rather -ss- or -st-. That is actually an Indo-European sound law (the same happens in Greek and Latin) and remained productive in Germanic. But as far as I know, none of the geminate consonants were affected by Grimm's law. There is also another, still controversial sound law called w:Kluge's law, which explains how PIE stops followed by -n- became geminated voiceless stops in Germanic. —CodeCat 17:00, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

So the PGmc form may have descended from *skat-no-...that makes more sense. Thanks :)! Leasnam (talk) 17:02, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

Not just *skat-no-, but also *skad-no- or *skadʰ-no- (and of course possibly with -o- or a laryngeal instead of -a-). Kluge's law apparently makes no distinction in voicing or aspiration, all three give the same result. —CodeCat 17:05, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

Nice. I think we have one like this already: *puttaz "pot" (< budnos "vessel"). Very intersting. I am still learning about PGMc. PIE is definitely next. :p Leasnam (talk) 17:09, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

clysan

Hi Leasnam ...

1. I'm a bit befuddle'd here about the etym. I don't see how Proto-Germanic can come from LATE Latin. This is way out of my knowledge, but the timeline ... as I understand it ... doesn't match up. If anything, it looks more like the Late Latin clusa would hav been a blend of the P-GMC and Latin. Any chance of chasing this back to the PIE? I know the further up the timeline the murkier it gets but I'd like to see the guesses at the PIE and then what came from that on the Germanic side if they can be found.
2. Are there any good online sources for Frankish? There are a lot of French words that I think are, at least, a blend with a Frankish root rather than only a Latin root.
3. I'll likely ask this in the tearoom but I'll throw it out to you ... In the past few weeks I'v come by OE words noted in "modern" fiction. I was taken aback a bit when I saw cniht in a 1903 novel and then eoten in a 2010 novel. Of course, one can find both words in historical context, meaning talking about them, but the novels are noting them rightly by their meanings ... So, is it kosher then to put them under an ENGLISH heading and tag them mainly historical or historical?

Thanks --AnWulf ... Ferþu Hal! (talk) 11:18, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

Hello AnWulf! You are precisely correct, Proto-Germanic (the language as it was before East and North broke off) probably did not have *klūsijanan; the language should be re-labelled Germanic (or West Germanic), as it was not yet Old English either. I have rewritten the etymology. Some sources (Gerhard Koebler's germanisches Wörterbuch for instance) do not adequately differentiate between true PGmc and the interim phase immediately following, so during the time when I was adding a lot of these etymologies, I was just calling everything Proto-Germanic for simplicity's sake. Were I to write it today, I would have called it Germanic. Leasnam (talk) 17:12, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

I am not familiar offhand with any Old Frankish dictionary resources, I usually stumble across Frankish loanwords into Old French through French etymological dictionaries.

If a modern work written in modern English revives an Old English term ((deprecated template usage) mathom and (deprecated template usage) errand-ghost come to mind), and you can find at least 3 independent citations, and these cites are usages, not mentions, then an English entry can be created for it. I would expect that cniht and eoten (modern (deprecated template usage) knight; (deprecated template usage) ettin, (deprecated template usage) eaton, etc.) would be labelled "historical", based on how they are spelt. Leasnam (talk) 17:33, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

"Germanic" isn't really a good etymology either, though. After the end of the true PG period, what was left was a set of five dialects: Gothic (East), Norse (Scandinavia), Invaeonic (North Sea), Istvaeonic/Frankish (Rhine/Weser) and Irminonic/High German (Elbe, Bavaria). The latter three formed the West Germanic dialect continuum that allowed some innovations to spread between them, the three names only indicate the three extremes of the continuum. So there was never a Proto-West-Germanic like there was a Proto-Norse language (and this is why the West Germanic languages differ much more at any given time than the North Germanic ones do at that same time). It's likely that a word such as clysan spread throughout that continuum. So at that point, there probably was something you could call Proto-Anglic or Proto-English: it was already differentiated from the rest. In particular, it was the more northern half of Ingvaeonic (spoken throughout Jutland), with Frisian further southwest and the Saxons southeast. But it wasn't yet Old English as we know it and was still spoken on the continent. —CodeCat 18:00, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

True. I have amended my statement above. Leasnam (talk) 18:31, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks ... my knowledge of what comes before Old English is murky ... I hav an overall feel (I think) ... but I only put in what others hav put in before me from other sources.

As for Frankish, I too find them as I trip over them from others. I was hoping for something I could go look at online. Oh well.

I think I'll wimp out for now and put the nowadays quotes of cniht and eoten on the Citations page for now and maybe put a note on the main page to see the Citations. They might look a little out of place under the OE heading.

Thanks again. --AnWulf ... Ferþu Hal! (talk) 19:51, 26 August 2012 (UTC)

/tʷ/ in PIE

I found this edit changing a PIE etymology from twak- to tʷak-. Is it commonly spelt with the superscript ʷ and is this said to be an actual labialized consonant, distinct from /tw/ as a sequence? I have never seen PIE with phonemic /tʷ/. I also can't find that etymology in a list of 3000 PIE roots which I assume is pretty fairly comprehensive ... is there a known source for it somewhere? Soap (talk) 17:42, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

Honestly I too have never seen the superscript used with this word, and I am unsure whether it is distinct. This *twak- is actually *twak₂- and may be reconstructed only for Germanic *þwah-; whereas the other, I believe, means "skin". Leasnam (talk) 18:52, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

WT:AINE shows how we transcribe PIE and what phonemes it has in the standard reconstruction. Neither tʷ nor k₂ is one of them... —CodeCat 22:00, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

*rīmaną

In Old High German, girīman is class 1 strong, while rīmen is class 1 weak. So if that can happen in OHG, it probably could have happened in OE too. But it's equally possible that there is just a gap in the attestation, and that rīmen was used by a later writer for who it was a weak verb, while girīman is older. —CodeCat 19:57, 13 September 2012 (UTC)

Ok. I have not seen OHG rīmen till now. Had I, it would have been crystal clear Leasnam (talk) 20:05, 13 September 2012 (UTC)

Etymology of *kalwaz

There's no such thing as lʷ in PIE, so what is that meant to be? —CodeCat 20:07, 17 September 2012 (UTC) Oh right. It's kalw-. My bad. I will fix. Leasnam (talk) 20:10, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

"g"-Replacement in Middle English

Hello,

do you know if there is a form of "go" which is "yo", samely as "give" and "yive"?

Greetings HeliosX (talk) 07:26, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

No, that only happened when the g was before a front vowel in (Pre-)Old English. In that case it's usually written ġ. —CodeCat 11:19, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

There was Old English "ġietan", is it possible to reconstruct a form "yet, yot, yotten" in English? And also, in English, is it possible to understand by the phrase "Pick up your things for the trip" also "Pack your things for the trip"?

What CodeCat states above regarding the palatisation of g before front vowels is absolutely true; normally, this would not occur. Do you see an example of yo = "go"? This seems vaguely familiar to me, and the only way I can possible think this might have happened is that it is a backformation from the past tense form of yode = "went" where the -de would have been easily interpreted as a normal -ed(e) ending. I will check for you... Leasnam (talk) 15:07, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Sanskrit usra or uṣṭra?

Hello. Here you added some Sanskrit usrá, biffalo. In Monier-Williams dictionary there is उष्ट्र (uṣṭra, “buffalo”). Did you have this word in mind back then? The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 06:48, 1 October 2012 (UTC)

Hello. Yes, that must be a misprint. I will update it. Thanks. Leasnam (talk) 12:55, 1 October 2012 (UTC)

WT:RFD#geardagum

FYI. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:52, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! Leasnam (talk) 15:41, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Extra characters

If you need to type extra characters a lot then you could try using a different keyboard layout. In Linux, the US international layouts (there are several) include things like macrons, acute accents and ogoneks. The Windows one includes acute accents but not the rarer characters, but there is a keyboard layout editor that you can use to make your own keyboard layout if necessary. It's very helpful! —CodeCat 13:28, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Ok Thanks! But what has happened to the control which is governed by the dropdown selection when one edits (Templates, Headers, Latin/Roman, etc...)? When I make a selection, it no longer updates, so I can only access Templates (the one loaded when the page refreshes completely). Leasnam (talk) 13:42, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

I don't know, it works for me. You could ask at GP? —CodeCat 14:18, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

PG pronunciation

The prefixes of verbs were probably not stressed, the stress fell on the root syllable instead. You can still see this in the modern languages. —CodeCat 18:35, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

Ok, wasn't sure. I believe that in OE the stress had not yet shifted to the second element and was still 'a:.bi:.dan, but htis happened during ME ... I am not 100% sure though Leasnam (talk) 18:39, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

I think it probably was already stressed on the second syllable. After all, the prefix had already weakened to a: hadn't it? Besides, to explain it as a parallel evolution shared by all Germanic languages after 1066 seems very unlikely. —CodeCat 18:41, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

I'm ok with the change. My thought is that the stress moved after *uz was lost altogether in OE and OHG leading to a meaningless-sort of affix...wheras in PGMc it still had meaning, similar to Modern English out-, but this is only speculation. I think the unstressed idea is just as equally justifiable, especially in light of the descendants. I am good with it : ) Leasnam (talk) 18:48, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

well, I shouldnt say it was meaningless, but rather that it wasnt clearly taggable to a known preposition, like some other prefixes were...

I think in origin, all verbal prefixes were unstressed, because they behaved somewhat like separate words still. In Gothic, the prefix could be separated from the verb by certain words and particles. It's curious that Dutch and German eventually re-developed separable prefixes all over again through a very similar mechanism. The original Germanic/Gothic prefixes are actually the non-separable ones in Dutch and German, and in Old English too (at least insofar as they prevent ge- from being added to the participle). —CodeCat 18:59, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

abide

I noticed you changed the etymology section of the word abide. I am not sure I understand why that was done, at least why it was changed to what it was changed to. The 2 points I have are first you totally erased the from aby section that dealt with the last sense of the definition. Second, you changed what I had researched and backed up with a recent source to a similar but different sourceless version. I never mean to step on toes, but I am curious. Note, I did re-add the aby section because I can't see that as being bad. The other portion maybe you have a more recent source or better info that substantiates what you have written. Thanks for your time. Speednat (talk) 01:02, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

Hi! I was in process of creating the Appendix page for the Proto-Germanic reconstruction, and I thought that the etymology format of abide might benefit from a rewrite. The listing of 2 OE terms ābīdan and abīdan, one meaning "to remain" and another meaning "earlier" (???) was a bit confusing... I think the mention of a conflation of sense with aby is noteworthy and should be included. Otherwise the basic information is still there. Leasnam (talk) 14:01, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

Category:Proto-Germanic words suffixed with -ijanan‎

Wouldn't this just contain the same as Category:Proto-Germanic class 1 weak verbs? —CodeCat 17:27, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

cinis

In this edit, you say that Latin cinis is related to Russian зола. Are you sure of that? It is difficult to imagine that they could be genetically related. How did PIE *ken- turn into Russian зола? I would guess that зола is probably related to coal, or to Sanskrit ज्वलति (jvalati, “to burn, glow”), both of which are unrelated to PIE *ken- or Latin cinis. —Stephen ^(Talk) 02:26, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

Yep, you're right. Russian зола is related to English coal. I think I connected them when I saw the etymology at зола without thinking. There, derivation from PIE *ken- is incorrect. Leasnam (talk) 16:48, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

Old English Entry

I'm asking for your help because I see that you are experienced in Old English. I had created an entry a while ago on this word leorningcild. Is the declension of it correct? I based it off this website here. Any help would be appreciated.

I'm pretty certain that is an error on their part. In Germanic languages, including Old English, compound words invariably take the gender and therefore the case/plural markings of the final element (in this case cild). Looking it up in other resources confirms that the plural (nominative) should be leorningcildru. Leasnam (talk) 16:36, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

Additionally, I could not find any other verified citations for leoru, leorua, leorum in the sense of "disciples". Leasnam (talk) 16:40, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

Would you like me to go ahead and modify the declension for you? Leasnam (talk) 16:47, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

Done. Leasnam (talk) 16:57, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! Much appreciated! Timotheus1 (talk) 19:38, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

Linking to unattested terms

There's a new template {{lr}} which is meant to replace {{lx}} for linking to reconstructed terms. It works the same as {{recons}}; it always links to the appendix, so you can use it to link to reconstructed terms in attested languages like Old Dutch too. —CodeCat 03:45, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Thank you! Leasnam (talk) 03:47, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

For you!

		Barnstar
		For your work on Proto-Germanic entries. It's really helpful! —CodeCat 19:03, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

Thank you! Leasnam (talk) 19:04, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

gainstrive

I took the etymology out, and replaced it with something a lot simpler. It seemed to be mostly about (deprecated template usage) strive rather than (deprecated template usage) gainstrive. Also I can't find any evidence of "Middle English gainstriven". But feel free to add some of it back in if it bothers you. Ƿidsiþ 17:20, 2 March 2013 (UTC)

WT:RFM#Proto-Germanic forms with final nasal vowels to their ogonek-spelled forms

I thought that might interest you... —CodeCat 02:22, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Yes thank you Leasnam (talk) 02:32, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

It looks like this move is supported enough, so I would like to start the move. Would you like to help out? When moving, be sure to check all the pages that link to it as well, and update them too. And also remove the head= parameter of the page you're moving, since it wouldn't be needed anymore. —CodeCat 13:17, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Yes! I can help Leasnam (talk) 15:18, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

For the time being, I will leave a redirect until all the linkages are updated--I dont wish to interrupt service to users. Leasnam (talk) 15:23, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

If you fix the links of one page at a time, there wouldn't be any interruption. That's what I've been doing. —CodeCat 16:02, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

I do hope you will be orphaning and deleting those redirects soon? —CodeCat 17:31, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I will go back and clear them out :) Leasnam (talk) 17:32, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

You're still leaving a lot of links to the entries you move. Could you please fix all links to an entry before you move the next? That way we can be sure that we don't miss any. —CodeCat 00:47, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Yes. of course. Leasnam (talk) 15:22, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Etymology of try

You added the current etymology to this quite a while ago, but I can't find any sources for the metathetic alteration bit. OED lists further than Medieval Latin as 'unknown'. Can you remember where you got this from? --Hyarmendacil (talk) 01:37, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

I can't recall exactly where I first saw that, it may have come from various (French) sources citing Frisch/Girart de Rossillonin such as Dictionnaire de la langue française by Emile Littré, L. Marcel Devic. See also [[6]]. Leasnam (talk) 15:55, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

haughty

Hi Leasnam in Appendix:Proto-Germanic/malskaz I can see the relationship between the description soft etc and the Dutch word mals, that is mostly used for grass that is soft and juicy, easy to eat for cows. But the description haughty puzzles me. Am I missing something? Jcwf (talk) 04:09, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

Well, the Middle Dutch malsch meant "headstrong, zealous". I am not sure if mals "soft" is a descendant of this same word. The Old English word malscrung meant "charm, enchantment"; Gothic malsks meant "foolish", so the original sense of "haughty" seems to hold true. Leasnam (talk) 16:55, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

I looked up the PGmc form again and found that one of the senses (given in German) is "soft" (weich). I have added it to the entry. Leasnam (talk) 19:14, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

Norwegian infinitives

Hello Leasnam. I noticed that in some Proto-Germanic appendices the Norwegian verbs end in -a. This is rather peculiar to Swedish, so I corrected the endings. Whenever you have doubts about the ending of Norwegian infinitives, you may find the Bokmålsordboka of the Universitetet i Oslo a reliable source pertinent to their dissipation. The above link shows the infinitive trygle (*trukōną) and its synonym tigge (*þigjaną) is also given in the definition. The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 08:00, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Thank you. The various sources show the -a forms, and usually cite them as being dialectal, so based on this I reasoned it away. Leasnam (talk) 13:39, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

wardōn

Could you have a look at the descendent list of *wardōn? In these cases, I always have trouble figuring out which absorbed the Frankish term first, Old French or Late Latin, and did Old French absorb it independently or via Latin. --Victar (talk) 16:28, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

can you please provide a link to the specific entry you are referring to? Leasnam (talk) 16:42, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

*wardōn. Thanks.

I would say that it was Old French who took the word in first. Usually, Latin preserves initial w- (cf. wambasium), whereas the Romance languages convert this to gu-. Leasnam (talk) 16:51, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Are you sure? I would expect that Latin would borrow w as v instead. Seeing w in Latin looks to me like a much more recent development. Old High German began to be written only in the 7th century, and they used w for their own language (uu actually but that's the same), and it seems unlikely that Latin would have already copied that practice earlier. —CodeCat 16:55, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Well, perhaps not "w" per se, "w" might just be a modern rendering of the sound (= "v", maybe "u"). What's important though is that it was not g- Leasnam (talk) 16:58, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

The thing with Old Frankish borrowings is that we really can't be sure into which language (Old French or Latin) it was borrpwed first. Even if it appears written in Latin first, that is really no guarantee. I have read that the majority generally found their way into Vulgar Latin and Old French, then from there into Mediaeval Latin. Leasnam (talk) 17:02, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

I just created *warduz! I can't believe we didn't already have this! Leasnam (talk) 17:14, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for your insight! Do you think the scenario above is the case with *wardōn? --Victar (talk) 17:23, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

I just left a msg on MGLovesFun's page. I would say it went into Vulgar Latin first, then was inherited by Old French. Middle Latin then picked it up from there. I'm not sure about Late Latin, but I would imagin it got it from OFr or one of its siblings (Italian). Leasnam (talk) 17:33, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

I've restructured the descendents list of *wardōn. Let me know if it's in line to what you were thinking. Thanks. --Victar (talk) 17:42, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

That is how I would have done it. Leasnam (talk) 17:46, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks again for your help! --Victar (talk) 17:50, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

What should be done in cases like *raubōn. Should we specify that the Old French rober and Late Latin raubare are descended from Vulgar Latin *raubare? --Victar (talk) 20:26, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

I would, yes. This word appears to have been borrowed very early, before au > ō, so an entry into Vulgar Latin would be expected. Leasnam (talk) 20:28, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. I wonder if someone should create a lat-vul template for reconstructions. --Victar (talk) 20:32, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

*raubare <= Leasnam (talk) 20:33, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Ah, VL. What an awful language code. --Victar (talk) 21:19, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

There are also ML. & LL. (Middle Latin/Late Latin). They seem to work only with reconstructions; or in etyl's. Otherwise, la for Latin should be used. Leasnam (talk) 21:21, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. Somehow I thought they all were defunct and merged into la. --Victar (talk) 21:28, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

waybread and bread

I think it's missing the sense that you added in the etymology. It would derive from Germanic *braidį̄ but I don't know what it means in English today. —CodeCat 02:23, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

I think it is possibly associated with the verb (in OE, brǣdan (“to spread”)), apparently so called from spreading along roads (ways). Leasnam (talk) 02:27, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Added. It's obsolete today, having been supplanted by closely related (deprecated template usage) breadth. Verb still survives dialectally though. Leasnam (talk) 02:41, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Frankish edits

Leasnam, I'm in the middle of cleaning up the Frankish entries. If you wouldn't mind, could you hold off on editing them so we don't cross-edit? Thanks. --Victar (talk) 00:22, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I completely understand. :) Leasnam (talk) 00:24, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Leasnam, you're welcome to have at them now. I ask though if you think some of the reconstructions are erroneous, i.e. if don't think Frankish maintained Sievers' law, please start a thread on in at Wiktionary_talk:About_Frankish so we can all be on the same page. Thanks! --Victar (talk) 00:22, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

You stealing my fun? ;-) --Victar (talk) 06:13, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Maybe :p Leasnam (talk) 16:17, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Why the reversion at med?

Hi. Why did you undo this edit? [7] Equinox ◑ 13:45, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

Oh, I was unaware. I was on my mobile, and I must have done something I didn't intend to...I apologise. It was an accident. Leasnam (talk) 16:41, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

Appendix:Proto-Germanic/siniz

You created this entry a little while ago. It's showing a script error now, because one of the links to Frankish is not marked as reconstructed. Is it a reconstructed term, and if not, is it still Frankish? —CodeCat 01:02, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

I don't see a script error when I look at it today (was it corrected?). Is it the personal name Sinigus? I think the name may be attested. Leasnam (talk) 15:55, 8 July 2013 (UTC)

gain- and with- terms

Just so you're aware, I've RFVed a number of gain- and with- terms because they seem to be used only by Richard Rolle. If you happen to know where to find other citations, that'd be great. - -sche (discuss) 05:34, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Many of these were taken from dictionaries, so finding Google hits is going to be difficult if possible. Quite sad, as these terms are not fabricated, just old, rare, and hard to find :( Leasnam (talk) 13:40, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Gothic script requests

{{l}} now automatically adds a request for the script if you leave out the word but provide a transliteration, just like {{term}}. So you don't need to add {{rfscript}} anymore for Gothic or any other language. —CodeCat 11:17, 1 August 2013 (UTC)

Cool! Thanks Leasnam (talk) 16:19, 1 August 2013 (UTC)

hearra#Old English

Hey, is this word really from Old Saxon, and is the Old Saxon word really from Old High German? Or are the three just cognate with each other? —Angr 16:49, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

I believe the Old English is a borrowing of the Old Saxon word (Sievers), and likewise Old Saxon from Old High German. It may have been a calque of the Latin or a use based on analogy (cf. senior), so it looks right. It was not very common in OE, used only poetically, appearing 23 times in Genesis, but only four times elsewhere, and was obsolete by the Middle English period. Leasnam (talk) 16:59, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Borrowing may also be supported by the vowel in the OE word, ea which had it been inherited from PGmc, it would be ā instead. Leasnam (talk) 17:04, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Not necessarrily, I think. -ai- is normally converted to -ā-, yes, but this word also has an umlauting factor. And umlaut of ā gives ǣ, which then breaks into ēa? I'm not sure if breaking would affect it here but it's worth considering. —CodeCat 17:08, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

That's true, but (--and I realise that OE didnt use macrons) the vowel is usually rendered short. Alternative forms of OE hearra are herra and hierra, possibly indicating an original e (e breaking to ie?). But to compare, there is also the ON harri, herra, which are also believed to be borrowings from OS. Leasnam (talk) 17:11, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Old English -ie- definitely indicates umlaut, so the term cannot have been borrowed wholesale from Old Saxon, unless it was borrowed at a time when the Old Saxon form was still the unsyncopated *?hēriro. The shortening of the vowel probably happened in Old English i much the same way that it happened in German (which today has a short vowel). Long vowel followed by long consonant usually causes the vowel to shorten. This isn't a regular process across languages (Dutch shortened the consonant instead), but it is likely that it happened at some point. The Old Norse word seems to have developed the same way: *hairizô > *hārizō (ai > ā before r is regular) > *hārzo (syncope) > *hárri (replacement of n-stem -o with -i, z > r) > harri (shortening of vowel before long consonant). I think that this may in fact be an early calque rather than direct borrowing, similar to how the day names were calqued into the cognate forms of each individual language. I would estimate a date of about the 5th-6th century, a time when the Northwest Germanic dialects were still similar enough to make such calque-borrowing possible. —CodeCat 17:25, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Okay, then from start to finish it was a calque in OHG, then analogised elsewhere among the other Gmc languages? But still, no PGmc use in the sense of "lord" ? Leasnam (talk) 17:34, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

It seems so. I don't know if it was strictly OHG because it was likely Frankish in origin, which probably means it entered Dutch and OHG at more or less the same time. But it's doubtless that some calquing did happen, because there doesn't seem to be any other way to explain the -a- in Old Norse. But some forms were also borrowed, like Old Norse herra which can hardly be original because of its irregular -a, which is a feminine ending in Old Norse. So it's likely that the word was calqued or borrowed by different people and the different forms existed as alternative forms of the same word for some time. —CodeCat 17:42, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

WT:PREFS

There are some pretty nifty gadgets here you may want to take advantage of, especially the accelerated creation of inflected forms, if you don't know about them already. Thanks! —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 05:37, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Okay. Thanks! Leasnam (talk) 19:56, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Middle Dutch descendant at *bērō

I noticed you used a macron to indicate length, but Middle Dutch has two different types of vowel length. Macrons are used to indicate originally short vowels that were lengthened. See WT:ADUM. —CodeCat 23:33, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Oh, should it then be baere? Leasnam (talk) 01:43, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

ae is used (at least in normalised spelling) only in a closed syllable. What I meant is that bāre would have a lengthened a, which is not the case here. It was long to begin with, so if you want to add diacritics at all you use the circumflex for this word, bâre. —CodeCat 01:50, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Oh, I see. No, I didn't realise we were using circumflexes. Does this extend also to Middle Low German and Old/Middle High German as well? Is this a policy change? (granted I was aware of the use outside of Wiktionary for stressed, long syllables. But I thought we were to forgo such here.) Leasnam (talk) 01:55, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

There wasn't any policy before, we originally didn't indicate the type of vowel at all. So I adopted the practice that I had seen in some of the phonological descriptions of Middle Dutch. These marks are only there to distinguish types of long vowel, not to indicate length in the first place. So we still should write just bliven and not blîven, because i in open syllable must always be originally-long in Middle Dutch, it can't be short nor lengthened. The same applies to u, so the difference is only relevant for a, o and e.

