User talk:Widsith/archive7

râter / rater

Can you elucidate on the French spelling of râter? It looks as a rare alternative form of rater. I can't find it in another French dictionary, so maybe it is erroneus. --Rising Sun 14:15, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, it's Old French, not Modern French; I fixed it.

temblor

I was going to tag it as US after I saw your note but apparently DCDuring already got to it. Mike Halterman 14:56, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

• No worries, I thikn we have a fair solution now. Ƿidsiþ 14:57, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
  • I've just been so busy working on the Danish proverbs and the Danish words that I removed it just before I went to bed last night and didn't even think about it. Mike Halterman 16:17, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks!

Hi Widsith, Just a quick note to say thanks for fixing the formatting on my entry at embarcadère. Much appreciated! -- Cdhaptomos 21:05, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Dog

You reverted my edit for dog. Explain. I just wanted to make it clear that dog#English and dog#Mbabaram were unrelated etymologically.— This unsigned comment was added by 220.253.134.159 (talk).

• Why would anyone think they were related etymologically? That doesn't even seem possible. If there's no connection you don't need to mention it. Bringing Mbabaram into it is just going to confuse people. Ƿidsiþ 06:55, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
  • People might think that they're related etymologically because they both mean the same thing.--220.253.102.150 13:13, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Middle English

I am interested in why you dislike Middle English sections. I sometimes add them, especially when there is paltry use of the spelling and sense in English and a different etymology section would be required in English and the only citations given are from Chaucer and Spencer (largely unintelligble to most normal users). Taking Middle English seriously wouldn't be much fun for an amateur because there seem to be so many alternative spellings. DCDuring TALK 15:46, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

• Yeah, the spellings are part of the problem. The other part is that there aren't actually that many words which were only used in Middle English without surviving into early Modern, and so generally I find it much more useful to see them in an English section where I can see any possible meanings which arose in later (modern) use. But I'm kind of being facetious, I have accepted that Middle English entries are probably unavoidable and even useful, I just dread all the duplication of information that they will entail.. Ƿidsiþ 15:59, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

brûle-pourpoint

My bad, I did not look closely enough and copy-pasted the adjectival definition. I've fixed that brainfart. Circeus 17:50, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Feed the bot

Hello. I would like to show you User:Dawnraybot/Feed me, where you may add a verb, and User:Dawnraybot will create the conjugated pages. --Rising Sun 21:22, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

front

Thank you for your many recent and significant contributions to this entry! --EncycloPetey 04:37, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

• You're very welcome! Yep, it sure was a quiet day at work yesterday... Ƿidsiþ 05:28, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

ello

thanx for making contact, yup i would love to help if i can, i will put it on my watchlist
cheers
B9hummingbirdhoverin'^{æ•ω•ॐ} 07:16, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

steven

I don't understand. It is not a citation for the term. It is for an alternate spelling. I thought that, for English, we insisted that citations be for the exact spelling of the headword. It might be different for Old English, Middle English, and for other languages. Refer me to some place where I can learn otherwise.

Relatedly I noted that you had reverted the Middle English entry to which I had moved the Chaucer citation. Chaucer is clearly Middle English. There might also be English use of the the term, but a Chaucer citation doesn't support it.

I recall that you don't like Middle English and I understand that there is some arbitrariness as to where one would set boundaries with Old English and English, but we clearly have Middle English as an accepted language. DCDuring TALK 18:16, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

• Hi. Well, I don't think we do insist that citations reflect the same spelling as the headword; my understanding has always been that citations of alternative forms can support either the alternative form page, or the main lemma entry, which seems to make sense (otherwise consider that e.g. Shakespeare quotes would usually be inadmissable to support entries in the original Folio spellings, I think that would be crazy). As for the whole Middle English thing, I apologise about that: the word did of course exist as well in Middle English but I changed it out of laziness because I couldn't be bothered to research exactly how the word looked in ME at the time. You have to note that the citation was actually in modern English (presumably you got it from a modern English translation of Chaucer?) so it's not a very good ME quote, indeed it's not one at all. I will fix all that tonight or tomorrow - sorry. My position on ME is that I totally accept it, but I only think we should also be allowed to use ME citations to support modern English words (so that that we properly illustrate a word's history). Ƿidsiþ 18:34, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

lown

Hello. You have created the entry as Scots, but there is at least one citation proving that it is used in English literature. In my understanding, any dialectal word appearing in poetry or scientifical works may be regarded as belonging to the formal vocabulary of the language and eo ipso no longer dialectal, but mainstream, i. e. English rather than Scots. What do you suggest? I am aware of the poet's Scottish origin, but his work is written in exquisite, immaculate English. Do you require it's use by non-Scottish poets in order to change the header to English? Is there a guideline for this? I linked the section from the TR section to this discussion, if you do not mind (since you are the only contributor to the entry). The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 20:00, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