We might want to apply it to MLG too, because I believe the difference was significant in that language too (at least if WT:ANDS is an inducation). MLG didn't usually write double vowels for long vowels in closed syllables, as far as I know. So it needs length marks in all cases. For Middle High German it's different altogether, w:Middle High German says that lengthening didn't occur until much later there (it seems like it spread from north to south). Middle High German also has its own normalisation conventions for writing long vowels. —CodeCat 02:21, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Oh, apparently we already have some conventions like this for MLG. WT:AGML. —CodeCat 02:25, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Old French morphology

I'm writing a VL to OFr morphology script. Do you know of any good resources, other than the Wikipedia entry? Shoot me your email if you're interested in checking out what I have so far. --Victar (talk) 06:31, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

Etymology of snide

FYI, I have replaced the etymology of snide with "Origin unknown", following sources. If you can source the etymology you have entered in diff, it can be returned back. --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:05, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Oh, and I should notify you of WT:RFV#snide, so you can provide attestation if you have one. --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:26, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Century Dictionary says that snide is probably a dialectal variant of snithe (adj.). Leasnam (talk) 22:34, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

But Century 1911 is an old dictionary, much older than the new sources (Merriam-Webster Online, Online Etymology Dictionary) that say that the origin is unknown. --Dan Polansky (talk) 00:08, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

There is a clear relationship between the two. Andrew H. Gray 09:59, 31 January 2017 (UTC)Andrew (talk)

Roh

May I know, why you deleted the Low German word Roh on this page: Appendix:Proto-Germanic/rōwō? --Stardsen (talk) 15:01, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

I didn't...lemme check...

its still there. I was on my phone and I accidentally reverted your edit, but then I rolled my edit to add it back. Leasnam (talk) 17:26, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Wikisaurus and heroin

From WS:heroin, I have removed Ron and shit (diff), since none of the two are entered into Wiktionary mainspace as meaning "heroin", and since I cannot easily attest them to mean so. The primary place of entry of new terms and senses is the mainspace, not Wikisaurus. --Dan Polansky (talk) 07:38, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

OK thank you for the heads-up. I will search for attests (I know them only from verbal use), and add senses as appropriate. Leasnam (talk) 15:39, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

shrithes

May I ask what you used to generate that entry? It's using rather outdated formatting. —CodeCat 21:31, 14 September 2014 (UTC)

i typed "shrithes" into the Search engine, then selected 3rd Person button Leasnam (talk) 21:35, 14 September 2014 (UTC)

hakebot

Old French word hakebot which I found while looking up escluse. Do you have any thoughts on what the hake bit means? And specifically which language the bot bit comes from? Thanks for anything you can add. Renard Migrant (talk) 17:08, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

That word is also in Middle English, supposedly from Flemish related to Middle Low German hegbōt; Middle Dutch hoecboot. Apparently "hook-boat" with the first element influenced by (deprecated template usage) hāke. Leasnam (talk) 06:22, 18 September 2014 (UTC)

Ent

For my own enlightenment, not for the sake of citation: Can you tell me what the Gothic word is that you listed ant- as prefixing in the Old English entry for ent, or else what the source of the information was? Thanks. 50.141.105.8 21:14, 17 September 2014 (UTC)

I got it from Gerhard Koebler's Germanisches Wörterbuch located here http://www.koeblergerhard.de/germ/4A/germ_a.html. Leasnam (talk) 06:13, 18 September 2014 (UTC)

Thanks! 50.141.105.7 06:16, 18 September 2014 (UTC)

-ier, -iest

Hi. Over the years I've noticed a lot of entries that have theoretically valid -ier, -iest forms that don't occur at all in attestable texts. Just now I saw "blastworthy" (ier, iest) and "stormworthy" (ier, iest). Could I ask that you avoid using the "ier, iest" template unless the word is common enough to have these forms in real-world use? Thanks. Equinox ◑ 03:27, 22 September 2014 (UTC)

Sure. I added those quite a while ago, and I actually have quit that template. Leasnam (talk) 03:31, 22 September 2014 (UTC)

Extraneous characters in forum edits

Could you be more careful not to do things like this (diff) and this (diff)? Chuck Entz (talk) 21:18, 26 September 2014 (UTC)

I will try. I only have a smartphone, and when i edit i notice it skips around...i was honestly unaware that i was adding additional characters in areas i was not directly adding comments. I will diff each time from now on Leasnam (talk) 00:58, 27 September 2014 (UTC)

undermeal

Regarding [8]: I added to the entry, over the past couple of days, every citation of the word that I could find. I didn't see any that had the sense you just added. Are you sure it's actually attested?
Incidentally, I saw a couple of reference-works which argued that the Bartholomew Fayre citation, although traditionally regarded as a use of the "afternoon meal" sense, is actually a use of the "afternoon" sense.
- -sche (discuss) 06:19, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

That is the one, yes. I took this out of Century, not aware that you had been working on it. And Cent. uses it for the meal. I dont know yet what to make of the purely "afternoon" sense, as though 'undermeal' were formed using -meal. Traditionally and historically it meant the former: undern ("morning", later "afternoon") repast. Yet it all hinges on citability :] Leasnam (talk) 06:44, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

I would say that the last sense catches this meaning (and allows for others as well); which, ironically was at one time the original meaning of the word, but no longer apparently. It just appears , from an evolutionary perspective, that it has broadened to include "repast" although in origin that is what it originally was. That is a little bothersome...but this might only irk me, and if only me, i'll be fine to remove the addition. Leasnam (talk) 07:05, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I'm not sure I follow; which sense are you saying was the original, "meal eaten in the afternoon" or "the afternoon"? (The entry implies it had both meanings even in Old English.)

FWIW, a couple of old dictionaries I looked at (to see if they had pointers to places the word had been used) argued that the plain "afternoon" sense was the original, and the "meal eaten in the afternoon" sense arose from misunderstanding of the "-meal" component of the word (but I don't know if those old dictionaries are right or not).

Which sense do you think the Bartholomew Fayre citation is using? I could see it as either, really.

- -sche (discuss) 07:16, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

You know, you've got me thinking. At first i would have seen it as meal=repast, but thats not even the original sense of meal: it was "time". "set time to eat" was a later development. So its very possibly (or really more probably) that it means "undern-time"=(early) afternoon. As far as Bartholomew Fayre, it can be either, but in absence of other attestations with this meaning i would say its safest to default it to the better known, surer sense. Leasnam (talk) 03:54, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

laggedness

Hi. Has anyone used this word? The Google Books results have two scannos, for "raggedness" and "jaggedness". I don't mean to offend, but you seem to have a long history of adding words that don't exist, or are vanishingly rare, and you don't add any "rare" or "obsolete" glosses to them. This is a disservice to foreign learners, who shouldn't be picking up what are basically non-words. Could I ask you to be more careful in checking the words that you add? If you're on an Anglo-Saxon kick, fine, but you still need sources. Equinox ◑ 03:14, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

No offense taken : ) You are right...only one hit is legit, which isnt enough for inclusion. I came across what I thought was this word while looking for another , so I could have checked it more thoroughly. I will be more careful in future Leasnam (talk) 03:40, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

further

Did you really mean to say that there is an English suffix -ther, and that further should be categorized in Category:English words suffixed with -ther? Chuck Entz (talk) 05:57, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

Actually, not a suffix, but an ancient relic (a suffix in PIE) found in words like other" and "after", but I woundn't consider it a suffix now. Leasnam (talk) 12:45, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

I've changed it Leasnam (talk) 14:47, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

chore

Your edit seems a bit pointless as it doesn't actually change anything. I wonder why you did it? —CodeCat 02:28, 2 May 2015 (UTC)

I only did it to make the definitions appear. Was there a glitch causing them not to display? I can see them now, you must have fixed it, yes ? Leasnam (talk) 02:39, 2 May 2015 (UTC)

Yes, there was a bug in a module I'm testing. I fixed it now. —CodeCat 02:42, 2 May 2015 (UTC)

Proto-Germanic *gailō

Hi, an American I.P. address added Appendix:Proto-Germanic/gailō in a fatuous manner, so I gave it some proper editing protocols. Now I'm leaving it to you. --Lo Ximiendo (talk) 23:27, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

Okay! I'm on it ;) Cheers! Leasnam (talk) 01:17, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

Buche

I don't know where you checked, but the German form is definitely from *bōkō. Kluge's dictionary, the main authority in German etymology says so. This [[9]], the main authority in Dutch etymology says so, too. Moreover, you can explain it to yourself, because *bōkijō would have trigged an umlaut in German: Büche, a form that does exist dialectally (< OHG buohhia). I'll revert your reverting me. Kolmiel (talk) 18:36, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't believe we have an entry for *bōkō. Customarily, when a word is a derivative of another (in this case, *bōkijǭ from *bōkō, in the absence of the other we place them all together (sometimes we use ( )'s to indicate indirect descent). I checked Koebler, and he derives OHG buohha from *bōkijǭ. Are you certain that PGMc -jǭ leaves -ia in OHG? And I didn't revert you. I edited your change because you asked. Leasnam (talk) 18:55, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

German is not the only form needing a move. Old Saxon might too. Kolmiel, are you certain that both forms didn't give OHG buohha (without umlaut) and buohha (with umlaut)? and the two later coalesced in MHG-NHG? Leasnam (talk) 19:04, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

@kolmiel What do you make of this then:

beuk 1 znw. m. ‘boomnaam’, mnl. boeke, bōke v., mnd. oostfri. bȫke v., os. bōka v., ohd. buohha v. (nhd. buche), oe. bēce v. (ne. beech) wijzen terug op een grondvorm *bōkiōn, een afleiding van *bōka: mnl. boec m., oe. bōctreow o., ‘beukeboom’, on. bōk v., vgl. got. bōka ‘letter’ (waarvoor zie: boek). — lat. fagus (met dezelfde bet. als het germ.!), gr. phēgós dor. phagós ‘eik’, gall. bagos in plaatsnamen zoals Bacenis silva ‘Harz’.

The German Buche cannot be from *bōkō, the German word is a weak noun. OHG buohha had a strong and weak form. MHG buoche was weak. Leasnam (talk) 19:08, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Ok, I checked a few other PGmc words ending in -jǭ, and they all invariably give rise to OHG -a, never -ia, so the form *buohhia would not be a reliable reconstruction. The descendant form (if valid) of PGmc *bōkijǭ would actually be buohha (weak noun), which coincidentally is identical to the precursor of MHG buoche, and German Buche. So the original is still correct despite the absence of Umlaut. Leasnam (talk) 20:01, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

PLEASE. You never let me answer :-) Stop adding new stuff. I'm answering. I'm answering! :-) Kolmiel (talk) 20:14, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

From back to top now:

1.) Well. The distinction between jo-stems and o-stems is still, on principle, valid in OHG. And *buohhia is a valid form. It is true, however, that these stems tended to collapse. I don't know all the details, but you have for example sunta and suntia for the cognate of sin. So you're right that buohha could have been a variant of buohhia. Compare also *lindō, where it says that *lindijō led to the Old Saxon variant lindia. I would assume that the forms in -ia are the older ones and that they later became -a, but that's a guess. You do see, however, that -ia is not something I made up.

2.) If the dictionaries say that buohha is from *bōkō, then I think that they checked the declension. What declension did buohha have? Was it an n-stem? That would of course make it's being derived from *bōkō unlikely. But I assume it was an o-stem. It's becoming weak in MHG is completely regular. Kolmiel (talk) 20:46, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I'm sorry. I wrote jo-stems. But the same is also true of jon-stems. Compare for example Mücke, which was mucka or muckea in OHG. And there's a winia ("female friend"). Kolmiel (talk) 20:55, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Well, if we look at it like this: There is certainly a reconstruction for *bōkō (> Gothic bōka, Norse bók, Old Saxon bōka, Old English bōc, OHG buohha (st F)) and the 2 -j-stem forms: *bōkiją ( > Norse bæki/beyki) and *bōkijǭ (> OE bēce, OS bōkia, OHG buohha (wk n F). I consider the MHG buoche (wk n F) to be the descendant of the latter rather than the former. But as you say, it may have shifted, and inherited certain aspects of both OHG forms, leaving a mix of forms still present today, like Buche beside Büche. In any event, I would consider Buche to be from *bōkijǭ, but *bōkijǭ itself is ultimately from *bōkō (so one can think of all these forms as descending from *bōkō). This is why I wouldn't mind placing all of them at *bōkō. When you say above that the dictionaries say buohha is from *bōkō, that is true but which buohha do they mean? The one that led to buoche or the one that died out? Leasnam (talk) 21:15, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

The distinction between strong and weak nouns ending in -e collapsed in Middle High German. Therefore I don't think your declension argument is valid. Compare for example Linde from *lindō, which is weak in MHG. (Compare Walther's famous: Under der linden an der heide...) To me, MHG "buoche" (weak) is from OHG "buohha" (strong).

The dictionaries mean that the modern German Buche stems from *bōkō, because it's the modern word that they explain. You have, admittedly, convinced me that OHG buohha may also be a spelling that represent the other form. Therefore I would say: put OHG buohha back on, and maybe add in brackets (*buohhia). But I wouldn't put the Middle High German and German continuations under it. Kolmiel (talk) 21:33, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I did. Please take a look and make additional changes as needed :) Leasnam (talk) 21:37, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Looks very good. Thanks a lot! Kolmiel (talk) 21:59, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

-stow

In this etymology Old English is supposedly derived from Middle English- can you fix it? DTLHS (talk) 06:10, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Done. Leasnam (talk) 14:12, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

lawl

I just noticed that if hlagol had survived into modern English, it would have ended up as lawl. History is funny. —CodeCat 23:15, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

Yes it is! :) Leasnam (talk) 23:17, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

neap

Thank you for your contribution. Any Germanic cognates with this word are welcome. Perhaps you might have time to scrutinise my rules on my user page, that may bear upon the need for a search for the most recent cognates. Normally, I believe that there is not much point presenting an unattested root unless other cognates that derive from this root are manifest. Should Germanic cognates be found for NEAP, then no one should criticise these and the unattested Germanic root that you have seen, being transferred to the Entry Etymology 2. I have to state that on the whole the Oxford Etymological dictionary is safer than Websters, who are not always right. I am still only an amateur etymologist, but have had considerable experience in dictionary comparisons. I notice that in the first syllable of most of the unattested PIE roots that the vowel 'Ā', or even 'A' is avoided; this makes me sceptical. Obviously all the vowels would have been used in ancient languages, but have been taught that initially roots were most likely to have the 'Ā' as initial vowel. I now realise that the Greek Ōmega or rather, Ēta is formed from the Attic 'A', but not older than the Sanskrit. I have very recently fabricated two or three Proto-Indo-European roots, that I should never have done without considering the Slavonic word that is likely to be the closest to the root. It also amazes me that no one has so far presented the Celtic cognates for brass. Andrew H. Gray 18:29, 15 September 2015 (UTC)Andrew

There's been considerable debate over the years about whether "a" can be reconstructed for Proto-Indo-European at all. At the very least, it's very rare. Almost all the vowels are an alternation between no vowel, e and o. Germanic strong verbs show the same alternation, once you adjust for sound changes: sing (PIE *e), sang (PIE *o) and sung (PIE no vowel). What looks like "a" and other such vowels in the daughter languages is mostly syllabic consonants like *l,*r,*n,*w,*y and the laryngeals. As for omega and eta: they're not really older. It's just that the Indo-Iranian languages have changed both *e and *o to a, so they don't reflect the original vowels anymore. Greek eta is actually what happens to most long "a"s in just the Attic dialect, which makes it more recent than the development of the dialects. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:17, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

Chuck Entz Thank you so much for this; your information answers my questions and fully confirms what I have heard - only presents far more detail of it, that is essential for me to bear in mind. I also should have borne in mind that Hebrew (that is conjectured to have come from Canaanite -itself likely to be an ancient form of Hebrew!) has only HĒ, WAU and ĪODh as letters for vowels - nothing for 'A'. I am intrigued by the references to Semetic about 3,500 BCE: Semetic is from Shem, over 1,000 years later! Andrew H. Gray 07:21, 16 September 2015 (UTC)Andrew

crevette

Hi. Thanks for your edit. I suppose you'd read my note on WordDewd's page. Where have you found the earlier attestations for cravette, crabette? They're of course another good possibility, actually making borrowing from Dutch an unnecessary supposition. (At any rate, we all seem to agree that derivation from chèvre or a cognate thereof can hardly be original.) Kolmiel (talk) 22:40, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

I did, yes :) Leasnam (talk) 01:02, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

PS: Should we still mention the chèvre-etymology? It's the only sourced etymology at my disposal, but if you have other sources, it could go unmentioned as far as I'm concerned.Kolmiel (talk) 22:42, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Not sure. Semantically, I dont think it makes any sense, but presenting everything and letting the User decide for themselvrs never hurts ;) Leasnam (talk) 01:02, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

Yeah... I've now rewritten the etymology a bit. Have a look at it. You may also revert it altogether. I just realized that since French has also écrevisse it is possible that the Frankish word did indeed influence crevette, but not necessarily via Dutch, possibly via a regional form within northern French. -- But what about the earlier forms you mentioned (cravette, crabette). When are they attested? Kolmiel (talk) 17:11, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

I'm running across a lot of mentions, none making use of asterisks, which point to Saintongeais crabette (petit crabe). Cravette, however, may be merely a hypothical intermediary form, but I am not positive. I like what you've done with the Etymology ! Very nice :) Leasnam (talk) 17:26, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

Okay. Fine. Thanks again :) Kolmiel (talk) 18:52, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

hod as "Hebrew"

Please don't fix up edits that will have to be removed because they're in the wrong script- that just makes it more complicated to revert or undo them. Thanks! Chuck Entz (talk) 04:46, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

k Leasnam (talk) 15:11, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

brass

If sufficient Celtic words can be found with analogous spellings, related to 'fire', it will confirm yours and Professor Skeat's analogy. It may not relate to 'harden by fire'; but it may be connected with 'flame coloured', but NOT at the Germanic level. The lexemes in the Germanic tongues are so diverse in meaning, that they clearly manifest a pre-Germanic origin - either Celtic or Iberian, whence Spanish BRASA (live coal). Comparison here may well be made with braise from French braise (“live coals”), from Old French brese (“embers”), from Old Low Franconian; akin to Norwegian/Swedish braseld (“sparkling fire”), Norwegian/Swedish dialectal brasa (“to roast”), Danish dialectal brase (“to flambé, enflame”). Compare also Gaelic BREO[4] (flame, fire) and BRAS in 'bras-ghabhail'[5] (to burn quickly). It really needs a genuine Breton word for BRASS to confirm this - and their word for 'flame'! There is also BRŌS in Cornish, meaning 'very hot'. Although unconnected, I find it intriguing that the Basque term BURDINORO for 'brass' literally means 'yellow iron': its word for BRONZE is obviously borrowed; but its term for 'copper' is translated as 'red iron'; which is very curious, because you would have thought that BRASS, meaning 'bronze', would have been the extant metal then used. Also, distastefully to me, there is no connection or evidence of it anyway between the Celtic BRAS <BRASSŌ with BRASS, as there is no evidence that 'greatness' assumes 'strength'. If proved, then it rules out a connection with a stock root 'to transfix', and I would have to adjust my talk page accordingly! Andrew H. Gray 20:02, 2 December 2015 (UTC)Andrew

"so diverse in meaning, that they clearly manifest a pre-Germanic origin"--I thought it was the other way around: diversity in meanings usually signifies that the word is older (in this case, native or borrowed at an early common date) and has had time to diverge...Why would Old French not be a candidate as the origin of the Spanish word? Leasnam (talk) 17:53, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

Dear Leasnam Your first sentence confirms what I meant; because of their diversity in meaning they were more likely to have come through Germanic native languages, from an earlier native source. There was, of course, Germanic infiltration in France, and possibly Spain; but certainly the Celtic invasion affected both, but more significantly in France; where pre-Iberian or pre-Punic races moved up towards Lapland, in comparison to the more static races in Spain. So if Spanish BRASA (live coal) were not borrowed from Old French it would have to have represented a very early origin, which is very dubious. However, compare BRASCA (coal powder with clay to line furnaces) - I cannot see any valid connection between that lexeme and French BRÈCHE > BRASH. Andrew H. Gray 18:35, 10 December 2015 (UTC)Andrew

auk#Etymology

In this diff] you added "fuligula glacialis" as a taxon for a kind of duck. I have not yet found the name in any book written since 1900 and can't be certain about what bird was intended. What is the source for the information? DCDuring TALK 13:36, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

The modern taxonomic name is Clangula hyemalis Chuck Entz (talk) 14:27, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

oh gosh, that was in 2011...I honestly do not even remember making that so I couldn't tell you. I would just update it with the modern taxonomy, or get rid of it altogether if it doesn't really add any benefit to the etymology Leasnam (talk) 15:24, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

@Chuck Entz Thanks. I was not familiar with that site (NBN). Though the site's performance seems slow its coverage seems excellent.

@Leasnam If I could have found the modern name with some certainty, I would have made that the primary taxon and retained the other as a synonym. But I was unaware of Chuck's source. I remain somewhat suspicious of alla as an etymon of auk. Alle (and Alca) have also bothered me etymologically. That said, I don't think we should remove anything because the information given seems to be the best available. DCDuring TALK 18:09, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the typo fixes on *wéh₁itis

Those typos have been sitting there for a while without my noticing them. —JohnC5 20:48, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

:) Leasnam (talk) 21:29, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

Pronunciation of French 'acheter'

Hello, you deleted my edit concerning the pronunciation shown for the French verb 'achter' indicating a so-called Parisian pronunciation, and an 'other pronunciation'; the notes on these pronunciations are completely wrong. The pronunciation containing a schwa is used in careful speech (or in a Southern French pronunciation), otherwise, the schwa never appears.

Would a qualifier such as "Used in careful speech, Parisian, southern France" be appropriate ? Leasnam (talk) 00:40, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

I think it originally may have referred to European vs. Canadian, but I might be mistaken Leasnam (talk) 00:41, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

Hello again. Yes, it would. However, the first pronunciation is not typical in Paris. Except in the southern part of France, no French speaker would pronounce the schwa of 'acheter' in a daily conversation / 'normal' speech. Regarding Canadian French, the schwa in 'acheter' would always be skipped, but as I said, it would be the same for the big majority of European French speakers. 86.207.134.159 16:29, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

I see. Okay Leasnam (talk) 17:42, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

90.9.36.172 00:34, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

Brock

@Leasnam It is vital to see that just because one cognate is found in a constitutionally Germanic language, does not mean that the lexeme is necessarily Germanic. I cannot over-emphasise that a number of words, for example pour were not assimilated into Anglo-Saxon, because they were just used amongst servants et cetera. So, your overall derivation from Celtic is vital here. A number of words are certainly borrowed from Celtic, but brock, down, dun and coomb (with others) were handed down from Celtic. Kind Regards. Andrew H. Gray 16:24, 25 January 2016 (UTC)Andrew

@Werdna Yrneh Yarg Hello Andrew, I've been following your user page for a while now. I believe I am right in saying that you wish to demonstrate the Celtic words that appear in English. It seems that, in the above statement, you are claiming there are words in English inherited from Celtic as opposed to borrowed from Celtic. This is not the case. English is a Germanic language, and any non-Germanic word (and some Germanic ones, for that matter) must have been borrowed into the language at some point. —JohnC5 17:31, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

daz

Could you review the etymology here. DTLHS (talk) 02:28, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

Corrected. Leasnam (talk) 02:32, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

gyden & hunden

I added the Old English words gyden and hunden. Would you like to expand them? I also added a note to the etymology of suffix -ess. --Lo Ximiendo (talk) 14:55, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

Appendix:Proto-Germanic/w%C4%ABraz

why? Lysdexia (talk) 23:45, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

Hi ! Only because at Wiktionary we try to adhere to canonical transcription for Proto-Indo-European reconstructions, for consistency. That's not to say you won't find forms written *wei- or *bAut-, etc, but when we see them, we either redirect them to the standard form, or we try to change them. A reconstruction of *wei- would have been changed to *wey-, then redirected to *weyh₁-, but the Etymology already contains *weyh₁-, which pretty much sums it all up already. Leasnam (talk) 01:05, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

proud

Are there any serious differences between ‘I am proud of’ and ‘I am honoured by?’ --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 03:39, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

The connotation is that pride is active- it's something you do. Being honored has the connotation that it's passive- it's your response to something someone else does. Of course, they overlap and merge into one another, but those are the core connotations. Chuck Entz (talk) 06:21, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

Ditto Leasnam (talk) 13:40, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

stuþs

Among "Stützen" and "stützen", the noun is rather the derival of the verb.

Both main German etymological dictionaries, Duden – Herkunftsörterbuch and Kluge – Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, explain "stützen" (and "Stütze") as intensivications of "stud-" nouns and verbs.

Nevertheless I also have to correct my own entry a bit, as, according to Duden, the intensivication "stütz" is documented parralel to the simple version "stud".--Ulamm (talk) 11:11, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

Stützen is related, but not a descendant of *stuþs. Stützen is a deverbal of a MHG verb going back to PGmc *stuttijaną. Leasnam (talk) 11:16, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

French spacing

How did you acquire the habit of using French spacing ? --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 21:48, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

Honestly, I don't remember :\ Leasnam (talk) 21:50, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

hiera

O Leasnam, may I ask of thee if thou knowest the offspring of this word marker? --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 03:54, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Are you asking what the descendant of this (Old English) word might be? Leasnam (talk) 16:39, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Yea. --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 17:37, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

I believe it survived into Middle English as heore, here (“their”), but I do not believe there is a Modern English representative. Leasnam (talk) 19:36, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Middle Low German schin

Hi Leasnam,
I just noticed that you have added Middle Low German to a Proto-Germanic reconstruction, but as a derivation from some non-existent, unattested Old Saxon word. Do you have a source for this derivation? I am asking, because I was about to move it under Old Norse, as a derivation from skinn, because the reputable ODS expounds its origin in that wise. The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 10:51, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

I got that from Gerhard Köbler's Germanisches Wörterbuch. He doesn't say where the Middle Low German schin descends from, but in such cases (without more precise information), it is customary to assume based on the form of the word that a hypothetical ur-form existed, in this case Old Saxon *skinn. If you have better proof to the contrary, please do not hesitate to add it :) Leasnam (talk) 16:11, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

Old Norse æfi

Thank you for the explication. I have one more quæstion, since I am not that versed in reconstructions. Vigfússon's Icelandic-English dictionary lists Old Norse (and Icelandic) æfi as a cognate of Latin aevum and Old High German ewa. Therefore I præsume that it belongs among the descendants from *aiwaz? However, there is already the Old Norse adverb ei/ey. Do you think it would befit æfi to be added to the same line next to ei and ey or at the very end of the page, as a new line? The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 18:37, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

Old Norse æfi has an alternate in ævi. It may not be a direct descendant of this word (albeit a related term or derivative), descending instead from PGmc *aiwiz or *aiwį̄ (“eternity”). I would list it under Related terms to be safe until we can know more Leasnam (talk) 12:57, 22 May 2016 (UTC)

I've added *aiwį̄ and *aiwiz to the Related terms on the page Leasnam (talk) 13:02, 22 May 2016 (UTC)

I see the Old Norse now on *aiwaz, it's not in the usual position (coming after OHG). I am not sure that this even belongs here, as ON ei is an adverb Leasnam (talk) 13:09, 22 May 2016 (UTC)

rice

Could you expand etymology 2 that I have just added? Thanks. DTLHS (talk) 15:39, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

Done. But I wonder if we should change this to "alternative form of rise" and move it there ? Leasnam (talk) 17:53, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

I'm not sure. I will look for citations later which will help decide. DTLHS (talk) 18:09, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

It is difficult to search for, with interference from rise / rice / other spellings. Are you satisfied with the entry as it is now? DTLHS (talk) 23:58, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

Looks good! Leasnam (talk) 00:14, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

Help

I am a beginner in German lerning And looking for a book/dictionary of cognate words in English and German. Könnten Sie etwas vorschlagen?(I don't know if you can see my reply there, sorry if I have disturbed you and wikitionary is good but i have to look up in it every time I learn a new German word ) 汩汩银泉 (talk) 12:01, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

Hello! Sorry I missed your reply on your Talk page, I didn't see it till now. Unfortunately, I don't have any good suggestions of my own on material relating to German and English cognates; have you tried looking for any online ? Leasnam (talk) 17:05, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

till now the best one i found is wiktionary, and this list on it https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:List_of_German_cognates_with_English That list helps me a lot 汩汩银泉 (talk) 06:44, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

bestow

Hi! Two senses that you added to "bestow" on July 16th 2011 are being discussed: Wiktionary:Requests_for_verification#bestow. Would you like to contribute? --Hekaheka (talk) 12:45, 30 May 2016 (UTC)

Middle Low German vowel marks

Hi Leasnam. Traditionally, Middle Low German grammars and dictionaries use a circumflex for Old Saxon long vowels and a macron for Old Saxon short vowels. As the only one working on Middle Low German here, I think we should follow that tradition as well. If you want to do me a favour, please find the system outlined at Wiktionary:About_Middle_Low_German#Normalisation. I would appreciate it Korn [kʰũːɘ̃n] (talk) 10:22, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

sure, absolutely Leasnam (talk) 18:44, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Your edit of alight

Hi, I saw that back in 2011, you added to the entry alight the meaning "To light; light up; illuminate" (Etymology no 3). I was wondering if you perhaps remember where you found this meaning, and ideally, whether you have any citations.

The reason I am asking is that I used this meaning, but then got into a discussion whether it exists at all. It was pointed out to me that this meaning doesn't seem to appear anywhere else, the OED included. Sephia karta (talk) 16:35, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

Hi ! Honestly, I don't remember exactly where I got that from...I use many, many resources. But I typed in "alight" and the definition into Google, which brought me to several places, one being this [[10]] which looks like it might be the place I got it, because it is very close to how it's worded (and it's a resource I've used on occasion). The page is hard to read, because it's so faded, but you'll find what you're looking for the third "a-light" down Leasnam (talk) 14:52, 18 July 2016 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/leuþą

Hi, is there a language phase called "German Low German"?[11] -- Puisque (talk) 19:10, 19 July 2016 (UTC)

German Low German is a language designation that accompanies the language code nds-de (distinguishing it from nds-nl). I know the name sounds funny, especially if you're from Germany, but "Low German" would simply be nds...Since my contributions are mainly from East Frisian Low German, I have become accustomed to using nds-de, and therefore the "German Low German" name Leasnam (talk) 19:33, 19 July 2016 (UTC)

It should be noted that 'German Low German' is mainly a geographical distinction. Pretending it were a language is purely a Wiki-thing, which was made up on nds.Wikipedia because the people there couldn't stop squabbling about how to spell and thus decided they'd instead have their own Wikis, with Blackjack and hookers. Korn [kʰũːɘ̃n] (talk) 21:19, 19 July 2016 (UTC)

@Puisque, had you changed the code to nds when removing "German" I would have left your edit alone Leasnam (talk) 21:34, 19 July 2016 (UTC)

ókr via gml?

Hey, I noticed that you listed the Old Norse word and its descendants as descended from Middle Low German at *wōkraz, which seemed odd to me. How do you come to this conclusion -- could the Old Norse word not just be a direct descendant of the P.Gmc. word (though I'd expect an initial v)? — Kleio (t · c) 02:53, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

I would agree with you, however all of the sources I looked at have it as a borrowing into Norse Leasnam (talk) 03:06, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

I've moved it and added a note...we'll see if anyone disagrees :D Leasnam (talk) 03:15, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

Alternative Etymology of Fun

@Leasnam Could there please be a source presented for this second controversial paragraph on fun. Your first paragraph is sound and helpful, but am worried that the alternative etymology may undermine the credibility of Wiktionary etymologies. You would probably have noticed that I have had to revert my appendage to the first paragraph without notification, since it had no foundation in the light of the third defining paragraph that you or someone else helpfully added, and therefore could cause confusion! My due apologies for having replied to JohnC5 instead of replying to you on the 1st February!

Andrew H. Gray 09:22, 17 August 2016 (UTC)Andrew

PG kōpijaną

Hello, I saw that you are the author of the entry on *kōpijaną. I was wondering about your source for the Swedish and Danish reflexes that you have given (kopa and kope, respectively). I haven't been able to find them in other dictionaries, and I would have expected the Danish reflex to be kobe, with lenition. Cheers, --95.42.15.199 00:20, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

I fixed the links. My apologies for just chiming in. Korn [kʰũːɘ̃n] (talk) 08:16, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

Oh, Jesus, I shouldn't edit pages before breakfast, I confused *kopijan- with *kaupijan-. But can you take a look at the descendants on Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/kaupijaną and Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/kaupōną anyway? Several descendants in the latter entry have an i-infix while the Old English one at *kaup- has an umlaut but no infix. I don't know enough to judge whether that's correct. Korn [kʰũːɘ̃n] (talk) 08:30, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

If by i-infix you mean the 'i' in the endings of OE ċēapian and OFris kāpia (as opposed to OE ċīepan), then yes, that's quite normal. Class 2 does get an infinitive ending containing /i/ (which never ends up causing umlaut) in Anglo-Frisian, whereas the original umlaut-causing 'i' of class 1 is lost. On the other hand, I find no mention of an ON verb keypa (listed as a reflex of *kaupijaną) in any dictionary. Already in (classical) ON, it's a single irregular class-1 lexeme kaupa-keypir-keypti-keyptr, as it still is in Icelandic, and, conversely, there is no kaupa-kaupar-kaupaði-kaupat, which should have been the regular reflex of a class-2 *kaupōną, nor are there any class-2 descendants in the modern languages. In all the modern continental languages the vowel is the same throughout the paradigm and could reflect either au or ey (except for Gutnish kaupe). The Faroese reflex, while listed as a reflect of *kaupijaną > ?keypa, actually seems to reflect au and not ey throughout (ON au > Far ey, ON ey > Far oy), but it also has class-1 endings and could be due to paradigm levelling. The Norwegian form kjøpe, while common to Bokmål and Nynorsk, is, IMO, best explained as Norwegianised Danish and not as a direct descendant of either a putative *keypa or kaupa, since neither au nor ey should undergo monophthongisation in this position in Norway, except in a few transitional dialects along the Swedish border. --95.42.15.199 20:42, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

Hi ! The Swedish can be found here [[12]] meaning to "look, stare". It's dialectal I believe (East Swedish in Finland). I don't know where I originally got them, since it was so long ago, but I agree, the Danish should look more like kobe. Leasnam (talk) 03:07, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

the "hood/dom" distinction

It seems as though you do not draw any distinctions between words suffixed with -hood and -dom. I do not know where you grew up in or whence you come from, but in the place that I grew up in people seemed to draw clear distinctions between words suffixed with -hood and -dom. For example, words like anthood and antdom would be analyzed by the community that I lived in as followsː anthood - the state or condition of being an ant; antdom - the quality or essence of an ant. Mountebank1 (talk) 06:04, 28 September 2016 (UTC)

That may be true of the locale you hail from, however, we draw the distinctions based on how people actually use the terms in print, on public broadcasts, etc. If you can find the distinctions you mention attested, then you are free to add them. Leasnam (talk) 14:49, 28 September 2016 (UTC)

I just added a cite in which the author uses the word antdom with 2 meanings: first, to mean "the world of ants" and a couple lines further, as "the state of being an ant". Leasnam (talk) 14:54, 28 September 2016 (UTC)

Well, this distinction is well attested in Middle English and not some much in Modern English where it appears to be a purely dialectal thing. But still in the place in which I grew up I would never use the word antdom to mean "the state of being an ant". In fact, we even had words like freehood (“the condition of being free”) and freedom (“the essence of being free”) and so in that stellː "you could live your life in freehood, and if you did, you would enjoy the freedom". We also had words like christenhood (“the state or quality of being a christian; Christianity”)([13][14]) and christendom (“the world of Christians”). So to me, using the word antdom to mean "the state of being an ant" looks like poor English... Mountebank1 (talk) 19:19, 28 September 2016 (UTC)

Today, however, in standard English, the disctinction is generally more along the lines of x-dom = the world of x / x's collectively; and x-hood = the state or condition of (being) x; with some moderate amount of cross-over between the two distinctions Leasnam (talk) 20:37, 28 September 2016 (UTC)

laudo

Explain you revert. -84.161.13.210 23:11, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

Explain why you insist on placing it there. Leasnam (talk) 23:24, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

If there are forms missing, that is not the place to add them. Bring it up in WT:TR Leasnam (talk) 23:26, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

I'm insisting on mentioning the form in the entry because it exists.
I'm not insisting on placing it, where it was. For example, one could also place it inside the table, if that's possible.

Then where is the place to add them? And who ensures that somebody adds missing forms, if they were only mentioned in the tea room? -84.161.13.210 23:31, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

Since they are forms that should be in the table (laudārī is already an entry), it wouldn't be the best place to list them as Related terms, so I would ask someone who knows more about Latin than I do where they might belong in the table, if at all Leasnam (talk) 01:00, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

@84.161.13.210, Leasnam: This should've added the alternative present passive infinitive form laudārier to the table. I'll go find out why it hasn't worked. — I.S.M.E.T.A. 11:28, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

My thanks to kc_kennylau for making my solution work. — I.S.M.E.T.A. 12:54, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

Quadrant

Hi Leasnam, Please check your last revert on quadrant (on 9 September 2016), i think it is an error. 192.93.124.97 09:56, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I think it was. But looks like it's corrected now. Thank you for bring that to my attention ! Leasnam (talk) 15:58, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

"ij" and "j" in Germaansch

Hallo, I'm not a science in languages but I work at the nds.witktionary.org and edit there articeles to show the etymologie of words. I have there a little question. For example: swallijanan, sometimes people write it with "ij", otherwise I find also swalljanan, only "j", but I think, that are not different words with different meanings, it's the same word. Is it right? Can you tell me, what is the reason, that it is as it is.

Second question: Pokorny don't write Words in IE with letters like "h₁" and something like this. My problem is, I have the wordbook written by Pokorny, but I don't know, how he writes a word, when I find the word written like this, for example in the en.wiktionary.org "bʰréh₁wr̥". Do you know a Internet-page, that help's me to transmit the words, so that I can find them better in Pokorny's book, and otherwise, where I can find, how to write with this letters, when I used Pokorny.

And another question: Often you have Words in modern Low German, where did you find them? My problem is, that I cannot find a book over Low German Etymologie, so I must write it by myself, looking, how the word was in Middle Low German and Oldsaxon, most I can do so, but sometimes I have Problems, because I do not know, is it a decendent of the Old Saxon or an decendent from the High German Word. In the northern Dialekts we know something called Missingsch, that's meaning, that they use a High German word on a Low German manner, so like kindergarden in Englisch, original it is Garten not garden, on the first look, it looks like an original englisch Word, but it is only written in Anglisch and they also speak the garden like englisch garden not like German Garten. So I need a source, in what I can look, if there is not 100 % clear, is it a descandent from the Low Saxon word or is it a descandent from the German word and would be happy, if you know one. To search in the Internet is a cruel, I think, the best sources etc. Google show on page 300 an so on and there is no other possiblity for me, to get the informations, I need.

Sorry my English, my last English-lessen is over 40 years ago and I don't speak often English since that time. Please answer on my talk-page in nds.wiktionary.org: https://nds.wiktionary.org/wiki/Bruker_Diskuschoon:Joachim_Mos --Joachim Mos (talk) 19:22, 9 October 2016 (UTC)

The difference between -j- and -ij- is determined by the weight of the preceding syllable. If only one consonant and a short vowel precedes, you have -j-, otherwise you have -ij-. This is called Sievers' law.

Pokorny is a very old source, and gives reconstructions that have long been discredited (they were dubious even in his own time). You're better off finding a more up to date source. —CodeCat 19:30, 9 October 2016 (UTC)

coorne

Could you take a look at this? It seems like it could just be an obsolete spelling of "crown", but I'm not sure what else should go on the page or if there are other etymological details. DTLHS (talk) 01:03, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

Hrm..I really couldn't find much to substantiate the well-constructed entry. The Alternative form is clearly Old French, not English. In Middle English, the spelling coorne usually signifies a "horn", not a crown. Sound clip is also for crown. Is this a fatuous entry ? Leasnam (talk) 01:35, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

I have no idea. RFV it if you want. DTLHS (talk) 01:38, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

Etymology of dad

Dear Leasnam, your last edit is very interesting. However, those Old English forms are not Germanic, but relate to even older forms than that of the Celtic, that were found in Scot's Gaelic and Old Welsh. Also, by "or" at the close of your edit, I believe that you might mean "and", since there is no direct connection between Russian and Old English; however, the addition of the Russian kinship is useful as pointing to a P.I.E. root of Sanskrit tata. So will only change "or" for "and" just now. However, am concerned that you do realise that your recent edits are purely hypothetical, since DAD, BABE and MA(MA) are all substrate lexemes; DAD being the newest, but of Celtic origin, ultimately from P.I.E., whereas MA- is the most substrate of all, having survived all conquests in most European languages. While thankfully, your recent edits may not discredit you in the eyes of other Administrators, they may to the public. The RULES on my User Page were for mine own guidance, but they should be pretty reliable. Kind Regards. Andrew H. Gray 08:28, 18 November 2016

Of course I realise they are hypothetical. They are clearly marked with an asterisk. A Celtic origin is not conclusive either. Why would the English begin using a Celtic word for 'dad' in the Middle English period ? (In Modern English I can see that might be likely...). It is highly likely that Old English retained the word *ætta for "dad, father", but it was never recorded due to the informal nature of the word. A child trying to pronounce *ætta could easily turn it out to be "tatta" or "dadda". It's speculative yes, but it is logical. More logical than a borrowing IMO. Leasnam (talk) 18:14, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

I realise a Celtic origin is not necessarily conclusive; but there was no question of a Celtic word suddenly being used during Middle English - most of such few substrate forms were not necessarily assimilated into the written vocabulary, but used in limited groups. It is the same with your re-constructed Old English forms; they do not exist in the Anglo-Saxon dictionary. However, as I already stated, those forms are not Germanic - if they did exist - but related to substrate forms in Gaelic and Welsh. Missing off the "p" instead of employing the older "q" or "c" (that does not apply here, of course), from the Proto-Celtic, as in the case of ATHAIR is nonsense. Kind Regards and happy new year. Andrew H. Gray 18:31, 2 January 2017 (UTC)Andrew

Well, it seems then that your target should be Proto-Germanic *attô, correct ? You believe that it was borrowed into Germanic from Celtic ? Leasnam (talk) 18:38, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

What is your evidence ? Leasnam (talk) 18:39, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

That is precisely the question. Where is there any evidence of it being borrowed into Germanic when it does not appear in Germanic? You have now found lexemes in the Germanic dialects; although they still do not prove a Germanic origin, since it has strong cognates in Celtic (Welsh, Cornish and Irish) and kinship as you rightly and helpfully put with the Russian lexeme. So, a form similar to Proto-Indo-European *dátta (“father”) clearly seems to be the root, whence Sanscrit "tata". Hope this clarifies the matter. Kind Regards. Andrew H. Gray 19:48, 2 January 2017 (UTC)Andrew

Don't forget that words for parents are strongly influenced by the development stages that infants go through: at first they can only make labial sounds, so languages around the world have a strong tendency to have simple labial sounds like m, b or p in words for mother and, to a lesser extent, father. At a later stage, they learn to make dental/alveolar sounds and spend days making only those. Since they've been interacting with their mothers for quite a while at that stage, the adadadadadadadadada...(etc., ad nauseam) sounds get applied to words for father, if they're applied at all.

In general, you can't really be certain that words like mama, papa, baba, dada, nana, or tata are inherited or borrowed unless you can show that things have happened to them such as added morphology (e.g. the PIE ancestor of mother and father) or known sound changes (Grimm's law and Verner's law being the most notable for Germanic, thus Latin pater vs. English father).

Also remember that words for things in a child's early environment are the most likely to be taught to the children before they interact with people outside of the immediate family, and thus the most likely to be inherited and least likely to be borrowed or supplied by analogy. The same principle explains why inflection of basic vocabulary tends to be more irregular and have more artifacts of earlier stages in the language's history.

@Chuck Entz Thank you for your reply. In my earlier statement to Leasnam I badly put that such lexemes were confined to a small group. My very due apologies for not correcting such a misleading or inappropriate statement - what I was trying to convey is that such forms would have been limited to speech, in the light of your central paragraph just above this, where you succinctly set out the whole point here, within the family of the illiterate in such past periods but not necessarily recorded in the written vocabulary. However, those families that communicated in Anglo-Saxon initially, where the children grew up in a semi-educated environment, would have used the Germanic terms. To sum up, to assume that those forms that you present above were Germanic, at least some evidence in such languages of that family elsewhere would have to be evidenced! Also, I need to make clear what I was referring to as to the O.E.D. reliable references; they are in the multi-volume set; not some of the recent independent sources in the online O.E.D., such as that for CAT, where the source wrongly assumes that all the Celtic forms are derived from Late Latin, that is certainly related to the Greek borrowed form; but such forms would have to be proved not to have been in existence in the Celtic family before any influence of Late Latin. The only statements that are not wildly inaccurate for PARCH (in the online O.E.D.) for example, are those correctly rejected etymologies, such as related to PERCHER (to pierce) and PERSICCARE (to thoroughly dry) in the attempt to arrive at a conclusion.Andrew H. Gray 09:15, 7 January 2017 (UTC)Andrew talk

What all of that means is that transfer of words for parents from one language to another is pretty rare, and you really need to have good evidence before you can assume it happened. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:03, 4 January 2017

Also, I need to thank you so much for revising the etymology of adze - I missed that! There has been scope for quite a few "perhaps" lexemes, especially where what follows is wildly inaccurate. By adding this uncertainly, as you know better than I, it carries far more confidence for the uninitiated reader and conforms to the most respected Oxford Dictionary (full version), because of this. Andrew H. Gray 08:55, 23 November 2016 (UTC)

My due apologies for being so abrupt in my edit summary message, but was shocked at any relation with "perish": I now see where yours came from; and apparently there were two words spelled the same: one meaning "to roast" (which is the only connection with "parch") and the other, unrelated,'to perish'!Andrew talk

You're good, no worries ;) Leasnam (talk) 17:41, 24 November 2016 (UTC)

bibliopole vandalism

Thanks for reverting the vandalism by 2601:681:402:5170:C839:49CA:2C60:71C2 and 2601:681:402:5170:c839:49ca:2c60:71c2. JonRichfield (talk) 03:28, 28 December 2016 (UTC)

@Leasnam I would agree completely with the expected morphology of the Old Saxon form, as that which Gresham picked up would not be derived directly from your proposed P.G. root. I therefore also believe that it may be borrowed and if so, its comparison does not add to the etymology and, as with a number of other edits, their proposed re-constructed P.G. form is just an unfounded assumption. Kind Regards. Andrew H. Gray 14:34, 9 January 2017 (UTC)Andrew

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skraudaną

Hey Leasnam, I was wondering why you put the English descendents of Proto-Germanic *skraudaną in parenthesize. --Victar (talk) 20:06, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

Because they're not true descendants per se. The ending of the OE verb (-ian) attests to this. The Old English verb is descended from Proto-Germanic *skraudōną, a related verb derived from the noun *skraudō, or it may have been formed from the noun scrēad in Old English. Leasnam (talk) 20:22, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

Than just delete them and add them to a Proto-Germanic *skraudōną entry, or add a (< Proto-Germanic *skraudōną), no? I think the parenthesize are just ambiguous and confusing. --Victar (talk) 20:39, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

If I had time to create the new entry and add them, yes, that would be preferred :) Leasnam (talk) 20:42, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

Also, I believe the descendants would only be the English forms, so that is a lot of effort for just one set of descendants. Is it really worth it ? It's easier just to show them as indirect descendants using parentheses, IMHO Leasnam (talk) 20:44, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree -- probably not worth the entry. I went with my second suggestion and added (< Proto-Germanic *skraudōną). I think that's a lot more clear. --Victar (talk) 21:15, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I like that method very much ! Less "busy"-looking on the page :) Leasnam (talk) 22:22, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

The verb should be placed at *skraudō if it's derived from it, not at the strong verb. —CodeCat 21:18, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I agree. Leasnam (talk) 22:14, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

It's been moved. Leasnam (talk) 22:21, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

Format anon user's edits

Hi Leasnam, the user 98.24.247.112 has formatting that has not been fixed, especially with the etymologies of prefixes and suffixes. Would you mind if you fixed them? I will help too. — AWESOME meeos ！ * (не нажима́йте сюда́ [nʲɪ‿nəʐɨˈmajtʲe sʲʊˈda]) 06:01, 7 March 2017 (UTC)

Yes, of course I will help ! :) Leasnam (talk) 13:03, 7 March 2017 (UTC)

That IP's latest edit was in 2009...but I think I see the one you refer to Leasnam (talk) 21:07, 7 March 2017 (UTC)

wherefor

I notice that you rolled back my edit for wherefor. I added "for which" as a meaning for wherefor in English. While Collins' dictionary includes "wherefor" only as an alternative spelling of "wherefore", Merriam-Webster includes it in its own right as "for which"; thus, given that another dictionary's definition matches mine, it works. It follows wherefore/therefore vs. wherefor/therefor. Editosaurus (talk) 15:09, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

Have you considered adding "for which" at wherefore ? When a word is an alternative spelling of another, it stands to reason to place all the definitions together, at the main headword. If someone looks up wherefore, they may not see that it can also mean "for which" Leasnam (talk) 00:39, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

I would, but that's not what "wherefore" means. I can present it like this: "Wherefore are you setting that aside?" = "For what reason are you setting that aside?" vs. "Wherefor are you setting that aside?" meaning "For what thing are you setting that aside?" Editosaurus (talk) 04:41, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

So you're saying wherefor = "what for" using the old "where" for "what"...but is that currently used in standard English ? Had I heard you saying this in speech, I would have understood it as wherefore = "why" Leasnam (talk) 22:02, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

Talk:pick

@Leasnam, just wanted to make sure you saw Talk:pick. Thanks. --Victar (talk) 22:11, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

Mote

@Leasnam: I can thank you for your edits - the correct Germanic dialect cognates - however they do not presume a Germanic root; since they, with the English, are all from a pre-Germanic source, as of the few exceptions to having a common Germanic root! Andrew H. Gray 13:07, 3 April 2017 (UTC) Andrew (talk)

cupster 1916 cite

"plague-masters, barbers, cupsters or scrubsters..." Could this actually be a cupper, i.e. one who performs the old medical act of cupping? That seems more related to the idea of plague, and to barbers (see barber surgeon). Equinox ◑ 00:31, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

Hmmm...possibly. If so, that is a good catch. Leasnam (talk) 00:42, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

Dutch zaluw

I'm trying to figure the steps between PGmc *salwaz to zaluw. Why didn't PWG *salu become ODut *salo, and why don't we have MDut sale? Should we be constructing it from PGmc *salwō instead? --Victar (talk) 20:50, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure. Isn't *salwō a noun though ? Leasnam (talk) 20:54, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

Sorry, I meant *salwô, a weak declension/n-stem adjective. @CodeCat, what are your thoughts? --Victar (talk) 03:55, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

You have to take into account the other case forms as well. The nominative singular would indeed evolve the way you said, but in all the other forms the -w- would remain. There would be substantial analogical pressure to regularise this, which indeed takes place. Compare the doublet of schaduw and nachtschade. —CodeCat 11:44, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

Looking at the Latin derivatives though, we'd then have to argue this happened in Frankish, which seems a bit less plausible to me. Could it be instead, or a mixture of Frankish taking the weak declension form, *salwô or feminine form *salwō? --Victar (talk) 15:35, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

@Victar: Please help me to understand what you mean here...Do you feel that Vulgar Latin/Old French borrowed the word from the nominative singular, rather than from the oblique forms ? Leasnam (talk) 17:01, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

Oblique forms? I'm saying Frk *salu > VL *salvus > OF sale seems problematic every step of the way, and I'm having trouble trying to explain it. --Victar (talk) 17:23, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

Yeah...but it's not Frankish *salu, it's the whole thing: Frankish *salu, *salw-, which then leads to > VL *salvus > OF sale. ...Or are you just referring to the VL *salvus > OF sale part ? Leasnam (talk) 17:26, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

Perhaps there's an intermediate byform in VL *salus to explain the French (?) Leasnam (talk) 17:30, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

@Leasnam: That's my whole point! how are we getting Frk *salw-? I understand regularization in MDut, which CodeCat pointed out, with the loss of case ending, but that harder to explain within Frankish. --Victar (talk) 17:42, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

@Victar: You have to think about the environment and situation when it comes to words in VL from Old Frankish where Old French is concerned. The words weren't borrowed per se, as if someone took a dictionary entry of Frankish and started adding it to their Latin--it was a bilingual situation over centuries, where native speakers of Frankish began co-speaking in VL and words crept in from their original language--where the Franks gradually went from the habitual use of Frankish to the habitual use of VL/Old French (very similar to Middle English where the traditional Old Norman speakers switched to English but peppered it with French words because those words were the most familiar to them). Look at the OE entry for salu and the Inflection table I've just added. If the Old Frankish entry had an Inflection table, it would look similar to it. Leasnam (talk) 18:09, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

About regularisation in Frankish, I don't think it happened, I think it still showed the stem in the oblique cases. Think of it this way, the Frankish word is really *salw-, but the nominative form shows degradation of the -w to -u/-o. The word is actually *salw(a)- Leasnam (talk) 18:14, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

Etymology of Vaterschaft

Hi there. Thanks for adding the Middle High German terms.--De-01 (talk) 12:39, 6 June 2017 (UTC)

My pleasure :) Leasnam (talk) 12:40, 6 June 2017 (UTC)

swarf

Could you look at the etymology here? Previously there was only 1 section referring to both the metalworking and fainting senses, but I split it, assuming that it didn't apply to the former. DTLHS (talk) 00:35, 11 June 2017 (UTC)

The two words are related, but they have distinct etymologies. I've edited it a bit. Leasnam (talk) 19:46, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Question

Stop me if I'm wrong but you wouldn't happen to be following Dr. Jackson Crawford's YouTube channel, would you? Mulder1982 (talk) 13:35, 20 June 2017 (UTC)

lol, yep ;) Leasnam (talk) 18:20, 20 June 2017 (UTC)

Hehe, I thought so. Mulder1982 (talk) 21:31, 20 June 2017 (UTC)

Applebee's

Hi, I edited Appleby a while back, expanding its definitions and adding its etymology section. Well, I looked again a bit later and realized that I had put "Applebee's", the American restaurant, for the Appleby definition. Oops. You reverted me taking the restaurant part away. I promise, I took it away for good reason. Thanks!! Taliarus (talk) 1:39, 25 June 2017 (CTS)

no worries, man ! Leasnam (talk) 13:50, 25 June 2017 (UTC)

seamer etymology

I didn't think sewing machines or cricket positions existed in ME times...? Equinox ◑ 19:48, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

Of course they didn't. The sewing machine sense is a derivative of the earlier literal Middle English sense "onw who/that which seams". It's the same word, with a new application. Leasnam (talk) 19:50, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

Yep, just looked a bit silly without any applicable sense there. Found a book cite now. Equinox ◑ 00:48, 9 July 2017 (UTC)

Thanks :) Leasnam (talk) 01:01, 9 July 2017 (UTC)

Similar issue with upshift. Can it be found in a broader/older sense? Equinox ◑ 19:12, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

I'll have to dig and get back to you on it... Leasnam (talk) 14:33, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

fists

I would like to understand what you mean by durably archived. In this case yes a toon. Are we not able to cite the use of words in television dialogue as examples? ScratchMarshall (talk) 06:20, 12 July 2017 (UTC)

By durably archived I mean that it is permanently stored somewhere where another can easily cross verify it (as in a Google Search for the written transcript). Concerning television dialogue, Yes, we are, but with all the printed citations of the word "fists", which neatly fit into our quote-text template, why not use one of those ? It was actually as I was attempting to fit it into format that I realised, there is no author, ...how can I make this work ? Leasnam (talk) 11:32, 12 July 2017 (UTC)

rapture

Why do you think my modifications are incorrect? I am just adding links to the glossary to simplify extraction by etytree, the tool that is trying to visualize etymological trees. Epantaleo (talk) 23:19, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

I don't think they're incorrect as they are unnecessary. It just amounts to clutter in the Etymology. I relinked to active participle, but I do not think that is to be encouraged in every etymology that it appears. Users can look up something, they don't need a link to it all the time. Leasnam (talk) 01:00, 15 July 2017 (UTC) Sorry, just woke up and now I see...what is "etytree", and does this type of linking need to occur in all etymologies ? Leasnam (talk) 01:22, 15 July 2017 (UTC)

𦘒

Hi. Could you explain your rolling back, please? Dokurrat (talk) 00:22, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

I reverted because Etymology is a standard header. Do glyphs typically use something else ? Leasnam (talk) 00:27, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

I did that per Wiktionary:About Chinese. Dokurrat (talk) 00:28, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

That's for a Chinese entry. The entry in question is Translingual. Do it also apply ? Leasnam (talk) 00:31, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

hamstered

Sorry about that. Apparently, hamstered has been deleted before per WT:RFD. --Robbie SWE (talk) 18:15, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

It is a verb though. I found several citations of it as a transitive verb Leasnam (talk) 18:17, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

Hmm, I guess if you want to add it again with quotes, that's alright. --Robbie SWE (talk) 19:08, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

It's on my bookmark to-do list. There may be two senses: storing up rations (as a hamster does with food, in its cheeks?) and some modern "redpill" misogynistic thing. Well done if you beat me to it. My word to-do lists are very, very long, and the stuff I put on my user page is only the tip of the iceberg where I've really given up on a word. Equinox ◑ 23:08, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

@Equinox okay, I'll hold off till you can get to it :) Leasnam (talk) 23:39, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

tween

Sorry about that. - Amgine/ ^t·e 23:39, 17 September 2017 (UTC)

No worries ! :) Leasnam (talk) 23:52, 17 September 2017 (UTC)

fraining#Noun

Hi. Coud you gather some byspels for this? — (((Romanophile))) ♞ (contributions) 14:53, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

The only one that looks like EME is this one: For the maker of all thinge hath ordeyned me so, and I suffre great labour in frayning the for the obedience that I owe to hym. from The Dialogues of Creatures Moralysed but I'm not certian of the date. It might be Middle English Leasnam (talk) 17:35, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

fulth

I think the first two senses are now cited or close to cited, but I can't find anything relating to flowers on Google Books. If it is attestable you should probably look for use in early modern English. Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk) 14:55, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Okay, will do. Thank you ! Leasnam (talk) 16:15, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Old English cleanup

Hi Leasnam. Could I bother you to deal with the incredibly crappy recent entries at Special:Contributions/Werdna Yrneh Yarg? They essentially need to be rewritten as new entries from scratch. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 17:10, 6 November 2017 (UTC)

Sure thing. I'll take a look once I have a little more time. Leasnam (talk) 17:21, 7 November 2017 (UTC)

Just a reminder about these. Also, do you know enough West Frisian to check the etymology and pron at tsjoenderij? —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 00:10, 15 November 2017 (UTC)

Thank you so much for sorting out and tidying up my edits; I ought to have followed others' procedures, but instead displayed my ignorance. I ought to have kept to etymologies which is my strongest point in Wiktionary. I probably know a little more about Greek than Metaknowledge believes as my father was a Greek scholar and encouraged me to follow it up, but still I accept any corrective measures as long as they do not drive me to withdraw any further service to Wiktionary and set up my own etymological dictionary independently, using the point system on talk pages. I realise that here the etymologies must be sourceable; but when you see cognates like mud in that of mote just because of synonymous morphology, you begin to wonder whether the initial editors are in cuckoo land!