I found an entry in Webster's dictionary (of the English language, albeit tagged there as dialect) which I added to the article. I am eager to change the header (based on said entry in Webster and citation from English classical literature) to English, if you do not object. The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 20:13, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

• That seems fine to me; you could also consider {{Scotland}} in the circumstances. Ƿidsiþ 06:40, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

  Done, but I have no idea about the comparative and superlative grade. Are they -er, -est or more, most l., as hitherto in the article. The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 06:49, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

ana

I believe someone once said "better late than never." I have edited ana to include a couple of citations for the sense that once bothered you, and to slightly alter the definition. Pingku 17:04, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

• Good work! Looks great. Ƿidsiþ 06:30, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

WT:BP#Replace Category:Old French plurals with Category:Old French noun forms

Mglovesfun (talk) 20:04, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

tip & muster

Hi,
Thanks for directing me to the defdate template at muster! I haven't come across that before, but I'll definitely use it now.
--Tyranny Sue 10:35, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

shrieve

Hi Widsith,

Could you have a look at this entry when you have time?

(1) I'm principally concerned about my conjugation of the verb, which, when it comes down to it, I don't have evidence to support. (2) I used 'alternative form' rather than 'alternative spelling' for the verb (in particular) since the conjugation looks like it might/must differ significantly - in simple past and p.p.) (3) I'm happier about the combination of 'obsolete' and 'alternative', since (luckily) it seems in both etymologies that the alternative to "shrieve" is at least as old (the etymology is just as applicable) as well as being more modern. The entry also implies that, in each case, there has been a time in the past when both usages were current.

I couldn't find a template for 'obsolete term for', which I first thought of using.

Cheers, Pingku 15:27, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

• We have {{obsolete spelling of}}, which is what I use for these cases. But someone should really create {{obsolete form of}}, because "spelling" always implies to me that the words were pronounced the same, which of course they usually weren't. The verb conjugation looks good to me. As ever, citations will clear most problems up, but it just depends how much time and effort you want to put into finding them. Ƿidsiþ 15:46, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

• • Thanks Ƿidsiþ. Pingku 15:52, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

source of date?

Hi there,
Just wondering where you found the date (19th c.) for tip Etymology 2, Noun, sense 3 (dump). I haven't been able to find any date for that so far.
Thanks! --Tyranny Sue 04:30, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

• The OED's first attestation for that sense is from 1862. Ƿidsiþ 05:30, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Ah, great. Thanks. --Tyranny Sue 05:37, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Your reverts

Since you only made three reverts, I am going to undo them until the community decides on what they want to do about the edits first, since they've already been made. Razorflame 07:57, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

the a in maxim

In this edit [1] (and afew other recent ones), you've modified UK pronunciations in ways that don't tally with my sources, but which I can certainly hear in recent UK television programmes (now that I know to listen for it). Is there a source you're going by for these, or is it experience? Is there a simple general principle for when or where this distinction between UK and US occurs that I could commit to memory, so that I know to consider it when adding future IPA transcriptions? --EncycloPetey 04:24, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

• I am following the new OED in marking /a/ for UK and /æ/ for US. This is also the UK vowel quality as described in Trudgill's "English accents and dialects" (2005). Most dictionaries still give the old-fashioned RP value /æ/ for UK, but I actually think this is misleading since the difference between UK and US <a> is easy for everyone to hear and it makes sense to represent it. Almost no one in Britain actually uses [æ] anymore, except the Queen. I brought this up on Wiktionary:About Pronunciation and some argued that it was a sub-phonemic issue which we shouldn't bother with, but in the absence of consensus I am going to follow the OED and my other sources until we decide otherwise. Ƿidsiþ 09:05, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

• I'm inclined to follow your lead on this, in the absence of any arguments to the contrary, and especially if the OED is now doing this as well. As I say, it's something I can hear, but never registered consciously for this phoneme. --EncycloPetey 17:31, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

ǽwiscnes

Please can you look at the Old English page ǽwiscnes. It has been on Request for Cleanup since 2007. On that page it is suggested "Rather long list of synonyms. Even if valid (unlike Wikisaurus type synonyms), the formatting is quite messed up" --Volants 13:38, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