Also there is more hybridity with certain Old English words than may be appreciated and the slight Celtic influence to change the morphology of Germanic "uh" et cetera to "ow" in Old English. == A barnstar for you! ==

The Original Barnstar Andrew H. Gray 18:23, 20 November 2017 (UTC)Andrew talk

laith ("barn")

Any ideas on what the etymology of this could be? Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk) 13:14, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

It's from Old Norse. I have updated the Etymology section. Leasnam (talk) 14:03, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, it looks good. Would it be pronounced /leɪθ/? By the way, I've added a closing tag to the above barnstar, so you can put your reply under it again if you want to. Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk) 11:51, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

/leɪθ/ is how I would pronounce it, but I am not 100% sure if that is how it is pronounced dialectally Leasnam (talk) 12:48, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

MidE IPA

Thanks for all the cleanup from last time. A new request, concerning a piling up of Middle English FWOTDs: could you please add IPA to fol-hardi, fomentacioun, and lollen? And as always, we need more nominations in whatever languages you like best. Thanks! —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 23:06, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

My edit

Why was my edit rolled back? The ones I removed are already present in the section above and they add up. What's the problem? --Sabelöga (talk) 03:12, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

Oh, okay, you didn't say anything in the Edit Summary so I couldn't tell. I've restored your edit back Leasnam (talk) 03:39, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

Okay, thanks. Guess I should have said that --Sabelöga (talk) 04:03, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

einmalig

Thanks for extending the etymology of einmalig, Leasnam. It's exactly what I was looking for at that moment;)--91.61.114.19 20:44, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

You're very welcome, and Thank you for your contribution ! :) Leasnam (talk) 20:45, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

Etymology of gorian and gorettan

Hi Leasnam,

I see an Icelandic verb with a similar pronunciation and meaning to Old English verbs gorian and gorettan, which are of unknown origin, as we've discussed before. That Icelandic verb is horfa. I couldn't find an etymology for the Icelandic, so maybe the Old English verbs and the Icelandic verb are related?--Beneficii (talk) 17:43, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Hrm, probably not after researching it a bit. Icelandic horfa is from Old Norse horfa (“to turn in a certain direction, face”), from Proto-Germanic *hwurbōną (“to turn”), a verb related to Proto-Germanic *hwerbaną, but they do sound similar. I even conjectured what would result if the PGmc word were prefixed with *ga- to arrive somehow at the OE word, but alas, that doesn't quite answer for the lack of a f (i.e. *gorfian < *gahwurbōną) Leasnam (talk) 17:57, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Then, how about Modern English rare/dialectal gorm, gaum, and goam, which appear to have related meanings? Even if the ModE is not derived from the OE, could they still be related?--Beneficii (talk) 18:00, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Still got bad news for ya :( ; gorm with an intrusive r is just a variant of the r-less forms, which are related to OE ġieme (“care, attention”). The root is Proto-Germanic *gaumaz. That isn't to say, though, that gorm couldn't have been influenced by gorian; however, there is no proof or reason to suspect that, since the development of gorm can be explained without the need to refer to gorian (cf. hoarse < hōs, etc.). Besides, there is too wide of a time-gap between the OE gorian and relatively recent dialectal gorm with no intervening ME *goren or *gorten to bridge the gap Leasnam (talk) 18:05, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Got it. Thanks. By the way, have you considered archiving your talk page?--Beneficii (talk) 22:21, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Archiving ? Yes, many times lol. Do you know how ? I never really tried... Leasnam (talk) 22:25, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Now that I think of it, I think I could figure it out hehe Leasnam (talk) 22:27, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/slinkaną

Hi Leasnam, thanks for your work on reconstructed forms. I have a question about this one though. In Dutch the verb slinken is ergative-only. It takes "to be" in the perfect, not "to have" and it has therefore zero passive forms, not even impersonal ones. This is not unusual for verbs describing autonomous processes that lack an agens, both in Dutch and in German. Essentially, they are median deponentia. So, I was surprised to see that the reconstruction happily gives a bunch of passive forms. I am not so sure that is correct. Is there anything known about that? (Just curious) Jcwf (talk) 23:57, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

Let me add that verbs like this often came in pairs with a weak causative. In this case this would have been *slinkjan that must have given a weak verb *slenken in some early phase of Dutch. These causatives do have a clear active meaning with an agent and -I'd think- passive forms. Jcwf (talk) 02:21, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

Hrm...the reconstruction uses a template that has pre-set forms. I'm also not sure how to best go about representing this correctly. Maybe reconstruct the parallel *slinkijaną and notate that this verb comes as a pair ? Leasnam (talk) 17:03, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

The latter would probably add to the quality of both pages, I think. It goes for a bunch of pairs like sit/set, lie/lay in en, dunken/denken, drenken/drinken and there are more. The template could be altered to put in an if-statement that suppresses the passive forms or puts them in parentheses or something. Jcwf (talk) 17:27, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

Regarding your edit to Old Saxon giwitt

Hello,

I would like to thank you for your edits on the entry for Old Saxon giwitt. However, the Old High German "giwizi" means punishment and the cognate would be "gewiz". Referenceː http://www.koeblergerhard.de/ahd/ahd_g.html

just wanted to share that with you. ː) All the best, Kevin (Leornendeealdenglisc (talk) 04:58, 12 January 2018 (UTC))

Ah, just looked it up properly, It's all good.

(Leornendeealdenglisc (talk) 04:59, 12 January 2018 (UTC))

No worries, Kevin ! You're right: giwīzi is punishment; giwizzi is mind, intellect :) Cheers Leasnam (talk) 05:01, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

l en

Why did you remove that? There's no rule to my knowledge saying you can't have that in an entry, and it's certainly less controversial than Template:def. Isn't it like the "from" preference? PseudoSkull (talk) 18:58, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

I must have been looking at an older version as this is what I saw: [[15]]. Pardon me, it was an accident. I'll revert myself. Leasnam (talk) 19:01, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

orthography

Dear Leasnam, I saw you reverted my edits, so I desided to talk about it. All I want is to make Old English words written with Ƿynn, like they would be written in the manuscripts. The tendency of using w instead of Ƿynn is unfair, yes, sometimes that sound was written as u or uu, but Ƿynn was the letter of Old English alphabet, and using it in Old English words more than natural, I don’t see why it’s almost always is not like that. People just have to become accustomed to Ƿynn, that’s all. Ƿynn and P are written defferently, especially in printed and electronic versions, it’s not supposed to be a problem. I was just changing orthography, I'm sorry if the table of conjugation was moved of something like that, I checked it out and it was fine

Birdofadozentides (talk) 20:25, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

I didn't revert your edit because you used wynn. I reverted your edit because you altered the header on the wynn page to display "ƿynn", which is incorrect: on the wynn page it should show "wynn". I'm fine if you want to create an entry for ƿynn, and for however many other ones you want to make using ƿ :) Leasnam (talk) 20:43, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

My edits you reverted were on the verb manswerian (I guess I should've mentioned it before, sorry), I never was on that page and didn’t change there anything.

"on the wynn page it should show "wynn"" In modern English section maybe yes, but why should it be so in the Old English one? Besides it's not just a word, it's the name of the letter we're talking about, and it should be written with w? I find it kind of cruel.

Would you please allow me to change orthography on that page, only in Old English section, I won't touch the other ones. And I'm not able to change titles anyway

About creating an entry, it would have the same information that on the original page but with different orthography, why create it if the main page can be changed? If it can't I will cope the information, get rid of w and save it, but changing a bit the main page looks more reasonable for me.

Birdofadozentides (talk) 21:34, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

You're absolutely right ! mānswerian. Still, same applies. If the title of the page is "manswerian", then the header should not read "mansƿerian", it should read "mānswerian". I would prefer you do not change the header back, but leave it as is. You can create mānsƿerian and indicate that it is an alternative form of manswerian...in fact, I will use the Alternative form link on the page to show you how...one moment Leasnam (talk) 21:39, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Okay, done. Leasnam (talk) 21:43, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

I'm sorry, the thing is I don't know much about programming. By the header you mean this: { { ang-verb|head=mānsƿerian}}}, right? So the title and the header must look the same. And whereever there's this tag, it mustn't be chanded, right? But I don't see this "head" tag on the Ƿynn page in Old English setion. Maybe you mean something else by "the header" that I don't understand.

Birdofadozentides (talk) 22:13, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

That's is correct. The "head=" displays what the text will look like. At wynn, no change is needed, so it defaults to the page title "wynn". mānswerian is different and the head (header) must be set explicitly because we want to show a macron over the a which is not present in the page title. Leasnam (talk) 00:44, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

I've created the entry for ƿynn under the link you provided, thank you. And thank you for creating mansƿerian page, it's not an alternative form, of course, but I'm glad there's this page. I've added the conjugation table on the page, hope it's fine.

Birdofadozentides (talk) 22:50, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

For us it is an alternative form. We used to use another template "alternative spelling of", which was later deemed redundant, and therefore now use "alternative form of" for both alternative forms and alternative spellings. Leasnam (talk) 00:46, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

I've connect the new ƿynn page with the main one. It's a pity I don't know how to create such new pages myself

Birdofadozentides (talk) 23:07, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

There are a couple of ways to create an entry: 1) is by clicking on a redlink (e.g. like this >noentry) and it will draft up a blank page template for you. 2). You can put the new term in the Search engine and look it up. If it doesn't exist, it will render a blank page template for you. Leasnam (talk) 00:49, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

Thank you for your help and explaining.

Birdofadozentides (talk) 23:53, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

These edits you revelted were old ones, I made them at the same time with my mānsƿerian edit. Perhaps I should've told you before, but I thought you'd noticed them along with the first edit

Birdofadozentides (talk) 01:56, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

I didn't see them till now. No worries Leasnam (talk) 02:05, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

I'm sorry. I don't know if I should bother you with saying that, but your nickname is great, it's like the word "pseudonym" but created with Old English words. It sounds beautiful and makes good sence

Birdofadozentides (talk) 02:19, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

Thanks ! :) Leasnam (talk) 02:38, 17 February 2018 (UTC)

FP

I think that rollback is in error. 79.117.108.194 13:40, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Okay. can you please explain to me then ? Leasnam (talk) 13:48, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Yes. FP stands for the YWOT user named FP, and is kind of a famous person. (But why "Re-adding previously deleted entries" when I put there a different one and not the one that was "previously-deleted" :/ ?) Thanks in advance for your reply. 79.117.79.30 14:38, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

What does the "FP" for YWOT stand for ? Is this Dictionary material ? Leasnam (talk) 14:42, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

If this is verified to be accurate, then it's not an Initialism. It would need to be placed under a new level header Leasnam (talk) 14:43, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

tsjoenderij

I've expanded on your translation, but I was wondering why you added that in the first place. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 13:08, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

I happened to see a request for translation while doing some other work on the page, so I took a stab at it. Wow, it makes much better sense now ! Leasnam (talk) 13:28, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

Do you know that you can access the WFT from the Geïntegreerde Taalbank? ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 13:48, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

Okay, Thanks ! Leasnam (talk) 18:12, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

-s and -es

"The falling together of the second and third person singular verb forms in English" -- diff.

What does that mean?

Modern English, doesn't inflect verbs for the 2nd person singular. According to the Etymology, the Middle and Old English "-es" was only 3rd p. sg, as well, at least in the way I interpreted the text at first. Now I'm, not sure. The Middle and Old English variants have no entry yet, so it's hard to tell. The replaced -aþ has the inflection for 1st, 2nd and 3rd person singular, but since the Etymology claims that it was replaced, I don't think it was meant. Perhaps "replaced" is too strong an expression? Also, it could be shortened. -s could simply refer to -es, for one.

The way this is written is confusing. Rhyminreason (talk) 21:42, 4 March 2018 (UTC)

@Rhyminreason:, Thank you for your question ! First, Modern English does inflect for the second person singular (thou makest). Granted, this is dialectal or archaic. In Old English, the second person was -es(t)/-as(t). When Scandinavian areas of the Danelaw switched from Old Norse to Old English, they were already accustomed in their Old Norse language to using the same verbal ending for 2nd and 3rd singular indicative (-r). This pattern was brought over to the English of the time, and the 2nd person ending -es(t) was extended in their Norse influenced version of English also to the 3rd person, based on this pattern, resulting in what would eventually become Modern English -(e)s. The two forms for 3rd person, -(e)s and -(e)th competed for a while until -(e)s eventually won out. Later, the use of thou fell out of use. ...It could be worded better, I suppose. Leasnam (talk) 17:52, 5 March 2018 (UTC)

I've now specified in both entries (-s, -es) that the "English" in question is Old English. Leasnam (talk) 18:00, 5 March 2018 (UTC)

pig

@Leasnam: Thank you so much for adding the t=; I displayed ignorance there, only seeing "t" that displayed unwantedly on the entry page; that was why I deleted it, but ought to have added the "=". I have however to state that your etymology including "uncertain" for adze was not incorrect but is confirmed in all the main dictionary sources. Am glad that I left this until having read the message on its talk page where, after the 1st accurate point, the unnamed editor presented the way that modern etymologists seem to think and I seriously worry about the lack in their course material at university. It is obvious that any few Pre-Germanic words were an appendage to the main vocabulary which was all Germanic in Old English as any etymologist knows, but if such few existed nationally verbally beforehand, they would have been assimilated into the main Anglo-Saxon vocabulary in use in the UK; but to state categorically that they must be Germanic, even though no cognates are seen in the other Germanic tongues, is somewhat unfounded. More seriously though, is an Administrator's insistence that "huff" was correct instead of "hruff" (the "r" being accidentally left out - obvious to you and other etymologists) under dandruff because its link leads to a lexeme meaning "cough" - totally unrelated semantically and discredits the etymology section in a very limited manner. On this account I have regretably decided to leave it on Wiktionary for the time being, while setting up an etymological word list from Mediæval and older based upon the Oxford etymological dictionary and one or two other reliable sources, using the points system to maximise accuracy and credibility, but not due to the insulting remark on the talk page of Torvalu4. My grossly wrong and careless edit for cog was, however, a blockable offence - thankfully quickly observed and corrected by Metaknowledge. Kind regards. Andrew H. Gray 18:17, 13 March 2018 (UTC)Andrew talk

Etymology request

Dearborn#Etymology. Thanks! PseudoSkull (talk) 16:05, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

Goodness, okay. I don't think that it's Old English though... Leasnam (talk) 16:14, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

businessman replaced merchant?

Were those words ever synonymous? When I think of a merchant, I think of someone who is in the business of (buying and) selling things. When I think of a businessman, I think of someone who is a significant member of a company; someone who often goes to business meetings, is involved in the management of a company, and so on. Tharthan (talk) 23:46, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

I didn't say "replaced" but displaced. And yes, merchant used to also be used in the way we use businessman today...it no longer does thanks to businessman ;) Leasnam (talk) 23:47, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

Recent edits of Appendix:Old English Swadesh list

I've noticed that you've reverted some of the edits I've made to the IPA transcriptions on this page, without justifying why they were reverted. For example, you reverted this:

• |c=02 class=IPA| /ˈfeθer/, [ˈfeðer]

To this:

• |c=02 class=IPA| /ˈfeðer/

I believe this is potentially misleading, as while the -þ- was pronounced as [ð], the difference between voiced and unvoiced fricatives wasn't phonemic (i.e. phonetically meaningful; unvoiced fricatives were automatically voiced between vowels and after voiced sounds). When using the IPA, the convention is to write a phonemic transcription in slashes (e.g. Old English feþer and English cat would be respectively transcribed as /ˈfeθer/, /kæt/) Phonetic transcriptions are usually placed in brackets (e.g. Old English feþer and English cat would be respectively transcribed as [ˈfeðer], [kʰæt͡ʔ]). Wiktionary follows this convention in other languages (check out the entry for cat), so why shouldn't it follow it for Old English?

Hazarasp (talk) 01:46, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

Yes, you're right, we should follow the phonemic transcription. Wow, I did not realise this is regards to the θ vs ð. I am simply following how it has always been displayed here for OE...θ-ð-θ/s-z-s/f-v-f...I'm merely a lemming (lol). But you're right, it takes a level of understanding of OE phonetics though to sound it out correctly. Take a look at the pronunciation of heofon. It's incorrect according to this, isn't it ? Leasnam (talk) 03:20, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

BTW, I think I now understand the [pronunciation] in brackets...is that the equivalent phonetic rendering ? Leasnam (talk) 03:20, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

Yes; so heofon would be transcribed in IPA as /ˈheo̯fon/, but [ˈheo̯von]. I've edited that page appropriately. Additionally, -ng- in Old English words should be written as /ng/, not /ŋg/ (though of course [ŋg] is fine); [ŋ] only occured before velar consonants in Old (and Middle) English, so same with -nk- etc. I'll go and change the OE Swadesh list now and edit other OE pages when I come across them. Hazarasp (talk) 04:42, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

@Hazarasp: This logic doesn't necessarily fit when c and g are considered though, right ?, since those sounds are not equivalents like the voiceless/voiced pairs above (OE was just using the same character for multiple sounds) : So rīce would not be /ˈriːke/, [ˈriːt͡ʃe] ? with the understanding that this k (written c/ċ) is palatalised to /t͡ʃ/ due to position and surrounding vowels (likewise in other words, /j/ for g/ġ). That's just going to extremes, isn't it ? The hard part about not using phonetic transcription is that we don't have any native OE speakers who use Wiktionary and are accustomed to OE phonemic transcription--they're really mostly (but not always) English speakers trying to pronounce OE and using Modern English phonemes to help us understand how the language used to be pronounced. Along those lines, at sēcan we show the headword as sēċan and the Pronunciation as /ˈseːt͡ʃɑn/, but the c was not always palatalised. In inflected forms like sēcþ it was hard, like /k/, so how do we show this? Other terms quite possibly did the same: like -līc which seems to have been both /liːk/ and /liːt͡ʃ/ Leasnam (talk) 12:50, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

That should be fine; [t͡ʃ] isn't always predictable in even the earliest forms of Old English (which is why it's usually indicated with the dot over the <c> in modern versions of OE texts). It's the same with /j/ (which is why <g> gets a dot as well).

Ok, very good. I'll start using the method you've outlined going forward, and updating existing entries as I come across them. This definitely seems to be a more thorough way of showing the pronunciation, now that I understand it better :) Leasnam (talk) 13:04, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

I don't have all of the correct fonts, like the /ɑ̯/ and /o̯/...I've been copying them from other entries. How can I get them ? Leasnam (talk) 13:05, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

https://r12a.github.io/pickers/ipa/ Korn [kʰũːɘ̃n] (talk) 01:02, 31 March 2018 (UTC)

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Middle English alternative forms (e) & (le), etc.

Hi there--I noticed that you were fixing instances where (e) and (le) linked to those variations of the word so as to only direct to the form without (e) or (le). I learned the format I used from Mahagaja, who had done that for frith when he was correcting a list I had made where they were separate. Is it incorrect? I'm wondering how then the (e)/(le) form, (e.g. "frethe") can be easily accessed from the base form (e.g. frith) without having to go through "freth".

Thanks--I just want to make sure I'm doing this right. --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 14:39, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

@SanctMinimalicen: In the case of freth it looks like the attested form was actually as freth' in passages in Old French no less. There are several ways we can approach this: sometimes a ME word is attested only in an inflected form (like a dative, genitive, or plural form) and it's difficult to extrapolate what the nominative form would have looked like, if it ended in -Ø or in -e. I think the Alternative form at frith is made to cosmetically look like it does in the ME Dictionary, as it could be either freth or frethe. OTOH, purpulle looks to me to be an inflected form of either purpul or purpull, which are Alternative forms of purpel. Purple as an adjective shouldn't be a headword form IMO, because it is used once in the phrase myn purple goune which means it's a weak adjective declension following the possessive myn...the nominative form would most like have been purpel, which shows up attested far more often Leasnam (talk) 17:28, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

That makes sense--I wasn't thinking carefully and the inflection aspect of "purpulle" didn't occur to me. As for "purple" being the headword, I agree with you 100%--in fact, I was going to change it to "purpel" earlier today when I was making the altforms but I refrained because I didn't want to raise a potential stink. I think it's worth changing though.--SanctMinimalicen (talk) 17:39, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

I agree...go for it ! :) Leasnam (talk) 17:41, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

Done! If you have a chance to look over the various "purpel, et al." pages again, a second set of eyes is probably a good idea to make sure I didn't make any significant gaffs (a real possibility).

I noticed also that the references on the entry for "purple" for Middle English were linked to "purpel" in the ME Dictionary. I think switching it was probably the right call, haha. --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 22:23, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

ME Plurals

Hey, do we have a precedent set for how to handle ME plural forms and their variations? I ask mostly with regards to having them present with the head. It seems, based on my (limited) understanding of the template, that we can include up to three plural forms and no more, eg.

Leasnam (plural Leasnams or Leasnammes or Leasnamys)

What a strange example.

In such a case, what should we do with e.g. "Leasnamis", "Leasnames" etc.? The MED assumes that i=y, which allows them to shorten the list, but with Wiktionary being general use it's unlikely that an average user would know to find unspoken variants like that. What are your thoughts? --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 23:29, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

I would show only one plural form in the header, usually the one with -s or -es; or two, if a word has a plural in -(e)n in addition to -(e)s. Any variations of the aforementioned I would list as Alternative forms on the plural entry page. So, if using my name as a headword, I would show Leasnam (plural Leasnamen or Leasnames), and show Leasnamys, Leasnamis, et al. as Alternative forms at Leasnames Leasnam (talk) 02:37, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

That makes sense; I'll do that as well. Thank you! --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 03:49, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

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Etymology of until

Where did you get your etymology from? All sources I can find agree that it's "und"+"till", not "un-"+"till". Danielklein (talk) 00:19, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

Right here [[16]]. Btw, what is und above ? Leasnam (talk) 00:36, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

Ormulum Category

Hello Leasnam. I'm not particularly well-familiar with categories and how they function, but I wanted to see if it would be possible/appropriate to add a Middle English category, specifically, of words/spellings unique to the w:Ormulum, which was written by a monk who sought to standardize spellings in order to properly reflect pronunciation. The resource has been indispensable to linguists for obvious reasons, and is rich with a plethora of unique words and spellings (See, for example: þeȝȝ, teȝȝ, þeȝȝm, þeȝȝress and ȝuw). Would it been possible/appropriate to add a category along the lines of Category:Middle English words unique to the Ormulum, or is it not a correct use of a category? I've added notes to the words, but I thought it might be helpful to have a place where they can be brought up in an index. --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 02:20, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Hmm, I am not familiar with any category that is similar to this--centred around a single work; but I do not see why it would be a problem Leasnam (talk) 02:23, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

We have Category:Hapax legomena by language, so it could be a subcategory of that. DTLHS (talk) 02:24, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Yes, and the standarisation of spelling might qualify as styles of a language Leasnam (talk) 02:26, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Okay, great. Do you think it belongs as a subcategory of Category:Middle_English_hapax_legomena? --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 02:29, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Well, I would think that a category with that name would be reserved for words that only occur once in Middle English... Leasnam (talk) 02:48, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

If there only a way to spin it so that the Ormulum were the "hapax" and the category would include words only occurring in that work ;) Leasnam (talk) 02:49, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

That would be convenient! Especially with Middle English, with its unique jungle of spellings often particular to certain works or writers. Alas. Where do you think I should put it then? Just Category:Middle English language? --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 02:57, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Or maybe we could put it in a new subcategory Category:Middle English dialects and orthographies--that would also allow us to begin categorizing spellings unique to eg. Kentish Middle English, etc., as well as these idiosyncratic orthographies. That would start giving meaning and organization to the plethora of spellings out there. --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 03:00, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

It appears there's one already there ! Middle English terms unique to the Ormulum Leasnam (talk) 03:00, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

That was the one I just made ;). I was drafting one and accidentally submitted, so I figured I'd may as well go for it since I can't delete pages. :P --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 03:03, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Looks good. Works for me ! :) Leasnam (talk) 03:04, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for all the help! --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 03:06, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Suffixes?

Hi! So something has been tumbling around in my head for a little while with ME entries involving common suffixes. Right now, words that share a common suffix end up thrown into different categories because the headforms use different variants of the suffix itself (e.g. wommanyssh, snowisshe, Englisch, Duchish); moreover, some headforms use one variant but refer to a separate one in the etymology, changing its category (e.g. elvyssh). Obviously deciding which variant is the headform with the definition is complicated, and different editors have different philosophies and reasonings. What I'm wondering is whether it would be worthwhile to try to settle on picking a specific variant of a suffix to be the standard for the headform entries that use it, for the sake of cleaner categorization and easy of navigation. All other variants, of course, would then be included as alt forms. --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 04:06, 18 June 2018 (UTC) (signed in retrospect for clarity)

I agree with you on settling for a standarised form for the affix headform. I tend toward the most conservative, but I am flexible :) Leasnam (talk) 23:53, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

@Leasnam: Thanks! I've been working with some of the suffixes, and have been conflicted at times about which to make the headform. When you say conservative, am I right to say that you mean you lean towards forms that are closer-related to OE (for example, -lich vis-a-vis -ly)? I have a general lean that direction, though at times I've also opted for forms that seem more common/well-trod and/or that are more 'characteristically ME'/seemingly unique to ME (an example might by -yssh, which shows up everywhere and is a general ME tip-off--in this case, my 'conservative leaning' might have pointed towards -issce). I think my main aversion is toward forms that are identical to/closely resemble the ModE descendant: often they're peripheral, uncommon forms until the very end of the ME period, and my suspicion is that they're often chosen because of their familiarity and ease. --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 04:06, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

It gets more complicated, of course, in instances where a certain word is only attested a certain way--say, for example, we were to pick -ye as a standard rather than -i, -ie and -y as the standard variant, but the (fictitious) word formed with raven +‎ -ye is only attested as *ravenni. Perhaps in such a case we would use the attested form for the headform, but the standard suffix in the etymology? I'm not sure what the best course of action is. I'm curious to hear your thoughts. I'm also going to ping @Hazarasp and @Julia to see what they think as well. --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 04:12, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

I am with you on this. Regardless of which form is in the entry headform, the link should be to the standard (e.g. for wommanyssh we would show the Etymology as {{af|enm|woman|-isch}} and we can even show it cosmetically as {{af|enm|woman|-isch|alt2=-yssh}}Leasnam (talk) 23:53, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

^This is what Hazarasp described, and I agree with you both on it. Additionally, I think the cosmetic idea is brilliant, and smoothens everything out. --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 04:06, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

I generally try to put words which have the same suffix in the same category, even if the suffix in the headword form isn't spelt the same way as the category name (e.g. Englisch's etymology section reads "From Old English Ænglisc; equivalent to Engle +‎ -ish, and it is in Category:Middle English words suffixed with -ish). I think forcing all instances of the same suffix to be spelt the same way in headwords is a bit extreme and gives people the misleading impression that Middle English spelling was more regular than it actually was. --Hazarasp (talk) 05:27, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

Don't forget that the etymology items are also supposed to link to entries, and that it's generally a good idea to link to the main rather than an alternative form. Of course, Middle English being what it is, a coin toss may be involved- I don't doubt there are lots of words attested only a few times, and each time with a different spelling... Chuck Entz (talk) 06:10, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

That's a good point--and I think that's the goal of what I'm describing, ultimately. And yes...there's a reason a lot of people avoid dealing with this language... --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 04:06, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

sheener

I don't think this can be an adverb. SemperBlotto (talk) 04:49, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Even if you say: It appears sheener than all the rest. (?) Leasnam (talk) 04:52, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

No, that's just shorthand for "It appears to be a sheener X than all the rest". sheen isn't an adverb. SemperBlotto (talk) 04:56, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Can you check the citation I just added at sheener...is this adverbial in some way ? Leasnam (talk) 04:59, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Looks like he means "sheenlier" (compare the adjective bright and the adverb brightly. SemperBlotto (talk) 05:06, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

sheenest

Is it from PGmc *skaunistô or from the superlative (*skaunistaz) already made. Don't know which one... Anglish4699 (talk) 20:08, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Thank you, I'll redirect it...it was late when I did it :] Leasnam (talk) 20:32, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Thank you so much! I've also added sheener and sheenest to the descendants list of the comparative and superlative pages respectively. Anglish4699 (talk) 22:29, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Old Dutch at Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/þanhtaz

Hey, it turns out that the Old Dutch is attested. [17] The ONW includes it in a slightly different form, which I've only just added to gedachte. Could you figure out what normalised spelling of the two should be used? ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 07:19, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

@Lingo Bingo Dingo: It seems that the Old Dutch attestation (githāhti) may be the plural form (similar to Old Saxon)...we'd need to back-form this to a hypothetical singular, possibly *githāht. Leasnam (talk) 20:12, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for sorting that out. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 07:53, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

Galician lobio < PGmc *laubjan

Hi. Actually the Galician lobio would not come from Frankish via Latin, but from Suevic *laubjo. Cf. Ernst Gamillscheg (1934, 1935, 1936). Romania Germanica. Sprach- und Siedlungsgeschichte der Germanen auf dem Boden des alten Römerreiches. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, vol 3, page 210. Cheers.--Froaringus (talk) 16:37, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

It's possible that various dialects of Middle Latin borrowed from various sources, so it may not always be Frankish. I can add this to the Latin entry Leasnam (talk) 20:31, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

Edits to heltą

I made some small edits to the entree to Proto-Germanic word heltą. I simply added Old High German and Old Saxon words listed on the page for English hilt but missing from the proto Germanic root page. I've re-added them again.

They really don't belong on that page, as they are not descendants of this word, which has a neuter gender...they belong on a different (and as yet) uncreated entry. Leasnam (talk) 17:05, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/heltą

• hilt#English: "From Middle English hilt, hilte, from Old English hilt, hilte, from Proto-Germanic *heltą, *heltǭ, *heltō, *hiltijō, (whence also Old Norse hjalt, Old High German helza, Old Saxon helta)"
• Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/heltą gives the English and the Norse as single descendant of *heltą, not of {*heltą, *heltǭ, *heltō, *hiltijō}

Combined in does indeed sound like the German and the Saxon descend from *heltą too. If they don't, hilt#English probably should be reworded, doesn't it? -84.161.7.192 17:26, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

I would say that the German and Old Saxon descend from *heltǭ. Yes, the Etymology at hilt should be reworded to include the Saxon and German forms as cognates, but not indicate that they also derive from *heltą Leasnam (talk) 18:12, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

cob

Not sure where the evidence is for Proto-Germanic *kubb- (“lump; round object”)? We have no proof that its origin was not already orally in existence before the Germanic invasions. It is apparent to me that Proto-Germanic was formed from P.I.E. after having moved into that area and as such, inherited a good number of native lexemes during its formation. To assume that such lexemes were borrowed implies that P.I.E was mollified; and suggests that P.G. did not exist as a language. This is not the case. Andrew H. Gray 17:54, 20 September 2018 (UTC)Andrew talk

Flections

I'm sorry for bothering you, but while creating alternative pages I noticed something strange in Declension of the word sƿæþ (hope you don't mind I mention the alt page, not the main one, I just don't want to write the word with w). Please have a look at genitive plural and dative plural flection (ua and uum). I'm not an expert but I can say it's wrong, besides in Edit Sourse all flections are normal. I don't know why it's shown like that and how to make it right, so I hoped you would know.--Birdofadozentides (talk) 03:22, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

@Birdofadozentides Thank you ! I have fixed all. Leasnam (talk) 04:07, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

Leasnam, thank you for fixing! Birdofadozentides (talk) 04:24, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

Guaio

I think the revert is an error. Ouai in Greek is well attested and Latin Vae was pronunced "uae" in origin. The etymological source like Treccani talks about a hypotetical proto-germanic voice. So we can fall in a authority fallacy. Consider that in South Italy there is the word "uaio" with the same meaning. At the end, let me say "hand off from our language".

On the one hand, Ancient Greek οὐαί (ouaí) is found throughout the Septuagint, so it's doubtful that it would have come from Proto-Germanic. On the other hand, "gu" points to a much later borrowing, after the /w/-to-/v/ shift- before that it would have ended up as "v". Latin vae was used throughout the Vulgate to translate Ancient Greek οὐαί (ouaí), so there was plenty of opportunity to enter the language with a "v". I suspect that wails are similar across language groups, like onomatopoeia and family names derived from baby talk (the Greek word is used in the Septuagint to translate Hebrew אוֹי (“oy”)).

As for the "hand off from our language" comment: this is not "your" language, it's the language of people who have been dead for perhaps a millennium. The fact that they probably include ancestors of yours doesn't give you any special knowledge about the etymology of their words. Chuck Entz (talk) 01:12, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

@Chuck Entz, Thank you ! Leasnam (talk) 01:17, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

Declension

I'm so sorry to bother you again. I have troubles with adding prouns Declension to hƿā and hƿæt. When I change w to ƿynn the template isn't working. I've tried a lot manipulation with it and all in vain. It's such a pity I can't add it. Is there any way the declension could be shown with ƿynn? Again, sorry for bothering. Birdofadozentides (talk) 09:23, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

I've added this broken template to hƿā to show how it looks Birdofadozentides (talk) 09:29, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

@Birdofadozentides It's no bother. The root of the problem is that you're trying to edit a custom template that someone has created specifically for hwā...I've utilised a non-coustom template at hƿā for you (it's the 'ang-decl-noun' template). You can edit it further if so needed. Leasnam (talk) 14:15, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

Thank you so much! Birdofadozentides (talk) 04:52, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

Inappropriate use of the "Rollback" tool

This was inappropriate use of the "Rollback" tool.

Please don't do that again. -- Cirt (talk) 02:02, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

This was also inappropriate use of the "Rollback" tool. Not what the "Rollback" tool was designed for. Please don't use the "Rollback" tool, for that, in the future. -- Cirt (talk) 02:03, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

My bad. It looked like gibberish and vandalism. What's with all of the missing and weird looking arguments : quote-newsgroup | date = September 27, 2018 | first = | last = | author = unclejr | title = Re: Devil's Triangle?| newsgroup = rec.sport.football.college | id = | url=|

What is meant by author=unclejr ? Leasnam (talk) 02:06, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

Usenet is one of the most preferred, if not the singular highest most preferred citation, on all of Wiktionary. -- Cirt (talk) 02:07, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

Those were not intentional. I was only rolling back what appeared to me as vandalism. My apologies if I got it wrong. Leasnam (talk) 02:11, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

Thank you, apology accepted, no worries Leasnam! -- Cirt (talk) 02:12, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

Duplicate page, hlankô and hlankō

Is the page *hlankô just a duplicate of the page *hlankō, and should it be merged in with it? --Caoimhin (talk) 13:58, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Not really. One is masculine n stem (weak), the other is feminine o stem (strong). Their descendants are distinct (Old English has a descendant from each). Leasnam (talk) 16:24, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

contentful and contentless ety 2

Are you sure it's from the adjective? I would have thought it's from the noun "content", meaning happiness, like "joyful", "blissful", etc. Equinox ◑ 16:03, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, that's probably correct. I'll change it. Leasnam (talk) 18:43, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

I've since had my morning cup o' joe ;) Leasnam (talk) 18:44, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

thirl etymology 4

Do you happen to know the etymology of thirl, etymology 4, related to thirlage? ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 15:37, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Apparently a dialectal variation of thrall Leasnam (talk) 12:40, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 15:16, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Normalisation of ME verbs

I was going through some old entries in order to fix some oversights and mistakes of mine, and I noticed that you cleaned up the conjugation at stinken (now relocated at stynken, as that's far more common). I have considered making it an aim to clean up the clutter of some of the ME verb tables eventually (as someone who practically revels in the extreme variation of ME and thinks that normalisation is often too misleading to be much good).

However, I personally think at least the major alternative forms should be kept until either entries for verb forms have been created (so links to alternatives can be added) or some sort of mechanism is added to the verb tables to show/hide alternative forms.

What's your thinking on this topic? --Hazarasp (talk) 13:37, 23 December 2018 (UTC)

Just as in Modern English, one can find examples of "I be", "you is" "we was", but we certainly would never show those in the verb templates at be. In Middle English, there was no standardisation; not even a controlled formal written form to aspire to. Variation could just as simply be error. Dialect and spelling complicate everything.

I tend to be conservative where Middle English is concerned. We know that there were still strong verb classes in Middle English. I would normalise the strong verbs (-, -e, -, -e(n), -e(n), -e(n)). And for verbs that are weak, I would create a normalise, templatised system of inflections (-ede, -edest, -ede, -ede(n), -ede(n), -ede(n)). Irregular verbs can be handled as we do in Modern English, on a case by case basis... Leasnam (talk) 05:06, 30 December 2018 (UTC)

I think we should have only the dictionary forms in the headword line and inflection tables of the lemma. Alternative forms should be listed as alternative forms in the pages for the dictionary forms, and attested forms that aren't alternative forms of dictionary forms should be mentioned in usage notes. Quotes for non-dictionary forms can go on the non-dictionary form's pages, but also on the lemma page (or on the lemma's citation page if there isn't room).

The idea is to have a network of main paths leading to all of the dictionary forms from all of the other dictionary forms, with secondary paths to lead those who find the non-dictionary forms first into the main paths. If people want to follow the secondary paths from the main paths to see what's there, they can, but we don't need to give them a map.

This structure should only be used in cases like this where there's no evidence for any standards and no native speakers to ask about such things. Chuck Entz (talk) 18:50, 30 December 2018 (UTC)

I think the main issue with this is your proposal to normalise the strong verbs; while some normalisation is helpful, I think too much of it can make ME look like a standardised language like ModE or (to a lesser degree) OE when that wasn't the case. For example, present plurals frequently show up in -eth/-eþ rather than -e(n) in Southern Middle English (Chaucer even has a few!); this form should at least be in any templates. Additionally, strong verbs IMHO are too fragmented in ME already to have premade templates like OE; though if ones are made, major variants should be covered there as well (e.g. for class IIIa, past singulars in -o- instead of in -a-, past plurals adopting the past singular stem vowel by analogy with other strong verb classes where the past plural and past singular). On the topic of templates, another idea I had was to create a separate conjugation template for northern ME, given the large differences in inflection it had; this would also prevent northern ME variants from clogging up verb inflection tables. --Hazarasp (talk) 04:04, 31 December 2018 (UTC)

Templates for Middle English would have to serve as gentle guides, not as hard rules. It's important to stress that Middle English was a free-for-all and varied from place to place and period to period (early vs. late). If we templatise anything, the reader must understand that the renderings we present are not uniformly official nor represent the sole possible conjugated form, but are meant to give a basic idea of what the verb conjugations were like. My concern, however, is that they may be taken as official and cause more confusion and frustration than good (since many will show inconsistencies). It's impossible to cover everything accurately for Middle English (reminds me of Scots...and why we don't see a lot of verb conjugation tables for that language being used). For the strong verbs, where the past plural assumes the vowel of the first-third singular (e.g. we stanken for we stunken) I would suggest that we be consistent with which one we choose for all like-conjugated verbs. For example, I wouldn't show we stanken for stinken and then show we sungen for singen. I would make it we sangen. (Personally, I would go with the most conservative stunken and sungen because those are the most etymologically correct ;). Coming up with a best way to normalise the verbs seems like quite a task, but it just takes some thought and planning but I think it can be accomplished. Leasnam (talk) 05:47, 31 December 2018 (UTC)

What I'm saying is that there should be room for some variation (just like in English; for example tread lists multiple past forms). For example, both "stanke(n)" and "stunke(n)" should be showed for the past plural of *stank* (but minor/purely orthographic variations should be excluded such as *stonke(n)* [reflecting either pre-nasal rounding of "stanke(n)" or writing of /u/ as "o"], "stankenn", "stonkyn", "stuncke", "stungken", etc.) ---Hazarasp (talk) 03:30, 1 January 2019 (UTC)

@Chuck Entz I very much like that idea. Leasnam (talk) 19:39, 30 December 2018 (UTC)

Regarding OE Nifol

Hello leasnam, hope you're doing well. I am curious where you got that the idea that nifol meant dark or gloomy. Thanks Leornendeealdenglisc (talk) 23:03, 19 January 2019 (UTC)

Well, it doesn't mean that to my knowledge. It means "low, deep, profound; lying low, prostrate". Where do you see the "dark/gloomy" ? Leasnam (talk) 23:05, 19 January 2019 (UTC)

I suppose some sources have it as "dark/gloomy"...here is one [[18]] (dunkel=dark) and [[19]]. Depends on what I was using as a resource at the time I suppose...Thank you for updating the entry ! Leasnam (talk) 23:08, 19 January 2019 (UTC)

Fair enough. The BT dictionary has it as a variant of Nēowol which meant the former of prone, prostate, profound. Here [[20]]

Leornendeealdenglisc (talk) 23:18, 19 January 2019 (UTC)

I see that, but there is a comment on the PGmc term here [[21]] that suggests that nifol and nēowol are different words. I'm beginning to think it may be true. I only see 2 actual attestations of *nifol in B&T, as nifle and niflan. I'll have to chew on this a bit to make heads or tails of it... Leasnam (talk) 23:24, 19 January 2019 (UTC)

In response to you (on the TR discussion on become)

(I decided to take this to your talk page, as it gets a bit off topic)

Yeah. I can't really think of any off of the top of my head.

Y'know, this is off topic, but... on a somewhat related subject, the fact that (for instance) the word because is essentially from "by cause" makes me wonder if perhaps there was still some understanding in the (distant) past of the connection between be- and by. I know that because is a special case, but still. I think that the lack of a good (or even slight) understanding amongst average English speakers of what the prefix be- actually is (although, who can blame them? The prefix has always been vague), is most probably the reason why it is quite unproductive in modern times. I think that people may look at it similarly to how they look at the a- prefix (the native one). I would say, though, that be- might still have some slight productivity left to it. I really cannot say that about the native a- prefix. If I had to venture a guess, I would say that its use as an intensifier, and its use as a slightly nuanced method of forming verbs from nouns, are probably the most likely to be used to form words nowadays, if the prefix is even used at all. Popular words like bedazzle and belabour (in the "harp on" sense) are probably interpreted by a lot of speakers as being prefixed with a fairly generic verb-forming prefix (particularly bedazzle). Modern (usage of) beclown, becringe, becroggle etc. seem to also be evidence of this. Tharthan (talk) 09:22, 22 January 2019 (UTC)

@Tharthan: Prefix be- was very productive in the 19th century, but usually used for archaic or poetic language. In the modern language it has given way to constructions using [verb] + about/around or [verb] + all over. There are 2 native a- prefixes. The perfective one (from Old English ā-) has been obsolete for quite some time, even since the Middle English era. The other prefix a- meaning "on", as in all abling with jewelry is still productive. This is the one found in words like aglow, around, aback, aright, etc. Leasnam (talk) 02:11, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

Old English niġon, niġoþa

I noticed that you reverted my edits to the pronunciation sections of these entries, which is a shame, since in my opinion the Middle English evidence proves that for least some Old English speakers <g> was palatal /j/. If it was /ɣ/, one would expect it to become /w/ (compare Middle English bowe from Old English boga. While this development does occur (the form niwon is attested, and the form niȝhenn in the Ormulum implies /ɣ/ ), and forms such as "nyȝan" are ambiguous, the majority form in Late Middle English (nyne) clearly implies /niːn/, which is most plausibly derived from earlier /nijən/, which can only come from Old English /nijon/. --Hazarasp (talk) 03:06, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

Well, I wasn't aware of who had edited before me...so I was not reverting your edit per se...I was merely making a correction to what was presented there. I believe you're mistaken about the development of velar fricative g in Old to Middle English...it becomes a w only after a back vowel or a consonant (like l or r), not a front vowel which i is. An Old English /'niɣen/ would also become a Middle English /ni:n/ Leasnam (talk) 03:12, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

I was not aware of that rare form (niwon). That is very out of the ordinary. Leasnam (talk) 03:25, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

As far as your claim that "a Old English /'niɣen/ would also become a Middle English /ni:n/"; I'm not sure about that; but I can't find any examples other than nigon because of Old English palatalisation of following consonants, like in -līċ ← *-līkaz Wikipedia states it shouldn't occur before back vowels, but it often does anyway. (There was probably dialect variation in palatalisation in Old English times; note that in the Ormulum as well as -liȝ ← -līċ, there was -lic ← -līc, and some English dialects had e.g. screw for shrew. A lot of this is put down to Old Norse influence, but some of the places where unpalatalised variants are found are very far from the Danelaw.) --Hazarasp (talk) 03:55, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

@Hazarasp In addition to what you say above which I don't doubt or disagree with, I believe there may have even been an OE variant of -līċ as -līh, which parallels the ic, iċċ, ih (“I”) scenario, which is the true origin of our suffix -ly, as well as Ormulum -liȝ. I also see *-līkaz => OE -līc as regular, and -līċ as irregular or even problematic. There must be some other explanation for it. Perhaps backformation from -līċe or there may have been a variant of the PGmc suffix as *-līkiz, *līkijaz...I don't know... Leasnam (talk) 21:44, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

I would disagree with *-līkaz => OE -līc being regular in all dialects; some Old English dialects seem to have palatalised following /k/ after following /e i/. Additionally, the form -liȝ can't come from anything like -līh, because the Ormulum (unlike most Middle English) is known for its regular orthography; in the Ormulum, /liːx/ would have been written -*lih; -liȝ represents /liːj/. I would say forms such as I for the 1p singular pronoun come from earlier /itʃ/ or /ik/, not earlier /ix/, so from my perspective, there is a parallelism between -ly and I, but for different reasons. The advantage of this explanation is that ih for the 1p singular pronoun is rare in Middle English and was probably on the wane and that *-līh and *-ligh, *-liȝh, *-lih, etc don't seem to be attested at all. --Hazarasp (talk) 04:37, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

It's very possible that -liȝ could come from -līh, through the intermediary -lī. Not my theory. I don't remember where I read that, but that's neither here nor there; or perhaps -līc was altered to *-līg, *-liġ through influence of words ending in l + -iġ. Like you said, these are not attested, but much of the spoken colloquial language of OE was not recorded either, which doesn't make it easier for us to see how these developments transpired. Yes, palatisation does seem to happen randomly after /e i/, but I would not call that regular. I would call that incidental. Compare sticca (“stick”), fician (“to deceive”), pīc (“pike”), none of these show evidence of palatising after /i/ in any dialect of Old English, nor in Middle English save for one odd (irregular) outlier that I found for pych in a placename, probably altered through association of the alternation between k to ch found in other words. I've always wondered if there was a first and then subsequent other phases of palatisation in OE into ME. Do you have any better insight into this ? Leasnam (talk) 07:00, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

It is theoretically possible that -liȝ could come from *-līh, but unlikely IMHO. The fact that it's unattested is significant because there is an alternative explanation that it could come from a normal development of /iːtʃ/ or /iːk/ under low stress, which doesn't have to rely on unattested forms (every, from earlier everich, ultimately ǣfre ǣlċ also doesn't have any forms ending in anything that resemble /x/. As for saying that palatalisation after /e i/ is irregular; I would agree that it's not totally regular, but in all the forms you've mentioned, it's blocked by a back vowel. In sticca the back vowel is obvious, but in pīc, it was lost (earlier *pīcu ← *pīkō); the Old English verbal suffix -ian comes from earlier *-ōjan (that's why the "i" in -ian never triggers palatalisation). An example of where it does cause palatalisation is lich (Old English liċ). --Hazarasp (talk) 10:28, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

That same process of palatisation blocking via back vowel is the reason I do not believe -līċ (West Germanic *-līka) could have descended directly from *-līkaz. Leasnam (talk) 22:06, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

Due to Anglo-Frisian brightening (which occurred before palatalisation) the form immediately before palatalisation would be *-līkæ (obviously with a front vowel); if the final vowel was retained at all; Ringe seems to think that the vowel was lost by this point. --Hazarasp (talk) 04:24, 22 February 2019 (UTC)

Of course, it's pretty easy to prove that palatalisation of /ɣ/ was regular in (southern) Old English after a front vowel (stīġan is a good example). --Hazarasp (talk) 10:36, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

Just had a look at Don Ringe's Linguistic History of English Vol. 2; it mentions the palatalisation of /k/ after a front vowel and lists several more examples: sīċ (English sitch), spīċ, ǣswīċ, wīċ, bliċċettan (the verb it's derived from, blīcan had /k/ restored from the past tense before OE was first attested), dīċ (English ditch), pīċ (English pitch), and siċċettan. --Hazarasp (talk) 11:01, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

spic, spiċ, spec, speċ (“lard, fat, bacon”) is an interesting one to me, because the ME descendants were a mix of palatised and unpalatised variants (e.g. spik, spike beside spich), and it's not palatised today in English or Scots (speck, spick). Was this due to Norse, and later Dutch influence ? Possibly. But if not, the only way I know that this might have been accomplished is if there were another PGmc form, a u-stem variant: *spikuz or *spekuz, which might have been an earlier ur-form, that levelled differently in different dialects of PGmc, with some keeping the single hard k (Old Norse), others remodelling as an i-stem then becoming a j-stem and geminating the k to kk (Old Saxon & Old High German), and then there's OE taking the i-stem and palatising the single k as ċ but also keeping the original hard k which later surfaces in ME). I know this is all speculation and really on the side of fringe-thinking and I am out on my own. But I love trying to figure things like this out :) Leasnam (talk) 22:41, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

bliccettan, blicettan has a cognate in Old High German blekkezzen, so the formation may have been from a noun: Proto-Germanic *blik(k)a-, *blik(k)i- (related to *blīkaną) + *-atjaną, *-itjaną. Like spic above I wonder if *blikuz might have existed at some point as well, but I am only guessing. Leasnam (talk) 23:09, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

The general consensus is that yes, speck is due to influence from Dutch, Norse, or Northumbrian Old English (which seems to have resisted palatalisation a bit more judging from northern Middle English; of course it's hard to tell in Old English due to the spelling).

I think we can certainly agree on that, the spelling of OE leaves room for a lot of ambiguity :) Leasnam (talk) 21:52, 22 February 2019 (UTC)

What you mention above about Scandinavian influence also confounding the situation between k and ch is also considerworthy...I figure that at some point those two sounds might have become regarded as dialectal identifiers and consciously manipulated...for instance, if a Northerner who said bak ("back") might have consciously (and mistakingly) changed his pronunciation to bach while travelling in the South, just because he knows that Northern k often corresponds to a Southern ch, that a scenario like this might be responsible for some if not more than a few of the variations we see in Late Old English and Middle English words. Of course, this was not the best example, and it is just an example. It's late and way past my bedtime, so it's the best I could do :) Leasnam (talk) 07:08, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

@Hazarasp We can always show both, as you're very likely correct...it was probably pronounced both ways. I'm not against showing the other pronunciation. Leasnam (talk) 03:19, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

But here's where we differ (lol), I would put the /'nijen/ pronunciation at niġen, but we can try it your way :) Leasnam (talk) 03:21, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

Etymology of theretofore

What is the Middle English word you think whence descended this Modern English word? Could it be something like theretoforn ? Lbdñk (⏳) 15:08, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

The immediate form(s) leading to the Modern English word would be ther-to-fore, þeretofore, þer to-fore, which are variants of somewhat earlier forms such as þer toforn, þær toforen, þær toforan. Leasnam (talk) 17:11, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

Well @Leasnam: is the Old English word that you wrote in the etymology section attested, or did you reconstruct it? I am telling this given that no Old English ancestor to Modern English heretofore has been given in the entry for heretofore. — Thanks, Lbdñk (⏳) 08:18, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Per the Middle English Dictionary it is attested in Old English:

a1121 Peterb.Chron.(LdMisc 636)an.1102 : Se cyng ferde & besæt þone castel æt Arundel..he let þær toforan castelas gemakian. Leasnam (talk) 16:54, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

"Britain" versus word usage in the UK

If you look at the entry before my edit, you'll see that the region or country indicated is "Britain". This is ambiguous, as it only includes England, Scotland and Wales. The entries I've been changing are so that a more correct and unambiguous geographic region is described.