• Done. Thanks. Ƿidsiþ 14:18, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

sieltan

I found sieltan at RFC, if you'd like to clean it up--Volants 13:31, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

knouleche

Middle English cleanup, of you're interested? --Volants 14:00, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

• Done (with extreme prejudice)...cheers. Ƿidsiþ 16:04, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

make ends meet

Don't the rules say that you can't use an expression that has already been used? SemperBlotto 10:15, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

• D'oh - you must have put yours in while I was editing the page. Didn't notice. Ƿidsiþ 10:18, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

Christmas Competition

A bit of rules clarification: You can't score 25 points for an entry yet. The linked idiom has to be created after 30 Nov to be eligible for that extra +10. It's still 29 Nov now. --EncycloPetey 14:56, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

apologie

Hi Widsith,

Could you take a look at this old edit of yours? Aside from the ==English== at the top, it looks like a French entry; but I do find some old uses of the spelling apologie in English, so I wonder if you meant to create both entries, and kind of merged them in your head?

Personally, I know that I've sometimes typed ==English== at the top of Hebrew entries and vice versa, but at least I have the courtesy to do it with languages where the alphabet gives away the game! :-P

Anyway, if you could fix up this entry to how you meant it to be, I'd appreciate it. :-)

Thanks in advance!
—Ruakh_TALK 03:01, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

• Yeah that was totally a mistake! Fascinating seeing the changes made to that page as the error was gradually made good... Ƿidsiþ 06:22, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

• Thanks! —Ruakh_TALK 21:02, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

TTBC

Do you know which PoS the TTBCs should go from this edit? I ask because the TTBCs shouldn't be under a separate section, but another Translations section. Thanks. --Bequw → ¢ • τ 05:27, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

• Oh, really? Well in that case maybe a new level-3 header at the bottom. Ƿidsiþ 07:15, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

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)

IPA of suite#French

I've always wondered what the difference between /sɥit/ and /swit/ is. The sound after the /s/ does seem to be a /w/ to me. Mglovesfun (talk) 12:20, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

• It's not easy to explain. The [ɥ] is a palatal approximant, which means that as well as the lips pursing (like with [w]), the middle of the tongue approaches the roof of the mouth. One way to think of it might be that [ɥ] is to [y] as [w] is to [u]. Although strictly speaking that probably isn't a good scientific way of describing it. Ƿidsiþ 12:33, 15 December 2009 (UTC)
• (/swit/ in French would be spelled *souite*.) Ƿidsiþ 12:35, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Anglo-Norman

What actually is Anglo-Norman other than a dialect of Old French? There must be something I'm missing, or it wouldn't have its own ISO code. Mglovesfun (talk) 14:00, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

assay

May I ask where did you find the nice archaic sense of assay - was it from an online source? I am looking for similar sources, because Webster 1913 online does not contain this sense. Also, do you object against changing the tag to archaic, since this sense is attestable in a quote from 1936? The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 10:58, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

• The OED has it (as sense 14), but I think it's definitely obsolete. Your 1936 quote seems better suited to the more general sense of ‘try, attempt’. Ƿidsiþ 12:14, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

  Ok then, if you think so, feel free to change it. The uſer hight Bogorm converſation 12:58, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Help:Writing definitions

You are one of our best writers of definitions. Could I convince you to take a look at Help:Writing definitions and improve, rewrite, or augment it. The target, I suppose, for that page is an unusually studious person somewhat new to Wiktionary or someone directed to the page by a comment by another user, such as a patroler.

We may also need or benefit from something more "technical", something like a dictionary style (not format) manual for definitions.

I am optimistic that such things are possible, having been reading Landau. DCDuring TALK * Holiday Greetings! 14:54, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

• Haha. Well, I have seen this page growing recently, and I agree with most of what it says – it's a really good start. From my point of view, the best way to write a definition is to start with several examples of the word being used and to try to explain them. That usually shows up most of the problems with what you think it means. Anyway, as for the rest, I will have a good look at it when I'm back home (I'm away right now). Ƿidsiþ 15:02, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Docga

Hello. I saw it first in Wikipedia under 'dog'. I was intrigued because I had never realised it before, but it made perfect sense to me. I then researched it in other places online. I agree there is no concrete consensus, so I have put the Etymology back to "Origin unknown" but I have left the rest as a "Perhaps from..." Leasnam 16:43, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

• OK. It would be could if we could link to a source though. Ƿidsiþ 02:05, 1 January 2010 (UTC)