So the entry 11-plus examination is described in the text as being used in "Britain". However, it is used throughout the United Kingdom. In fact, ironically, I think the only part of the UK that the 11 Plus exams are still used is a part of the UK which is outside Great Britain.

Frankly, a better way to deal with this inaccuracy and ambiguity is to change the template - I've just realised how many words there are for me to change! As a non-registered contributor, who has no intention of creating an account, I am disallowed from editing these templates. In fact, even if I became a registered user, I'm not sure I'd be allowed to change any templates these days.

If you can change the template, please do! --82.2.5.153 00:06, 29 March 2019 (UTC)

Incidentally, I have some Stevenson in my own ancestry! :) --82.2.5.153 00:08, 29 March 2019 (UTC)

Really ? Nice ! :) Leasnam (talk) 00:13, 29 March 2019 (UTC)

I got you. You may want to bring this up at Wiktionary:Beer parlour. For anything that would affect several thousands of entries, we would want to have the input of several editors, 1) not only to make them aware of the change, but 2) to also give them an opportunity to express any concerns. Leasnam (talk) 00:12, 29 March 2019 (UTC)

Sorry I'm only getting back to you now. Years ago Wikipedia (particularly the encyclopaedia) took up too much of my time, took too much effort with fighting against systemic bias and individual bias, and I had my account 'hacked'. I decided to call it quits, and I will never, ever, register an account again. But I sometimes stop by to try to improve it. Plus, I've been pretty busy recently!

Anyway, I will probably take your advice - and thanks for pointing it out. I've forgotten a lot of things, and the place keeps developing and changing!

Thanks again. --82.2.5.153 01:01, 20 April 2019 (UTC)

Ænglisċ -stow

Hello, I think you could help me in this issue. -stow is a suffix found in Old English toponyms (sense 1), so I added the following example: Bryċġstōw "Bristol; literally: the place by the bridge". Actually, Bryċġstōw is the very word that descended into Modern English Bristol, and Bryċġstōw is full well attested, see for example^[22]. However, my edit was reverted (diff). So, do you deem this fair and justified? If I be right, you might therefor undo the ignorant changes.
Thanks for the heed!—Lbdñk^{(⏳)·(🙊🙉🙈)}15:41, 31 March 2019 (UTC).

Hi ! It may have been reverted: 1). because its a place-specific name, and doesn't really best exemplify the use of the Old English suffix; or 2). because there are numerous other examples already present, and no more are needed. Have you contacted the editor who reverted to ask why ? Leasnam (talk) 02:26, 2 April 2019 (UTC)

Well @Leasnam: to clear up confusions, -stow has the following two senses:

1. Suffix found in many placenames denoting "place" or "place of"
2. Place, area; provenance of, office of, jurisdiction of.

If you see the entry for -stow, you would find that the former sense has no exemplification, while the latter has many; and it was for the former one that I gave the example of Bryċġstōw. I understand not what makes administrators think that Bryċġstōw doesn't really best exemplify the use of the Old English suffix. Furthermore, my comment to the editor was also deleted (diff). It is truely a good example. Thanks— Lbdñk^{(⏳)·(🙊🙉🙈)} 14:05, 2 April 2019 (UTC).

Well, I truly do not know what to say. You have the option of adding it back and commenting you concerns briefly in the edit summary section. Try that and see if you can get an explanation as to why it was removed. Leasnam (talk) 18:32, 2 April 2019 (UTC)

Etymology for hereof, thereof

I think you can give the Middle and (late) Old English forebears of these twain words in the etymology section. Thanks, —Lbdñk (talk) 17:19, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

Done :) Leasnam (talk) 18:30, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

Etymon of helly

Wiktionary wants an etymology for the word helly ("hellish"). Is it from some Old English helliġ, and equivalent to hell +‎ -y ? Thanks, —Lbdñk^{(⏳)·(🙊🙉🙈)}, 18:23, 21 April 2019 (UTC).

@Lbdñk, If it's from the Middle English word, then it's from Old English hellīċ, equal to hell +‎ -ly. Leasnam (talk) 00:50, 22 April 2019 (UTC)

Etymology of English ship (verb)

Is ship (v.) a continuation of Old English sċipian, or is it a development from the Modern English noun itself? Thanks as wont — Lbdñk^{(⏳)·(🙊🙉🙈)} 15:59, 15 May 2019 (UTC) Lbdñk (talk) 15:58, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

Yes it is ! via Middle English schippen Leasnam (talk) 01:05, 16 May 2019 (UTC)

canard

It is as Chuck Entz says, I was just trying to stretch out a joke for as long as possible.

I have the utmost respect for other Wiktionarians, and I think that our etymologies are pretty top notch the majority of the time.

I also didn't realise that you had been a big contributor to the etymology section of that entry. My apologies for any confusion or trouble caused. Tharthan (talk) 19:03, 26 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi @Tharthan: Thanks for taking time out to reach me on my talk page. I'm sorry man, I misinterpreted your comments. We're cool :) Leasnam (talk) 02:55, 27 May 2019 (UTC)

ME weȝen ?

Is Middle English weȝen, wegen, the immediate ancestor of Modern English weigh, an attested word? It is shown in the etymology of neither English weigh nor Proto-Germanic *weganą. —Lbdñk^{|⏳|🙊🙉🙈|}, 20:04, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

It is, although I don't believe that wegen is an attested form, perhaps weghen might suffice. Leasnam (talk) 21:29, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

Old English for hug

Are you aware, perhaps, of how one would have expressed the notion of embracing in Old English? I have not seen any information on this. Tharthan (talk) 13:49, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

As a noun, a hug could be a clypnes, fæþm, or feng. As as verb, clyppan/beclyppan; fæþm(i)an/befæþman; or ġefrīgian. Leasnam (talk) 19:26, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

dye (verb)

I think th' word dye (v.) is a continuation o' Old English dēagian, via Middle English deien. Now the fraining is, is the OE word deriv'd from the noun, or is it straightway from Proto-Germanic? —Lbdñk^{|⏳|🙊🙉🙈|}, 13:27, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

Hmm, good question ! There are no direct correspondences to Old English dēagian in other languages (--but for that fact, neither are there for dēag either), so I cannot speculate... In either case, I think that a reconstruction for Proto-Germanic *daugō is a pretty weak one at best. Leasnam (talk) 18:40, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

Learned borrowings or not?

Bothering you again, but I would like to know from you that, should words such as Italian iniziale, rurale (and their other Romance cognates) be considered learned borrowings or evolved descendants of Latin? I oft find it hard to discern between the two. Thanks! Lbdñk (talk) 19:35, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

My recommendation for determining whether these words are inherited or borrowed is through an etymological dictionary, or a dictionary that provides adequate etymologies for words. You may need to take it on a case by case (i.e. word by word) basis for italian. Leasnam (talk) 23:58, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

adread

Hi, few problems... Is Modern English adread not a continuation of Middle English adrad? Also, is adrad not a an alternative form of ydrad, ydred? Furthermore, I wanted to give the following quote:

1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

Yet nothing did he dread, but ever was ydrad.

However, Spenser wrote in Early Modern English, but I see that we only have a Middle English entry for the word ydrad. So should I give this quote in the ME entry itself, or in adread? Thanks, —Lbdñk (talk) 19:53, 14 July 2019 (UTC)

@Leasnam, any suggestions? Lbdñk (talk) 17:43, 16 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi @Lbdñk ! Sorry, I've been away at a reunion the past few days and although I saw your inquiry, I wasn't sure of the answer till now. Yes, I believe that it is probably inherited from Middle English adred, adrad (“afraid”), probably a continuation of Old English *ondrǣdd, past participle of Old English ondrǣdan. You can either connect it to the unrecorded OE word, or simply lop it off at ME, your discretion. Leasnam (talk) 21:24, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

@Leasnam, well, according to Webster, adread rather than being an adjective / past participle is the verb itself, meaning "to dread", and whose past participle is adrad (which see). May be adrad is an obsolete spelling in Modern English, so that adread is both a verb and thence an adjective.

Also, for the unrelated verb ydrad, what should I do... should I put the Spenser quotation in the Middle English entry, or create a separate English entry for the quote? Thanks —Lbdñk (talk) 20:02, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

Ah, I didn't notice that our entry at adread was missing the verb. I shall add it. As far as adrad is concerned, I believe that to be a Middle English form. The Webster link mentions Chaucer at the very end. You might be able to find it used in Early Modern English (EME) though, especially dialectal EME. As far as Spenser's ydrad, you will need to find at least 2 other independent uses (not mentions) in Modern English (post 1500) for it to qualify for inclusion (I know of at least one other in The Life of the Soul in Psychodia platonica, Henry More). Please refer to CFI for more. Leasnam (talk) 20:24, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

Should the reconstruction not be *andarēdaną, that it corresponds to *anda- +‎ *rēdaną? I am saying this, since English adread / dread is equivalent to a- (and-) + rede (read). —Lbdñk (talk) 16:29, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

That is one theory of origin. In fact, I was the one who added that; however, it's also possible (and possibly more probable) that the second element was *hrēdaną (“to frighten”) instead. Leasnam (talk) 21:13, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

Twitter famous

One of your contributions made its way into my Twitter feed. I wondered what you'd make of it haha. Ultimateria (talk) 17:12, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

Wow, haha. Hey, I was just recording for posterity how some refer to a, erm, member...all in a day's work I suppose :) Leasnam (talk) 21:21, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

-like

Hi, can we call the adjectival suffix -like to have come straightway from the same source as the adjectival suffix -ly has arisen (and thereby call them both doublets)? Or, is the former a later innovation, simply deriving from the adverb like? This thing struck me and I thought of asking you. Thanks, —Lbdñk (talk) 12:38, 6 August 2019 (UTC)

There was an adjective suffix -like (e.g. besekandlike, coife-like, clothelyk), which meant x-"like" (whatever x is) in Middle English, derived from the adjective like, see here [[23]], so an argument could be made that the innovation occurred in Middle English rather than in Modern English. Otherwise, it is generally regarded as a later innovation. If we could demonstrate continuity from Middle to Modern English, we could say that it continues the Middle English suffix, and was continually reinforced again in Modern times by like. But I believe in the majority of cases that it is distinct from -ly, not sharing the same Old English origin in -līċ. Leasnam (talk) 22:52, 6 August 2019 (UTC)

Category

Hi. An important thing: Early Scots and Middle Scots need to be set as ancestors of the Scots language in our Categories, as they are not set so beneath Middle English. While writing the etymology of a Scots entry, when I wrote {{inh|sco|sco-smi|-}} for a Middle Scots term, error was being displayed naturally owing to the aforesaid fault in our Categories. So you may make the needful changes. Thanks! —Lbdñk (talk) 19:57, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

Also, the nonfunctioning template for Middle Scots has compelled me, for the time being, to use the template for Modern Scots in Middle Scots entries. —Lbdñk (talk) 15:36, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

@Lbdñk: I believe we've been treating 'Early Scots' simply as Late (Northern) Middle English and 'Middle Scots' as Scots, in much the same way that we treat 'Early Modern English' as part of Modern English. I would not be against doing so, but if you would like to begin including Old/Early Scots (sco-osc) and Middle Scots (sco-smi) as separate languages, my recommendation would be to begin a discussion first at the Beer Parlour. Leasnam (talk) 05:23, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

@Lbdñk: I've updated the parent languages for Middle Scots and Early Scots, as they are historical in nature and not really a part of Modern Scots: You can now begin using them in etymologies (e.g. {{inh|sco|sco-smi|word}}, from {{inh|sco|sco-osc|word}}, from {{inh|sco|enm|word}}) Leasnam (talk) 05:43, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

Now, I am able to use them in Scots entries, but not yet in those (tho' there is one thus far) of Middle Scots, where still lua error is showing. Maybe because you have not updated them here. —Lbdñk (talk) 16:02, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

@Leasnam, your further planning on this? —Lbdñk (talk) 10:39, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

I've opened a discussion at Grease Pit for this Leasnam (talk) 21:35, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

suck my cock

That's not a command, you understand :D I just would like to remind you that "related terms" are supposed to be related etymologically (way - via) and not topically (so egg - bacon are not "related"). So e.g. here [24] you would do better with "see also", or maybe even "coordinate terms" sometimes. Thanks! Equinox ◑ 02:18, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Noted. Thanks ! Leasnam (talk) 02:21, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Neighing

@TheSilverWolf98 West Germanic indicates *hnajjaną, North Germanic indicates *hnajjōną. Which came first? mellohi! (僕の乖離) 16:46, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Update: Wait a minute, the sound correspondences don't seem to check out for West Germanic. -jj- shouldn't give OHG -g- (cf. Ei). The diphthong in OHG is also completely unexplained (unless we construct *hnaigijaną which would account for Old English, OHG and Old Saxon but not Dutch!). And then there's Dutch neien which indicates no -g- at all. However, the Dutch form does check out with *hnajjōną. mellohi! (僕の乖離) 17:19, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

@Leasnam More updates: I made a mistake - OE form's G is soft, not hard. But that still leaves the long vowel and the High German forms with /g/ posing very big issues. mellohi! (僕の乖離) 19:45, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

@Mellohi! what are you looking at for the OHG term ? Leasnam (talk) 19:57, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

@Mellohi!, I believe *hnajjōną is the correct reconstruction meaning "to neigh (like a horse)" Leasnam (talk) 20:02, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

@Leasnam I'll brush me asking for OHG as another mistake on my part. But Century Dictionary notes as additional cognates "MLG neigen = MHG negen", meaning Middle Low German and Middle High German I assume. The long vowel listed for the Old English term goes unexplained still I was not paying attention to the eggs again. mellohi! (僕の乖離) 20:09, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

The MLG has the following variants: nêigen, nigen, nîhen, nîhahen, nihagen, nyhan, nyhagen, suggesting OSX *hnēgian, *hnēhian. Strengthening of j to g could occur in OSX/MLG between stressed and unstressed syllables (cf. neigen "to sew" (from OSX *nāian), MLG eggere "eggs", etc.); otherwise, g before a front vowel could also represent /j/; it's hard to say here how exactly the MLG words might have been pronounced. I also found it interesting that Middle English has variants with ȝ/h/gh (i.e. /ɣ/, /x/) as well (e.g. nehyn, neiʒende/nayʒende, nyghe) and this draws into question how the OE word was pronounced. It may have dialectally been /ˈhnæːɣɑn/. Only a possibility. MHG only has negen/innegen. I wonder if that may not be a loan from MLG. Leasnam (talk) 20:36, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and updated the etymology at neigh. Leasnam (talk) 20:46, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

lama declension

I need to move on after tearing myself into embarrassment over horribly fowling up a reconstruction of how horses neigh, so I have a shorter, more basic OE question to pose: lama is a weak-only adjective? mellohi! (僕の乖離) 20:18, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Neigh, I mean Nay (lol)....it was used as almost all adjectives were used, strong and weak Leasnam (talk) 20:37, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

What would be the strong form? Lam? Because if it is, the lemma is in the wrong place. Is lam, lamu, and other strong forms attested? BT for example lemmatizes it at the weak form, and all its examples are weak. mellohi! (僕の乖離) 23:44, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

The strong form is lama m, lamu f, lama n. Weak is lama m, lame f, lame n. Leasnam (talk) 00:07, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Ah, I was confused by the lack of final vowel deletion. mellohi! (僕の乖離) 00:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

From the way it's attested, it really looks like it could either be an adjective or a noun:

Iċ eom lama þearfa ("I am lame and needy/poor" OR "I am a lame [man] and a needy/poor [one]");

ān mǣden sēo wæs lama ("a maiden who was lame" OR "a maiden who was a lame [one]");

Þā læġ þǣr sum crēopere lama fram ċildhāde ("there lay there a certain cripple lame since childhood" OR "there lay there a certain cripple, a lame [man] since childhood").

It's never used like ān lama mann OR ān lama mǣden Leasnam (talk) 00:51, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I had this suspicion too that it wasn't really an adjective while I was looking at the quotations. mellohi! (僕の乖離) 02:22, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

freezy definition

Hi. You changed the def at freezy from "freezing, chilly" to "chilled almost to freezing". So your definition doesn't allow for actual freezing, but only almost freezing. I don't think that's right: "Sure is a freezy morning!", "a freezy sort of sensation", "a freezy winter's day". I think it's just a colloquial way of saying freezing. Any ideas about how we could verify? Equinox ◑ 12:31, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

I agree with you, it should also include the freezing point and beyond. Leasnam (talk) 15:51, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

 Done Thanks! Equinox ◑ 09:45, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Community Insights Survey

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Sincerely,

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Reminder: Community Insights Survey

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Sincerely,

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אַרבעס

Could you review the etymology of this word? The Proto-Germanic root given there is different from the one used in cognate entries. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 09:29, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

I've added a couple of byforms to the PGmc page (*arwaits, *arwits), and corrected the linkage to that page. Leasnam (talk) 16:52, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

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etyl

Inspired by this edit, have a reminder that {{etyl}} is deprecated. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 07:03, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

없는

Hello. Thank you for your contributions. Is there any reason to add a form of 없다 to the very page of 없다? Isn’t that just redundant? — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 07:42, 11 October 2019 (UTC)

I suppose it is, since I see now that it is redirected back to the same entry, I've removed it. Leasnam (talk) 19:41, 11 October 2019 (UTC)

Be Ealdengliscre worda endebyrdnesse

Eala mann. Ic geseah hu on þissum tramete þu awrite þone cwide Geboren wæs ic on Engla lande, ac on Scotta lande forleas ic minne mægþhad. Wite þu þæt þeos worda endebyrdnes biþ woh. Rihtlice ne onwent man næfre þæs subjectbinaman stede wiþ þæs wordes butan hie beon æfter þonne oþþe þa oþþe ne, oþþe hwilum nu oþþe swa, oþþe hit axung beo. Þy wrat Ælfric On þæm feorðan dæge gescop God twa micel leoht, ac on þæm æfterfylgendan cwide, On þæm ilcan dæge he geworhte ealle steorran. Hundwine (talk) 06:01, 12 October 2019 (UTC)

I wasn't attempting to make a grammatical correction, but I was attempting to remove the translated-word-for-word-from-Modern-English sound to it. It was fine the way it was, but I think it flows a little better, but that may simply be to my ears. If you dislike it you can change it back no harm done :) Leasnam (talk) 06:59, 12 October 2019 (UTC)

Ic wat, ic wolde þæt þu stæflicne regol cuðe þe me ne þuhte swilce þu wiste. Butan þæm wæs þin rihtung god. Hundwine (talk) 08:25, 12 October 2019 (UTC)

This rollback is an error

https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=stauropegial&oldid=prev&diff=58088351 Veverve (talk) 05:16, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

That may be so, however would you please explain this edit [[25]] and this [[26]] ? Leasnam (talk) 05:21, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

@Veverve: may I suggest adding back your last edit only, barring the other previous ones ? Thanks ! Leasnam (talk) 05:22, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

A primate is supposed to be the highest ranking bishop, so I tried to simplify. However, I guess for the Catholic Church it may create confusion. As for my other edits, I maintain that they are useful as the current definition is only half true and contradicts stauropegion, i.e. you do not need to be a patriarch to be in charge of a stauropegion. Veverve (talk) 05:28, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

Ah I see. Ok, my fault. I will reinstate your edit. Thanks for clarifying it for me :) Leasnam (talk) 05:30, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

qerth rfv obstruction

context: rfv:qerth
Another user has tagged qerth for verification, giving the reason "this word doesn't exist". When given 3 dictionaries (2 Albanian > English; 1 Alb monolingual) in which to find the word, he still refuses to de-tag the word. We're at an impasse. Have I or have I not done what's necessary to verify the word's existence in order to lift the rfv? Your help would be appreciated. Torvalu4 (talk) 21:53, 13 December 2019 (UTC)

bedeutend

Hi Leasnam.

Thanks for correcting my inattentive editing here! --2003:CF:3F2E:850A:8D5:3C91:65A9:6FD1 14:39, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

PWG *þorn

This is a u-stem, *þurnuz, in Proto-Germanic. While none of the West Germanic descendants preserves this, there are some that have -u- rather than -o- in the stem, presumably reflecting the lack of a-mutation due to the following -u- that must have originally been present. For that reason, I'm not sure if the PWG form is *þorn (a-stem) or *þurnu (u-stem). —Rua (mew) 09:59, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Ah okay I see. Hmm... Leasnam (talk) 20:33, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

My apologies.

Sorry about that. I meant to replace "quiteness" (a typo) with "quietness", but I guess I just ended up replacing one typo with another. It's fixed now. Tharthan (talk) 01:58, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you ! You know, I didn't catch that at all. Thanks for making the correction :) Leasnam (talk) 01:58, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

knyflok

Hey Leasnam, do you have any insights on the etymology of West Frisian knyflok? Both the o from Proto-Germanic *au and the y look quite unexpected to my untrained eye, while it also shares the kl > kn shift with continental cognates. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 09:59, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

I agree with you on all points. It closely resembles Middle Low German knuflôk (knüflôk ?), variant of kluflôk. The vowel in the first syllable is really a surprise, even taking into account GML ü. I wonder if it has any folk-etymological associations with knyf (“knife”) (?) Leasnam (talk) 03:03, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Leasnam, that putative association might be distant, if there is an association between knife and Knüppel. I don't know about that. I had rather expected to see knife with Knipse, cf. knipsen, kneifen "to pinch", but ...

Knüppel comes to mind because of an analogical comparison with PIE *(s)kleh₂w- "hook, key, peg" (cf. Pol. klucz, Lat. clavis "key"), Ger. Schalter "switch, push-button", Knopf "button, push-button", etc., keeping in mind a certain kind of buttoning-up mechanism involving a peg hooked into a loop. These keywords make for a fine rabbit-hole (happy easter to you by the way). Anyhow, a Knüppel would be a supersized peg (i.e. a club), and v. knüppeln goes down a different semantic road (cp. klopfen "to knock", kloppen "to clobber, beat", actually though idiomatic "to work hard"). Yet, this parallels the auto-antonym cleave "to cut, separate" / "to bind", that reminds of knife on the one hand side, indeed.

On the other hand, cp. knüpfen "to knot, bind"; aufknöpfen sits comfortably in the middle, that is likewise "to button-up" and "to beat up, rip off, murk" (in fact, I cannot decide this one between ö or ü).

This is awe-some, there might be literally a thousand comparanda in this spectrum, many more if allowing kl ~ kn.

Take all that with a grain of salt. I thought key were Fr. cle, clef, too, in the wiktionary, but that's not being the case.109.41.1.179 17:46, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Thank you. It seems like Low German is the closest match then, though I rather leave it to you to judge the certainty of that. There are forms with a high front vowel in Middle Dutch and early modern Dutch, but I haven't seen forms with such vowels that also underwent the kl > kn shift, so that seems a much less likely source. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 08:29, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

slap

You have hardly added information (a red link isn't helpful), only removed some. The entry wasn't in good condition, but your removal of the reference suggests it wasn't worthwhile. I think it's reasonable enough to remove the suggestion for comparison into a RfE-header, and notify the editor.

A similar wording (viz "old") can be found at klappen, by the way. 109.41.1.218 19:04, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Old English i-stem nouns: -as vs. -e

I notice you recently edited Template:ang-decl-noun-i-m to give the nom/acc plural suffix as -e instead of -as. While it is true that some of these nouns are attested with -e in EWS, I think -as is more common by far; for example, the plural of "sele" is usually (if not always) "selas". If there are nouns where -e is more common or mandatory, then I think this should be special-cased. - Furrykef (talk) 19:07, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

@Furrykef: Can we distinguish one from another by adding a parameter to the template ? Leasnam (talk) 22:24, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Either that or create another template, I suppose. I'm not sure which is better. The issue only came to my attention because I saw that the entry for sele contradicted itself (the entry itself said the plural was selas, but the table gave sele). - Furrykef (talk) 02:45, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Borrowed Affixes

Hello,

I have noticed that your reason for reverting the entry on what I perceived to be the ancestor of the Latin -ulus is that -le, as a Latinate suffix, is not a "true suffix," which I found confusing as there are already entries for Latin prepositions used as prefixes in English and other languages (like ad-) or other Latinate prefixes of different kinds (like -um). This does not mean that they are all nearly as productive as, for example, other suffixes like -er or -ess, but I fail to see what may possibly distinguish those from the Latinate -le (assuming, of course, that you actually consider the aforementioned examples to be true suffixes). Roger.M.Williams (talk)

The key phrase is "in English". What exactly are you adding the suffix to in circle? Are you saying that "circ" is an English morpheme? An etymological correspondence isn't a suffix- if it was, we'd have to have an entry to match the suffix in pre-English that caused "goose" to turn into "geese" and "man" into "men", or the one that turned "food" into "feed" and "drink" into "drench". Chuck Entz (talk) 05:26, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

My question is about affixes that are 'formally' present in a given language, which is why ad-, for example, is mentioned. As for the exclusion of "circ," wouldn't that also apply to, say, the -cep- in the English reception (or even the Latin receptio)? And yet ad-, -tion, and -tio have their own entries. Roger.M.Williams (talk)

How common was the shift of (Proto-Germanic) þ → t in Old English?

"twinge" and "husting" seem to demonstrate this, so it obviously did sometimes occur. Tharthan (talk) 16:11, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

@Tharthan: I wouldn't call it a PGmc change of þ → t, but an OE change of þ → t under certain conditions. For instance ON húsþing => OE hūsting where the combination sþ becomes st (cf. OE hafas þū => hafastū). Our etymology for twinge seems to be off. This should come from PGmc *twangijaną. Leasnam (talk) 16:24, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

I've updated the etymology at twinge. Leasnam (talk) 16:33, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Rollback on his

I made an edit replacing the deprecated etyl template with der, and added a couple rfes, but was undone. Is adding etym requests frowned upon, or is the derived template not appropriate for this word? OR AlexMC (talk) 02:28, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

@OR AlexMC: It must have been an unintentional or accidental reversion on my part, as I do not remember reverting it, nor, after reviewing the edit, think I would have intentionally done so. I apologise for the mistake. And in answer to your questions, etym requests are not frowned upon AFAICT, and the 'der' template is certainly appropriate. Leasnam (talk) 04:06, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

clench

The etymology given here is intriguing. How often did ġ (/dʒ/? /ç?/) shift to ċ, either in Old English or pre-Old English? Tharthan (talk) 03:56, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

It was rare. I can't really think of another example of it, though I'm fairly certain I've seen another one before. Leasnam (talk) 17:31, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

@Tharthan: I found an example, it's the dialectal crinch, a variant of cringe (ME crenchen vs. crengen). The shift between /d͡ʒ/ <> /t͡ʃ/ looks to be at late OE/early ME. Leasnam (talk) 18:03, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

iugum revert

Hi, Leasnam. Please see here: versus under the "noun" section, and consider undoing your revert. The 'versus' was another unit of land measurement used within the Roman world. Thanks.

When we say a term is a 'Related term', we generally mean that it is etymologically related. I'll add versus to 'See also' Leasnam (talk) 18:40, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

Ah! I didn't realize that it was etymologic relation only. Sorry about that, and thanks for the correction.

Leasnam, if it appears not too troublesome, perhaps you might assist me with something (assuming that you are a "Latin guy"). On the iugiter page, there is a sense listed of "immediately", "instantly". Though I can discern the semantic connection between "continuously" (the strict sense of the term) and "immediately", I have, through much effort, been unable to locate a reference for this usage within the Latin corpus. I must admit that I've begun to grow vaguely suspicious of the sense, as it is a bit of a semantic road to travel... I've been told that Lewis and Short list that sense, but the online versions of that work do not give references for it. If you can obtain a reference (perhaps via a paper copy of Lewis and Short, or elsewhere) for that usage, please let me know of it, as I have searched for awhile now to no avail. Thanks.

*twitwizōną

If any of the reflexes warrants a second *w, I'd really like to know. I rather expect that it could somehow disappear everywhere, possibly causing geminates, while a reduplicated root is simply appealing. Any opinions on the stem? Onom. is as so often not really satisfying. 109.41.2.103 23:43, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Possible need for new etymology section under -y, or an additional section added to one of the current ones

hasty and jolly beg the question: ought there to be an indication somewhere in the -y entry that there was probably a conflation of an f-less form of -if (modern "-ive") and the native suffix that continues as -y? Some have also proposed hautif as a contributor to modern haughty. If it was, that would lend credence to the validity of that idea.

What do you think? Tharthan (talk) 07:03, 6 August 2020 (UTC)

I don't think that makes it a new suffix -y₄. In some of those words, the forms with -if/-ive have been altered to fit the preexisting English pattern of -y similar to words without a suffix (like hussy), so it's a phonological change, not a morphological one. Nothing distinctly different in the way of a suffix is created here. I don't even think one could even really argue that this -y is some type of obsolete alternative form of -ive because it occurs so infrequently. Can you think of any words today that are being formed using -y from -if/-ive ? Leasnam (talk) 14:05, 6 August 2020 (UTC)

I suppose you could change the etymology at -y to say the native suffix absorbed the other one. It's true that no one has ever distinguished between Old French and Old English etymologies when they added -y to a word, but I'm sure some of the words of Old French origin that end in "y" have been re-analyzed as a stem + -y, so the terms with Old French origins might have expanded the semantic range of "-y" terms. It's more a matter of influence than direct incorporation, though. Chuck Entz (talk) 15:19, 6 August 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps, yet I don't think it's accurate to say that modern -y is in part attributed to Old French -if on account of a small handful of words. Only jolly seems to be a real example, and still jolly is not joll + -y (--joll is a much later back-formation). Hasty and haughty have somewhat different etymologies. It's better served noting this at the individual etymologies of those words rather than at -y, imho. Leasnam (talk) 17:49, 6 August 2020 (UTC)

Well, that's fine too. The point that I was trying to get across is that this reduced form of -if is analysed as being identical to the native -y suffix today. We mention such things on other entries when it is noteworthy, so I was just suggesting that it might be a good idea to note this somewhere. If not on the -y entry, then noting it on the individual entries would do just fine. Tharthan (talk) 23:25, 6 August 2020 (UTC)

heam rollback

Hello, ad [27], please see [28]. Let me know if I misinterpret that anyhow. Best, --Martin Urbanec (talk) 16:35, 29 August 2020 (UTC)

@Martin Urbanec, the family name would need to be added to a differnt entry at Heam. It's capitalised. Leasnam (talk) 17:23, 29 August 2020 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/þrakjaz

Why does the Old English descendant end in -x/-hs? Tharthan (talk) 22:02, 19 September 2020 (UTC)

Is that a usual development? Tharthan (talk) 01:19, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

I am not sure where the -s comes from, and no, I would say that this is rather unusual. Leasnam (talk) 03:54, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

I would suggest comparing it with other PGmc words that end in -akjaz, but we don't have any.. — This unsigned comment was added by Chuck Entz (talk • contribs) at 5:49, 25 September 2020‎ (UTC).

Reconstruction:Old Frisian/os

Hi, I'm fine with the split, although I wouldn't (and didn't :) ) do it myself, but I don't agree with giving the descendants and etymology in both sections. I would thus delete the etymology in *os in any case, and personally I would let the descendants be on the main page, rather than *os. And now I'm here, why did you split the page, if I may ask? Thadh (talk) 11:28, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

I think it's a good idea to remove the Etymology from *ōs. I split the forms because *ōs(e) is a bad entry title, having parentheses. The form is not literally *ōs(e), but rather *ōse and *ōs. Leasnam (talk) 21:52, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

However, Proto-West Germanic *samft(ī) does exist... But I'm completely fine with splitting the pages, and I'll remove the etymology from *os. What shall we do about the descendants? Thadh (talk) 13:31, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

Proto-West Germanic *samft(ī) needs to be split as well, imho. As for the Descendants of *ōs, since the Old Frisian is unattested, it's impossible to know whether they came from *ōse or *ōs, so I would list them under both. That's just my personal preference. Yours may differ. It's likely that the word actually went from *ansijō to *ōse to *ōs then to the descendants, so the 2 forms may be different depictions in time, one earlier the other later. Leasnam (talk) 16:05, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

Well, I guess. I still don't like the idea of double etymology, but alas. Also, about your edit just now: I think Saterland Frisian wäl is from Old Frisian hwelk, just like the North Frisian welk, hook :) Thadh (talk) 16:49, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

Ah ok. I see it also resembles East Frisian (Low German) well as well. I'll remove it then. Leasnam (talk) 16:51, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

• Just noticed this discussion. I agree and already moved *samft(ī) to *samftī. --{{victar|talk}} 03:40, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

  Well, I did, but @Rua reverted me. @Mahagaja, Burgundaz, Mnemosientje --{{victar|talk}} 08:55, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

  The conventions for Reconstruction space are different from those for mainspace. I really don't mind having parentheses in reconstructions—it's what we regularly do for PIE s-mobile, and they're all over the place in our Proto-Sino-Tibetan entries. Also, I think hard redirects are a good idea in Reconstruction space but not in mainspace, so we can have just one entry for a reconstruction and have hard redirects from alternative reconstructions. So I'd recommend either restoring Reconstruction:Old Frisian/os(e) or hard-redirecting Reconstruction:Old Frisian/os to Reconstruction:Old Frisian/ose and listing ōs without a link under an ===Alternative reconstructions=== header. —Mahāgaja · talk 09:27, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

  @Mahagaja: I think soft-redirects is a good way to go about it, especially when descendants have a mix of two stems. That's why we have {{alternative reconstruction of}}. --{{victar|talk}} 16:16, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

  We have many of such adjectives in Category:Proto-West Germanic ja-stem adjectives, because the descendants occasionally aren't clear which class they belong to. If we're going to move one of them, we should deal with the rest too. And that may not be as easy as it seems. —Rua (mew) 12:27, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

Synchronic analysis of non-inherited words

Hello. I want to ask you that, when a word originates from a foreign source which itself happened to come from an ancestor of the language in question, would it be deemed wise to show the synchronic analysis of the word? For example, English skipper, which is a doublet of the native shipper, came through Middle Dutch, and ultimately from Proto-Germanic. So my asking is that, is it really a good idea to say that skipper is equivalent to ship +‎ -er just because we know its diachronic etymology? Since it is a non-native word, it is simply not recognisable by this synchronic analysis, which is therefor, I feel, useless. What is your thought? Thanks! — inqilābī ^{[ inqilāb zindabād ]} 20:21, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

The thing is, though, that is totally irrelevant. It is simply a fact that skipper is "equivalent to ship +‎ -er". You are looking at an etymology section. The etymology section presents you with the word's etymology, and what its components are equivalent to in English if they are present in English.

And, for the record, I am very fond of that part of our etymology sections. Perhaps it doesn't help with understanding for you, Inqilābī, but I know that it does help others. Tharthan (talk) 22:40, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

No, shipper is equivalent to ship + -er, but skipper (“master of a ship”) isn't. (Obviously, skipper (“one who skips”) is equivalent to skip + -er, but that's not the word Inqilābī is talking about.) —Mahāgaja · talk 23:40, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

When I say "equivalent", I mean that the components that skipper owes its formation to correspond to ship + -er in English. Tharthan (talk) 00:35, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

In etymology sections, though, "equivalent to" is used to refer to the surface analysis; sometimes I put "synchronically analyzable as". And ship + -er is definitely not the surface analysis of skipper. —Mahāgaja · talk 09:01, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

@Tharthan: Firstly, please do not make personal attacks on me (“Perhaps it doesn't help with understanding for you, Inqilābī, but I know that it does help others.”). Also, I think you misunderstood me: I am not against having a synchronic analysis in our etymologies, it is indeed nice; my objection is to using it when it is impossible to synchronically analyze a word because the very definition of surface analysis is violated. — inqilābī ^{[ inqilāb zindabād ]} 17:42, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Bringing back ƿynn entries

Hello, I'm sorry for bothering you, the point that all entries with ƿynn have been deleted. There was a vote I didn't know anything about - Wiktionary:Votes/2020-09/Removing_Old_English_entries_with_wynns. I found out about it only when it was too late. There was also Wiktionary:Beer parlour/2019/November#Proposal:_Delete_all_Old_English_words_with_-ƿ-

During this discussion I was told that I could start a vote to bring ƿynn entries back Wiktionary:Beer_parlour/2020/November#May_at_least_one_entry_with_ƿynn_stay?

There was also Wiktionary:Beer parlour/2019/November#Proposal:_Delete_all_Old_English_words_with_-ƿ-.

I've never created votes and now I'm only leaving messages to users that I think could support it. I know only a few.

I am very uncomfortable with disturbing people like that, but I can't let these entries be gone for good even without trying. I thought you might support this idea. You were the person who taught me how to make an entry, I've learned about macrons and you were so kind to fix some desclentions when I asked you to. I've learned so much from you. Sorry for bothering again. Birdofadozentides (talk) 08:59, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

horig

Thanks for updating the entry. Recent etymological dictionaries are split on whether the Middle Dutch is a shortening of onderhorich/ghehorich (EWN) or directly formed from horen + -ich (EW, NEW). [29] Do you have a preference? ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 18:52, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Reping. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 17:49, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

@Lingo Bingo Dingo: The background of this question is whether the sense of belonging was derived from a basic verb of hearing, equivalently, which one has older continuity: gehorchen or hören?

In the simplest case they are unrelated; absent a better alternative, reanalysis has to have obscured the missing link not the least since *h is the end result of many sound changes. More so, the development towards grammaticalization of the ga-prefix remains obscure. There is in effect no shortage of alternative options to consider, although the comitative semantics of the reconstructed particle ("with", cp. co-) for one are very well compatible with belonging, the allusion to hearing is just-so. Any such reanalysis could be however inherited.

Within Dutch, unless there is striking evidence, there would of course be the possibility that ge- + horich was constructed synchronicly, while -horich could be nevertheless shortened from a form whose loss would motivate the new construction by analogy. For example, forms closer in meaning to High German gehören are more likely borrowed or calqued, while Low German would generally have lenited and perhaps elided the prefix. The spelling of "ghehorich" might be decissive at that, if the orthography implies /*x/. ApisAzuli (talk) 23:52, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

telephone

You reverted an edit on telephone. You should also hide the edit as it and its edit summary contain telephone numbers. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 13:22, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Roger that. Thanks ! Leasnam (talk) 20:07, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

EN cruse and DE Krause

Heya, noticed that you'd added the DE cognate in the etym at English cruse. I can't find any such sense ("pot with lid") at either our German Krause entry or at Duden. Is this sense super rare, or archaic? ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 18:00, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

In German it may now be obsolete. It descends from MHG krūse (“Krug, Trinkgeschirr”), see here [[30]] (click on the row krūse (1) to expand) and here [[31]] Leasnam (talk) 23:44, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

Happy New Year!

Hey, Leasnam. Happy New Year!

I hope that you have a great 2021! Tharthan (talk) 17:29, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

@Tharthan: Same to you, brother ! Leasnam (talk) 18:44, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

Ongoing vote

Hello Leasnam! I just wanted to inform you about the following current vote: Wiktionary:Votes/2020-12/Bringing back wynn entries. Since you deal with Old English, and also have shown interest about ƿynn entries in the past (if I remember it aright), you might want to cast your vote. I am sure you would be able to make good judgement there :) . Thanks! — inqilābī ^{‹inqilāb·zinda·bād›} 17:49, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

Saterland Frisian numerals

Hey, I thought I'd check it with you before sending to RFV: do you remember your source for adding Saterlandic numerals, namely this diff? I have multiple others like them (see also the two RFVs I have created) that seem like derived from an oral source. The only source yet I have encountered that has been mentioned is this website, which is out of service by now. For reference:

Saterfriesisches Wörterbuch	IPA	Unknown source	IPA
sogen	/ˈsoːɡən/	soogen	/ˈsoːɡən/
njúgen	/ˈnjuːɡən/	njuugen	/ˈnjuɡən/
alven	/ˈalvən/	alwen	/ˈalvən/
twelig	/ˈtveːlɪx/	tweelich	/ˈtveːlɪx/

Thanks in advance! Thadh (talk) 17:19, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

@Thadh Be careful about Saterland Frisian: I believe we treat all of Frisian East Frisian (as opposed to Low Saxon East Frisian) as Saterland Frisian. As I understand it, the ISO messed up the codes so much that stq is the only code available for any kind of East Frisian. It's an odd compromise, but no one had a better suggestion. The question should really be: what variety of East Frisian are we talking about, and how do we label it so it doesn't get confused with Saterland Frisian in the narrow sense. Chuck Entz (talk) 17:34, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

@Chuck Entz: Even varieties should be sourced well, so I don't think there is any problem with this question. If the variety was indicated in the source, that'll be great, since it can be given as an alternative form with the |from= parameter. I'm pretty sure SW follows "normal" Saterlandic. Thadh (talk) 18:37, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

njuugen should rather give /ˈnjuːɡən/ (long u) as well, shouldn't it? Pyt Kramer, Wurdlist Fryske-Sealtersk, Ljouwert, 1964 has njuugen (Saterland Frisian, Saterlandic) = njoggen. --46.91.98.89 12:02, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

@46.91.98.89: Well, <uu> is realised as /u/, [uˑ], so no. Furthermore, before a single consonant the modern orthography seems to not give a double vowel, but rather a single one (so the result would have to be njugen). As stated on the RFV page, I'm not quite sure if Pyt Kramer's wordlist is to be considered an authorative source. Since Saterfriesisches Wörterbuch is published by the Gemeinde Saterland and Niedersähsisches Ministerium für Wisselschaft und Kultur, I trust their orthography is correct. But it's true that stq.wikipedia often uses some alternative spellings of uncertain origin, so maybe I'm missing something. Thadh (talk) 12:25, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

sceacga pronunciation

Hello, Thank you for creating and editing the entry sceacga. I'm confused by the recent edit by IP 2601:5c8:c200:1760:ec2e:453f:e3c4:7a8c changing the pronunciation to /ˈʃæ͜ɑɡ.ɡɑ/. The page originally listed the pronunciation as /ˈʃɑɡ.ɡɑ/, and the pronunciation with /ʃ/ followed by a back monophthong /ɑ/ seems most consistent with what Wikipedia says about palatal diphthongization: that "the back vowels u, o, and a were spelled as eo and ea after ċ, ġ, and sċ ... Most likely, [this] was simply a spelling convention, and a, o, u actually did not change in pronunciation: the vowel u continued to be pronounced in ġeong, o in sċeolde, and a in sċeadu" ("Phonological history of Old English"). In words of similar form not starting with a palatal, such as stacga, we certainly see /ɑ/ in the first syllable, so that's why I thought that sceacga would have unchanged /ɑ/. I'm not sure what evidence could be brought to bear on this, however, as /ɑ/ and /æ͜ɑ/ regularly have the same reflex in Middle English. Did you learn something new since your initial creation of the page that contradicts this?--Urszag (talk) 01:42, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

I think it's impossible to know exactly how sċeacga was pronounced. In some cases, the "conventional" diphthong was pronounced as written, as in ċeald, sometimes we are fortunate to have multiple attestations, like sċolde beside sċeolde ("should"), and even ceald beside cald to help us figure this out. Complicating this is the fact that sceacga could also have been spelt *scacga with the same pronunciation /ˈʃɑɡ.ɡɑ/. With g and c it's more necessary to insert an e to indicate pronunciation. For instance, without an e, gard would be /ɡɑrd/ instead of /jɑrd/. But with sc there is no need to do this. sc is always /ʃ/, so scacan and sceacan both have /ʃ/...then what is the distinction, if any? It could be the vowel. Or as the Wikipedia article suggests, it could merely be interference from the other spellings. I think we can feature both pronunciations at sceacga, but I would prefer this be done via the ang-IPA template. I would not want to jerry-rig entries on a case by case basis in order to carry this out Leasnam (talk) 21:16, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

kind (adduced from personal names)

Could you please specify a name? ПростаРечь (talk) 20:51, 3 May 2021 (UTC)

Hi. I'm not sure what this is in reference to (?) Leasnam (talk) 04:53, 4 May 2021 (UTC)

https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/kinþą&oldid=21464633

ПростаРечь (talk) 12:52, 4 May 2021 (UTC)

Added, yet they need Gothic script Leasnam (talk) 21:42, 4 May 2021 (UTC)

Thank you! ПростаРечь (talk) 09:56, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

I know
Cindaswinth ~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chindasuinth
Cintila ~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chintila
Who are Cendamirus, Censindus? ПростаРечь (talk) 09:27, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

Wolken

After your edit I realized that almost all descendents on this page appear to be plural forms. Strange. Was there some kind of reason or was it a mistake? Singular Dutch would be "wolk" and singular German would be "Wolke". Prinsgezinde (talk) 17:35, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

It's all messed up. I see that there's another entry for *wulkną that has the Anglic descendants. These all need to be cleaned up. Leasnam (talk) 18:50, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

fyld

I've noticed you've added Middle English felde as a descendant of Old English fyld, but I can't seem to find such a form. Additionally, the OED says fyld "did not survive into Middle English". Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 04:59, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

@Hazarasp I should change the descent to "uncertain". I took it from FOLDE (2) in the MED, which has: c1350(a1333) Shoreham Poems (Add 17376)87/38 : Ase hyt hys in holye boke I-wryten ine many a felde [rime: ʒonge and ealde].. The MED lists this term as a variant of folde (="time", hence "many a times"), yet this singular passage is the only one to use felde vs. folde (--yes, I know: felde might have as well descended from Old English fild or feald). But what's also odd is that it has the phrase prefaced with the preposition ine ("in, within, inside of") as ine many a felde, where the other examples using folde to mean multiplicity of instance curiously do not. This makes me think that this may not be felde = "fold, times" but felde = "book, volume" (OE fyld). I know it's a stretch. Your thoughts ? Leasnam (talk) 12:48, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

I don't believe it's reasonable to assume that this instance of Middle English felde could be from fyld.

I'll begin by noting that Old English fyld probably didn't mean "volume"; the assumption that it did is based on a misinterpretation of Latin volumen, which means "turn, course", not "volume" in this context. Even if it did, the semantics don't work here. The phrase "holye boke" almost definitely refers to the Bible, but medieval Bibles weren't usually divided into many volumes. It's also worth noting that Old English fyld is rare in Old English, making a survival into Middle English less likely, especially when there isn't any other possible ME attestations to buttress it.

The claim that no other attestation of the phrase many a folde is preceded by in is erroneous; The Siege of Milan has in many a folde; by the time Milan was written, final -e had fell silent, obviating any difference between in (< Old English in) and ine (< Old English inne) that may have previously existed. Besides, any such distinction isn't relevant in Shoreham's case, since he apparently uses the form ine interchangeably with in. Even if your claim wasn't mistaken, I don't see how it's relevant; many a folde wasn't particularly common, so it'd be unsurprising if a certain preposition only preceded it once.

Finally, there's a good reason why the Shoreham passage's the only passage with felde; as far as I know, it's the only Kentish work that the MED entry quotes. Unlike in most other Middle English dialects, which have fald(e) or fold(e), felde is the regular development of Old English feald in Kentish; compare ealde < Old English eald (= old), teldest < Old English tealdest (= toldest), and y-helde < Old English ġehealden (= holden).

Given these points, I hope you don't mind if I remove felde from the Descendants section. Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 13:56, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

Nope, by all means remove it. My mistake. thank you for catching it ! :) Leasnam (talk) 16:41, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

@Hazarasp I went ahead and removed it. :) Leasnam (talk) 17:26, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

Evidence for non-historical usage

Hi! Do you think such words as Modern English wer and geld have at some point been used as an inherited descendant of Middle English, rather than being used in a historical sense. The definitions are also labelled obsolete/archaic even though no native usage has been provided as attestations in quotations. After I am wholly sure these are only historical terms, I shall fix these entries. Thank you. ·~ dictátor·mundꟾ 17:55, 31 August 2021 (UTC)

lad

@ Leasnam: Your last edit in lad is logically feasible; but what followed that is sheer nonsense. Regards. Andrew H. Gray 17:42, 20 October 2021 (UTC) Andrew

I don't know what you mean (?). It's pretty much what is relayed in the MED [[32]] Leasnam (talk) 18:38, 20 October 2021 (UTC)

@ Leasnam: Whilst I realise that each etymology should be sourceable from an authentic dictionary, such etymologies are only as reliable as the accuracy of the time period in which they exist and also the accuracy of their paths and gradations. You might say, at least 99% of such words are accurate; but it is up to the etymologist to ensure that what is presented on the Wiktionary main pages is true. This requires etymological logic. It is no good taking them at face value. For example, the Proto-Germanic form LAMBAZ is a mere substrate from Proto-Uralic LAMBAS; not the other way round and this can be proved by a substrate root 'to jump or leap' that is found as a substrate of Old Cornish which has a small collection of pre-Celtic lexemes. Another classic example amongst others is that of WOOD: the Proto-Germanic is merely a substrate of Proto-Celtic WIDUS; and Old English WUDU is not formed from WIODU as I erroneously stated, but assimilated into Anglo-Saxon as cognate with Irish Pictish UUDU (wood). All the Germanic forms are from the same WIDUS as substrates. Dictionaries that I have viewed do not take into account substrates nor hybrid forms and therefore cannot be implicitly relied upon, especially with problematic etymologies, where temptation is to present some pseudo plausible solution, as with 'stocking' connected with lad. We are supposed to reject such ideas. Also, I am afraid that I have to state that the author of the dictionary that presented *ADISO as the imagined root of adze, did not take into account that ADOSA and ADOSAN were older forms than ADESA and therefore was in error here: Welsh NADDU (to chip, whittle) is the nearest I know, except for Spanish AZOLAR; but both are too problematic to include; and so the conclusion for this word is the same as most reliable dictionaries state, as unknown. Andrew H. Gray 10:40, 22 October 2021 (UTC) Andrew

Middle Low German adjective

Hello Leasnam,
I just took the liberty to alter the spelling of the Middle Low German adjective in Reconstruction:Proto-West Germanic/welag to welich instead of welig, as this is the spelling present in Duden (the entry for German wählig) and in ODS (“vælig” in Ordbog over det danske Sprog). I must admit that I am not familiar with Middle Low German (just Standard German), so I was curious about whether you have a source for the welig spelling in Middle Low German. Both sources concur that welig is the spelling in (contemporary) Low German, but not in Middle Low German. Bogorm converſation 21:20, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

Hi ! No, I do not have a source for welig as welich is actually the correct form. I appreciate your attention to this and Thanks for correcting it ! :) Leasnam (talk) 21:41, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

KO 할머니 and 할아버지

In diff, you rejiggered the etymology at 할머니 (halmeoni) to remove detail and refer the reader instead to 할아버지 (harabeoji). However, 할아버지 (harabeoji) just refers the reader back to 할머니 (halmeoni) for those same details.

Could you have a look and fix this cross-reference loop? ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 17:24, 5 November 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing this out ! I must have grabbed "see that entry for more" from 할아버지 when editing by mistake and added it to 할머니. I've removed this blurb from both. The earlier text didn't make much sense: From the roots 하— (hada, "big, great", Modern 크— (keu-, “big”), 하— (ha-, “to do”)) + —ㄴ (-n, determiner suffix) - I get where this is going, but 크 is not a descendant of 하, just that it may be related. I've reworded and hopefully made it easier to follow. Leasnam (talk) 19:06, 5 November 2021 (UTC)

Cheers, thank you very much! ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 19:16, 5 November 2021 (UTC)

samana(i)

Dear Leasnam, I found your entry for Proto-Germanic samanai and noticed that the final -i is not mentioned in earlier dictionaries, e.g. Koebler (2014), Fick (1874). They write samana. I therefore wanted to ask: Where is this -i coming from? Is it a dative marker, as for example mentioned for aftai on Wiktionray, which is afta elsewhere? If so, what should the choice be based on to write one or the other? Thanks for your work, and all the best! Lrkrol (talk) 10:51, 4 December 2021 (UTC)

I believe that -ai ending was a way to reconcile the various adverbial endings in the daughter languages. It should be samana. I've moved the page :) Leasnam (talk) 14:47, 4 December 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for the speedy update! Is the pronunciation still correct, ending in a non-syllabic i? Lrkrol (talk) 11:07, 5 December 2021 (UTC)

Ooops, you're right. Fixed. Leasnam (talk) 17:10, 5 December 2021 (UTC)

seldsome linked pages

Hi. Please remember to deal with Special:WhatLinksHere/seldsome after deletion: there seem to be quite a few incoming links. Thanks. Equinox ◑ 10:26, 29 December 2021 (UTC)

How we will see unregistered users

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Thank you. /Johan (WMF)

18:14, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

I hope that you get well soon!

I am sorry to hear that you got the coronavirus, and have not had an asymptomatic case.

I hope for your full and speedy recovery!

Tharthan (talk) 01:33, 12 February 2022 (UTC)

Thank you :) Leasnam (talk) 12:22, 12 February 2022 (UTC)

See also'ing to non-existant pages

Should we actually do this? I think we should just create entries and add the {{also}} boxes when we do, because right now Uun- links nowhere. But what are your thoughts on this? Thadh (talk) 23:45, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Also, now I think about it, Uun- shouldn't be a separate prefix, just like German Un- isn't... Thadh (talk) 23:51, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Well, it helps to point out that there is a need to create the page. There is a redlink in the example given at Template:also though. I don't know what you mean by "separate prefix" (?) Leasnam (talk) 03:18, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Ok, I see now what you mean about the German analogy. Hmmm, to me they are not the same prefix since one applies to nouns (capitalised) and the other to adjectives....I've never given this thought before however...but I do see what you mean. It actually makes me want to make Un- for German lol Leasnam (talk) 03:23, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Okay, I've reverted :) Leasnam (talk) 03:34, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

I mean, it does make sense to analyse it as the same prefix, because capitalisation is a matter of convention and historically, it was definitely the same prefix. But I see your point.

Don't forget that <uu> and <ie> are short (or, phonetically, half-long), while <úu> and <íe> are long - at least according to Marron Fort's orthography. Thadh (talk) 10:28, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

blindhood

Hi. I added a Middle English etymon, but later noticed that the etymology previously had another one— reconstructed (suffixed with ME -hode), but all etymons were removed (in bad faith?) by a user. So just letting you know that you might want to re-add it. Thank you. ·~ dictátor·mundꟾ 19:15, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

I appreciate the heads-up. Thank you. Leasnam (talk) 04:31, 22 March 2022 (UTC)

geong pronunciation again

Decided to ask this in response to yet another user changing the pronunciation from /juŋɡ/ to /jeoŋɡ/. I just noticed that in Middle English there are not only forms in /juŋɡ/ (which is obviously etymologically original and also obviously the basis of the modern pronunciation), but also those indicating /jeŋɡ/ and /jiŋɡ/. Could the /jeŋɡ/ and /jiŋɡ/ more likely come from /jeoŋɡ/, which would thus coexist with /juŋɡ/ in OE? — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 03:35, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

AFAIK, ME forms such as yeng and ying are usually thought to be levellings from the OE comparative ġingra and superlative ġingest. Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 03:47, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with Hazarasp - I would take them as being taken from the comparative and superlatives. Leasnam (talk) 12:56, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

@Hazarasp: Alright y'all, I've added an edit notice (in comment markup) to geong to warn against reverting the pronunciation away from /juŋg/. — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 21:16, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

saisir

[33]. A term in language A deriving from a term in language B doesn't require that A and B were spoken at the same time. It does logically require that some form of A was spoken at the same time or after some form of B was (Egyptian couldn't borrow from modern English), but that relation holds in the case in question. Anyway, I didn't even add the claim, but the entry was previously being categorized as if it was an Old French word when it's not. 70.172.194.25 03:47, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

Yes, it's fine. I misread the edit in the revision summary, which was then obvious to me when I actually clicked on the entry page and read it. Leasnam (talk) 03:51, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

The productivity of English -th

To continue from our previous spat, wrength isn't sufficient evidence that English -th is productive, as it is a analogical formation along the lines of strong : strength and long : length. The fact that strength and length happen to have historically ended with -th is immaterial; if the English words for "strength" and "length" were *stringe and *linge (regularly corresponding to Proto-West Germanic *strangī, *langī), then the analogy would still operate, producing *wringe, but that would hardly prove the productivity of reflexes of Proto-West Germanic *-ī! Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 15:31, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

I disagree with your viewpoint. Forming new words by analogy with other words employing an affix is an acknowledgement of the validity of that affix. Most words using affixes are created in this manner. So this is moot. Leasnam (talk) 15:44, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

newth, wholth, and illth are other examples. We don't have entries yet for oldth and wrongth, but they are on my radar. Leasnam (talk) 15:48, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

Of course analogical formations serve to propagate a affix (or any linguistic type), but as I tried to point out with my analogy, I don't think a one-off formation proves the productivity of a type. Anyway, all this is besides the point. While illth and wholth don't suffice to prove the productivity of -th, as they're too old, oldth does seem to (I could not use newth to prove anything, as the homonymous surname Newth makes it difficult to search for). Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 16:24, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

About "guerroyer"

Let me run this by you real quick. I need to to see if you understood what I was trying to say (ES June '22) since, as you may be aware, people charge me with allegations of being incomprehensible.

As it stands, guerroyer derives from a combination of a root akin to German wirr and the suffix -oyer from -idiō. The origin of the suffix, you claim, may also be Germanic although Greek stands to reason.

To validate the claim there need to be Germanic words with this suffix to be loaned. A single comparison won't seal the deal, but it is a start. For this purpose I refered you to the idiom irren und wirren with its variants. I have avoided spelling out what would be my best guess, because it could be wrong or close but no cigarillo. That is, I intended to circumscribe *wirrirren, whatever that means. Has that become clear?

From your dismissing it by referring to "OHG *werrezzen" and "look-alike" "wārezzen (“to assure, guarantee”)" instead I guess that you have understood, and did dismiss it out of hand. This may be difficult to negotiate, however. Therefore I am simply asking, Did you not see that? not asking rhethorically, Why did you not see that, it is totally obvious! It's probably the notion of rhotacizm that is a show stopper, although I would double down on that because irren supposes rhotacism, albeit from a different root. ApisAzuli (talk) 14:45, 8 July 2022 (UTC)

Honestly, I read over your post the first time, and it seemed off-topic to me if I am truly honest. Because I didn't understand why you were referring to German verbs and the past participle of essen. Perhaps the placement of the response immediately after mine where I defended that I didn't say it was the source was confusing (?).

I have just returned from holiday, but I will review your initial post and the one above and get back with you. I can't think of a time that you've ever been incomprehensible or hard to understand, at least in your communications with me :) Leasnam (talk) 20:04, 10 July 2022 (UTC)

Feminine sīn

Hello, I've noticed that in your edits to Old English sīn, you say that it was used only with masculine and neuter words. But I've found one line from Beowulf that shows its use with a feminine word (excuse the lack of macrons):

• Bær þa seo brimwylf, þa heo to botme com, hringa þengel to hofe sinum

It's clear from the context that brimwylf (clearly a feminine noun) is the antecedent of sīnum. I believe you should revise the entry to reflect this. 2601:640:8900:2450:31C8:4317:E4F7:B47D 08:47, 19 July 2022 (UTC)

Ah, yep, you're right. Thanks for catching this ! Will revert Leasnam (talk) 14:12, 19 July 2022 (UTC)

Gothic: 𐌻𐌰𐌹𐍃𐍉 (laisō)

Hi, where can I find this word? ПростаРечь (talk) 19:02, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

I obtained that from here [[34]] as laiso "Lehre" Leasnam (talk) 19:29, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure how often -𐌴𐌹𐌲𐍃 (-eigs) gets appended to verbs....seems that this is a nominal suffix, hence the suspicion of *𐌻𐌰𐌹𐍃𐍉 (*laisō). Leasnam (talk) 19:46, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

Thank you! ПростаРечь (talk) 19:53, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

Blue

Dear Leasnam, I have had to adjust my edit of BLEE; and it is just as well that you struck out the Welsh form for colour, because it left potential confusion since, as you stated that has no direct connection. I initially intended to simply link the root pf BLEE as an ultimate cognate with that of LLIW that is as far removed as Latin FLAVUS. Due to the lack Germanic morphological sound change, BLEO is not a satisfactory cognate for the Anglo Saxon form either. Your last inclusions which you edited are very interesting and helpful!

Unless a P.I.E. form is totally out of the question, one must avoid the temptation to include Basque UBEL (blue purple, bruise) as having any connection. If the Gothic for UBEL (evil) were a substrate, there might be a very remote connection there as from the same Neolithic root as in UBEL only.

Kind Regards. Andrew H. Gray 07:48, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

Further, as to Welsh LLIW, it should have been abundantly obvious to me that it is akin to Latin LIVIDUS and therefore no connection whatever with Middle English BLEE, but is an example of where the 'll' does not represent a P.C. 'pl'! Kind Regards. Andrew H. Gray 16:26, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

"not sure why you undid it"

Got confused after seeing this diff. 2600:387:9:5:0:0:0:84 20:26, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

PGmc *straukijaną would produce Proto-West Germanic *straukijan which would produce Old Frisian *strēka, *strētza (cf rēka, rētsa from Proto-West Germanic *raukijan (“to smoke, fume”)). Saterland Frisian strookje and West Frisian streakje point to a Weak 2 verb rather than a Class 1 weak verb. Leasnam (talk) 04:50, 7 September 2022 (UTC)

FWOTD

Hi Leas, would you know any good Old or Middle English candidates for FWOTD? ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 11:13, 17 September 2022 (UTC)

hmm, I'm thinking...Leasnam (talk) 15:07, 17 September 2022 (UTC)

@Lingo Bingo Dingo: How about Old English calwa (“alopecia”) ? Leasnam (talk) 03:19, 18 September 2022 (UTC)

That looks good. Do you have a scholarly reference or a durable quotation? ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 11:48, 18 September 2022 (UTC)

Old English sel and sæl

The same word 'hall' coming from Proto-Germanic *salą appears twice. Would you mind sorting this out? ᛙᛆᚱᛐᛁᚿᛌᛆᛌ ᛭ Proto-Norsing ᛭ Ask me anything 15:58, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

I will when I return, likely later today Leasnam (talk) 16:15, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Origin of OE þincg

Hello, do you know what the etymology of OE form þinċġ is? None of the reconstructed forms in Proto-West Germanic *þing would have led to palatalization, I believe, and since you're the one who created the page for þinċġ, I thought you would have a better understanding than I. 2601:640:8003:8A10:BDA5:23CF:C4E6:C42E 00:16, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

I'm not Leasnam, but I believe there's no reason not to interpret Old English þincg as anything other than [θiŋɡ]; compare æþelincg, cynincg, alternative forms of æþeling, cyning. Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 11:16, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

I would tend to agree, þing can also be spelt þingc, and þincg may simply be a variant spelling of that. þing, þingc, and þincg all mean exactly the same thing in Old English, and examples such as nān þincg beside nān þing seem to bear this out. There is a small amount of evidence of palatisation in Middle English with some forms showing possible /d͡ʒ/, but certain /t͡ʃ/ (e.g. þenge, þengge, thingge, þynch (and in placenames thinch, thynch, etc.) so palatisation in Old English þincg might have been possible, if extremely rare. As for the Middle English placenames that show palatisation, these can also be attributed to conflation/confusion with Old English ġeþinġe (“thing"="assembly, meeting”) from Proto-West Germanic *(ga)þingī (cf Old High German gidingi). Leasnam (talk) 15:37, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

Note that none of the ME forms that you adduce unambiguously show palatalisation; in Middle English, <ch> could occasionally represent /k/, especially in early attestations and placenames, both of which have a relatively low level of orthographic fixity. Spellings with final <e> are even less definitive proof; it should suffice to mention that Middle English scribes would've been very familiar with spellings like brynge for bryngen where a final <e> (whether pronounced or not) follows /nɡ/; the assumption that it must represent /d͡ʒ/ in this context can only be sustained for Modern English. Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 04:49, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

Sparring with the IP at the ES

I think you're misinterpreting the IP who posts to the Etymology scriptorium. This is just Rhyminreason/ApisAzuli evading their blocks and trying to be clever. Because of the randomness, it's easy to misread what they say, but I've never seen them attack anyone or anything. Their sole, massively overriding focus can be paraphrased as "Look at me! Look at how clever I am!". They've learned enough historical linguistics to dress up their random nonsense with real sound correspondences and references to real authorities on the subject, but it's still random nonsense. I've kept out of enforcing their blocks because of a rather unprofessional block message I used sometime back, but you should know that anything that geolocates to Land Berlin and the neighboring region is probably them. Chuck Entz (talk) 20:26, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

Noted. Thank you, @Chuck Entz :) Leasnam (talk) 20:31, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

pentice

Why are you adding definitions without cites and then RfVing them? Those who try to cite RfVs are not your servants, but you are treating them as such. You should know better. DCDuring (talk) 19:30, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

@DCDuring: I wasn't the one who added the definition. I edited the Etymology before realising the word was questionable. Leasnam (talk) 19:33, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

I apologize for being careless in looking at the history and then being testy about it. DCDuring (talk) 20:14, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

All good man :) Leasnam (talk) 20:18, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

stinky

In 2017 you added the etymology for stinky as: "From Middle English stinky, stynky". Is this right though? Because OED's earliest citation is from 1888 and EEBO seems not to have any results for stinky nor stynky. –Vuccala 00:13, 29 December 2022 (UTC)

It's in late Middle English, see here [[35]] Leasnam (talk) 00:43, 29 December 2022 (UTC)

So it is. Thank you! –Vuccala 03:21, 29 December 2022 (UTC)

yellow-red

I didn't think this had been used since the 1930s. I have an old color-wheel with only 5 basic colors, and 'yellow-red' alongside the other four intermediate colors (yellow-green, blue-green, etc.). But I see we also have blue-red. That isn't on my old color-wheel. Is it ever still used, or can we tag it as obsolete or archaic? kwami (talk) 22:09, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

Hm, the 2009 source is a bit odd. It's not using yellow-red as a color, but rather as red with yellow added, which it identifies as the color orange: they start with a contrast of red and green, and then add yellow so the contrast is now yellow-red vs yellow-green; from then on they shift to 'orange' as the actual name of the color. Are there any recent uses of 'yellow-red' simply as an intermediate color, analogous to 'yellow-green' or 'blue-green'? kwami (talk) 22:21, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

I've added some cites for blue-red. All of these "hybrid" colour names can represent either the blended colour, or a mix of the colours individually, but citations are not difficult to find if you search for them. Leasnam (talk) 22:33, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

Yes, but there's a difference between blended colors, such as red-green in your 2009 source, and an intermediate color. Yellow-green is not necessarily a blend of pigments, it is also the name of the color between yellow and green in the spectrum. Yellow-red once had that meaning, which it sounds like it still has as the name of a Crayola color. But apart from that, it would seem to be obsolete in that sense. I suspect that blue-red as the name of a color (rather than a blend) is similarly obsolete, or (as in one of the examples) a calque from a non-English source. kwami (talk) 22:41, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

I'll find a more fitting example and replace the 2009 cite. Leasnam (talk) 22:47, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

I've added a couple more to yellow-red under the Adjective. I'll find some time to review all the x-colour-x-colour colours (haha) to ensure both the blended and mixed senses are cited. Due to the naming of the crayons in the Crayola box, I'm confident we'll be able to find multiple examples of each, since children my age grew up learning these colour names from the crayons, and I still use them to describe intermediate colours to this day. Leasnam (talk) 22:43, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

Now that I think of it, there was no yellow-red crayon, there was orange-red and yellow-orange because those colours are next to each other: red and yellow are not. Same goes for blue-red...so what I mis-stated above does apply, but only to colours like blue-green. Leasnam (talk) 23:13, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

No wonder I don't remember it!

In my mom's old color-wheel, red and yellow were next to each other, because there were only 5 basic colors. 'Orange' wasn't yet a basic color term AFAICT. It sounds like if you go back a bit further, there were only 4 basic colors, and 'purple' or 'violet' weren't yet basic color terms. I assume you could use them to name colors, but that it would be like using "chartreuse" for yellow-green today. kwami (talk) 02:55, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

I found a few examples where it would seem that the [x-colour]-[z-colour] denoted 2 individual colours that were blended where they met (either gradiently; or, if speckled, mottled, or blotched, where they touched), but I'm not sure there's a need to have this separate sense for this (?). blue-red is frequently used this way when describing a bruise Leasnam (talk) 23:41, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

Sure, but is it ever used as a synonym for 'purple', which is what it once meant? Same for "yellow-red": until maybe the 1930s or so, it was the word for what we now call orange, but I'd be surprised if it's still used that way.

For me at least, a "blue-red bruise" is rather like a "purple-green bruise" -- it suggests a mottled coloring, not a simple purple. It won't always be be easy to determine in which sense a particular source is using a compound color. And for something obviously productive like "yellow-green", it's probably not terribly important. (I would say "yellow and green" if I wanted to avoid the monochromatic sense, because that's so dominant.) But I think it would be of interest whether "blue-red" and "yellow-red" are still used (say, in the last 40-50 years) for monochromatic "purple" and "orange", or whether those senses are old-fashioned. At least, I'd find it interesting. kwami (talk) 03:00, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

easen?

You've created the entry "easen" (https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=easen&action=history), but I couldn't find it in any dictionary. I asked on StackExchange, and several English-speaking people replied that there is no such word (probably its usage was just mistakes). What is your opinion on that, why do you consider it an English word? What should we add to its page to tell people that it is non-standard? Yaroslav Nikitenko (talk) 15:59, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

@Yaroslav Nikitenko: English, like all languages, is constantly evolving and changing. Some English speakers are closer to the cutting edge of this change, others are not. There was once a time when ain't wasn't considered "an English word" but we know that it has always been, since it was created within English. Easen is a word, but it may not be considered a standard word. You cannot always go by what others say, even reputable educated individuals, because language cannot be fully controlled, because no one group or individual has complete control over it. On Wiktionary, usage determines whether a term is an entry-worthy word or not, and there are more than sufficient attestations of the word on the page to allow that. The construction of the word also conforms to acceptable rules of English word construction, namely adjective + -en = verb, so it need not be a mistake but rather a new creation based on analogy with other similar constructions. Many English words start off as errors or looking like errors. However, at this time, I don't think it's common enough, and I don't feel a label of nonstandard is inappropriate or wrong, so I will add one. Leasnam (talk) 16:38, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

Also would like to add, if you are an English learner or wouldn't consider yourself a native or near-native speaker of English, I would avoid using easen. You will likely be corrected. It is an artful word that has usefulness only in special specific applications, like poetry or when you're possibly making analogy to other words ending in -en, or if you need a rhyme in a verse, or consciously trying to draw attention to the fact that you're using easen over ease. You have to use it knowing that it is non-standard, and that's what makes it charming :). It's like quieten, which is a synonym of the verb quiet in that it exists in parallel to the bare verb having both evolved independently from the adjective (also compare the obsolete verb hard "to make hard" vs. harden, and other pairs with slightly different meanings like to bold and to bolden). Easen exists solely because the vitality of the -en suffix still has some life in it. Leasnam (talk) 16:59, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

Many thanks for adding these labels and for a thorough discussion on that. No, I'm not a native speaker, that's why for me it would be important to know beforehand that many English speakers would find this word "incorrect" (so I would choose another one in a colloquial correspondence). Actually I do write poetry in English, and I've already used a word "soothen" for that same meaning (oops, this word again appears nonstandard!) - I found it here in Wiktionary. Yaroslav Nikitenko (talk) 18:12, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

bodag

Could you please give a source ? ПростаРечь (talk) 12:28, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

Here you go [[36]], just click anywhere on the information to open up the details. It says perhaps from PGmc *budaga-. Leasnam (talk) 16:21, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

My toes hurt

Man, I just love working on the same entries at the same time. Not disruptive at all. -- Sokkjō 05:00, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

SOrry, I just got back to my PC...I thought you had done these earlier. My Bad Leasnam (talk) 05:09, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Frequentative suffix -ikōn, -ukōn

I see you cited *stalkōn and *talkōn as being derived from frequentative suffix -ikōn, -ukōn. Are there any sources that claim this? -- Sokkjō 06:48, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

@Sokkjo, Alright, give me a bit to look for something. I also saw your other request regarding merging the Page histories...I'll need to work out how to do that first. Leasnam (talk) 14:02, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

I like the idea that -ikōn is a borrowing of the Latin frequentative -icō, but I just haven't seen anything on this, and if there're only two examples, it's hard to base a theory off of it. -- Sokkjō 16:50, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

There are far more than 2. I've just added *hauʀukōn. Please, check it out :) Leasnam (talk) 18:03, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

@Sokkjo, In PWGmc (and perhaps also PGmc), it seems the frequentatives are derived from or associated in some way to the adjective/diminutive suffixes such as *-in/*-inōn, *-ul/*-(u)lōn, *-ur/*-urōn, *-g/*-gōn, and in this case from *-uk/*-ukōn, etc. so unlikely that Latin -icō could be the source. The Latin seems parallel or cognate to the *-g/*-gōn though. Leasnam (talk) 18:12, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Any paper on that? -- Sokkjō 18:18, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

No, that (directly above) is just an observation. Leasnam (talk) 18:24, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

@Sokkjo, *-ukōn might go back to Proto-Germanic, as Old Norse has a causal verbal suffix in -ka (see English -k for examples of Old Norse descendants). Leasnam (talk) 18:42, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

@Sokkjo, <<Any paper on that?>> - not that I know of. There might be some sources out there who've observed the same, so please don't take my answer as an absolute...I just didn't obtain my observation from them, but we may have independently noticed the same thing. Leasnam (talk) 20:12, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Lurk

@Leasnam: Regarding the origin of lurk being connected with that of leer, it rather depends whether Scots Gaelic lorg (trace) is borrowed from Norse and not related to Old Cornish LERGH (way); if so then the connection is certainly feasible. However, if not and the Scots Gaelic form is not borrowed, but a cognate of the Old Cornish LERGH, the Old Norse forms are most likely substrates from the Proto-Celtic *lorgo, via Proto-Germanic. Even then, it depends whether there is a connection (that I believe is very dubious) between the Old Cornish LERGH (way) - HENS being the normal word for that meaning - and Proto-Celtic *lir (sea) > Old Irish LER and its derivatives in names et cetera; that according to Wiktionary is a substrate word. If so, the Celtic forms could also be substrates, but only if LERGH meant sea way; however this is exceedingly dubious. Kind regards. Andrew H. Gray 17:29, 6 June 2024 (UTC) + + Andrew H. Gray 17:29, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

@Werdna Yrneh Yarg, <<leer>> did you mean lour ? I do believe it is connected to lour, which as Middle English louren also meant "to lurk, crouch". Lour is well attested in North Germanic (Faroese lúra (“to lie in wait”), Swedish lura (“to cheat”)) and West Germanic (Dutch loeren, German lauern). Lurk is just a frequentative. I've added West Germanic cognates to the page at lurk. Leasnam (talk) 05:17, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

Thank you so much; that was an utterly gross careless mistake on my part; leer is, as you know, connected with 'cheek'. Thank you for replying so promptly. If it is truly just a frequentive, the Celtic forms are separate and unconnected with LURK; bedause I cannot see a connection between the LOUREN and the P.C. *LORGO. Kind regards, Andrew H. Gray 17:31, 7 June 2024 (UTC) Andrew H. Gray 17:31, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

long

Hello! I see that a while back you added etymology 6 ('to belong') to our entry at long. Is this really distinct from the verb sense under etymology 4 ('To be appropriate to, to pertain or belong to')? Should the etym 4 verb sense be merged into etym 6? (Or was there some reason to keep them separate?) — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 18:48, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Resolving some PG RFDs

Hey, could you history merge a few PG entries? RC:Proto-Germanic/wrībaną and down to at least RC:Proto-Germanic/faką. -- Sokkjō 19:39, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Sure...I'm in the middle of a house-move, and once settled I'll pitch in (I need to refresh myself on how as well) Leasnam (talk) 16:54, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

færbu

I would like to request that the page for færbu be restored, or that I be permitted to recreate it (I have some adjustments prepared for it anyways.

The word is widely cited in the public sphere, including by a number of authoritative institutions, such as the University of Texas, and several examples can be found of people inquiring about it. I therefore believe that it meets the WT:CFI. And in any case, a page demonstrating it to be a ghost word would be useful for mitigating further misuse. Ythede Gengo (talk) 02:38, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

Done. Leasnam (talk) 03:34, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

Yew

@Leasnam: Although I thanked you for the correct P.G. root, the Old English forms are actually substrates from the Celtic and do not directly derive from Proto-Germanic; but are likely to have been retained by the latter's influence. Although I am aware of the sound changes from 'h' to 'w' in many instances, the native English 'w' form had been retained. Kind regards. 21:15, 10 September 2024 [[User:Werdna Yrneh Yarg|Andrew]] Andrew H. Gray 20:19, 10 September 2024 (UTC)

Fixing PGem. i-mutation being wrongly triggered by diphthongs

I have attempted to fix the erroneous i-mutation by PGem. diphthongs that Kenny promised to fix for you two months ago but forgot about, so I had to do it for him. Let me know if new concerns about this issue pop up. — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 05:42, 14 September 2024 (UTC)

(Basically what I did was make the module only i-mutate when the triggers [iīįǐj] are preceded by a consonant.) — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 05:48, 14 September 2024 (UTC)

Velar consonants before ea from breaking

The standard timeline of sound changes places breaking before a-restoration, which in turn is placed before palatalization, so West Saxon forms with “ea” from breaking are expected to have palatal ċ ġ. This is consistent with our entries for forms such as ċeald (vs. Anglian cald), but I noticed that you marked g as velar in gealpettung, and changed it from palatal to velar in gealga with the comment "not a single ME form shows y-/ȝ-". My assumption is that the ME forms, like the modern English form of "cold", are simply derived from Anglian rather than West Saxon forms. Do any sources say WS could have a velar consonant in these circumstances? Urszag (talk) 14:15, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

@Urszag, My attempt in moving galpettan to gealpettan was not to make it West Saxon, but to normalise it to how the headword is found in written sources; galpettað is the attested form, along with the derivative gælpettunga. Leasnam (talk) 19:38, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

Plus, I was aiming at creating the ancestor of Middle English galpen, so *galpian, yet this did not look correct in light of related words like ġielpan. Perhaps galpettan and *galpian would be better despite.
On second thought, I see what you did in creating the entry normalised for WS, but offering the Alt form and placing a note in the Desc. That'll work ! Leasnam (talk) 19:41, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

For ġealpettung to have a form with i-mutation (i.e. gælpettung ~ *ġielpettung), there would have had to have been two verbs: Proto-West Germanic *galpattjan beside *galpittjan; and the i-mutated derivative would have had to have come from the second whilst the main verb came from the first. This is highly unlikely. It is more likely that one verb survived (if there even were two to begin with) and the gerund was taken from it, and æ ~ ea is just an orthographic variation or a fusion, since ea is really just æa. Leasnam (talk) 19:53, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

Edit reversion in error

Hi, you reverted all of my edits to niggatry using the rollback feature. No reason was given except "If you think this rollback is in error, please leave a message on my talk page," so here I am, saying that I think it's in error. I am genuinely trying to learn about language and improve this dictionary.

I am new to Wiktionary and still learning how things work here, especially in how operations and policies differ from Wikipedia. (Shouldn't we be having this discussion on the talk page for the dictionary entry, rather than your userspace?)

All evidence I've seen indicates that that episode of "The Boondocks" (S2E4 "Stinkmeaner Strikes Back") was the first instance of this word in the English language. The episode is a parody of "The Exorcist." No evidence is given for the etymology currently on the page, and searching for quotations earlier than the episode's air date revealed nothing.

Additionally, the word has now had usage in serious academic context, which I would like to quote as well without being reverted. LesbianTiamat (talk) 02:23, 4 December 2024 (UTC)

Hi @LesbianTiamat, this topic was discussed last month [here]. In the end, it was determined that niggatry was a separate term from niggardry. Your edit put the etymology back to what was determined to be incorrect. Leasnam (talk) 04:35, 4 December 2024 (UTC)

Oh. On Wikipedia that would've been on the talk page, but it didn't exist on that article. How do I find that stuff? I apparently wasted quite a bit of time repeating research.

I disagree with your assessment but will take it to that discussion. LesbianTiamat (talk) 05:01, 4 December 2024 (UTC)

You can find discussions about specific term etymologies [here]. You can also bring up new discussions as well. Leasnam (talk) 17:49, 4 December 2024 (UTC)