Wiktionary:Etymology scriptorium/2023/June

кринджи
Absolutely no clue. R:grk-mar:RRS gives the form крингки, which suggests that this goes back to *κριγγι(ν), but there's no Greek cognate that I know of, and I can't find any plausible Urum or Russian/Ukrainian donor.

Pretty sure that the "earring" sense is primary, for what it's worth. Thadh (talk) 13:37, 1 June 2023 (UTC)
 * It would be pretty cringy to have penises hanging from your ears. —Mahāgaja · talk 19:50, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

It might be from the Goths, who dominated the area c. 300 AD. Specifically a Gothic equivalent of Old Norse kringla, "disc, circle, orb". And kringja "to encircle" comes even closer phonetically. (The Greeks were here long before the Goths) For the semantics, compare the sense development of Schmuck.24.108.18.81 23:38, 1 June 2023 (UTC)


 * There are no known borrowings from Gothic to Greek and most Mariupolian Greeks have migrated to Crimea after the (mainstream) Goths left the region - I don't think this theory is grounded. Thadh (talk) 17:49, 2 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Agree with Thadh. There also, but it's also probably not a relative word. By the way, the etymology of ain't so obvious neither (i reckon, you've meant this word). Tollef Salemann (talk) 18:09, 2 June 2023 (UTC)
 * The Greeks were established in Crimea since ~600 BC, and never left until they were deported to Mariupol in Soviet times. Greeks in pre-Roman Crimea. There is no reason why they should not have been in contact with the Goths. 24.108.18.81 20:58, 2 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Greeks settled and re-settled the region until the fall of the Byzantine Empire, and if you can find me any mention of Gothic borrowings into Greek I'll be happy to consider it. Thadh (talk) 22:35, 2 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Ulfilas was a mixed race Greek-Goth who translated the Bible into Gothic. His ancestors combined Greek and Gothic culture. Here is a perfect environment for Greeks to borrow Gothic words, and vice-versa. So kringla is not beyond the realm of possibility, and no-one has come up with a better explanation, 24.108.18.81 06:35, 3 June 2023 (UTC)
 * That's still the other direction - Greek to Gothic. Wakuran (talk) 07:15, 3 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Only a dozen words of Crimean Gothic are recorded. Demanding direct evidence of the above hypothesis when you fully know that there is none is in one word sadomasochist. Sadistic because you begin to enjoy it the more often you punish people for challenging your grounded theory. Masochistic because you like speculation against all better judgement. 141.20.6.65 16:12, 7 June 2023 (UTC)
 * .Goths and Gepids aren't always distinguished, historically. Köbler does have Gepidisch *krings ? "Ring, Platz; arena", not jewlery. Anyway, Greeks prefered to think λυγγούριον was dried lynx urine, so cut me a cheque if I don't count classicist opinion as the bench mark to meet. I do recognize that Scythian has very similar problems in Iranian, so no ard feelings. 141.20.6.65 16:36, 7 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Look for pre-slavic roots: krąg, krążek. Goes from something like z - rąg/róg (horn), which is straight: r - power use, ą - force use sound, z - cut off. So horns were cut off and named "cut off with force" Then changed to krąg (from zrąz or like) (because women did not have teeth (hunters-gatherers, they treated leather with their teeth whole life, could not say s/z/c/cz/etc) The artefact is "ż" (zh) in small form krążek. the "z/s" on the beginning is in "srogi", "srożyć" which means literally "full of horns set against you" So earrings were probably made by cuting horns of aurochs or mammoths in slices (krążki) BTW. PIE is a dead-end.

long firm
RFV of the etymology:


 * From and.

The etymology comes from, but it looks completely made up (maybe the book title is partly self-reference?).

To start with, I can find nothing in Bosworth-Toller for the alleged Old English etymon- exists, but it means things like "belonging to", "coming from", "dependent on", etc. Even if this sense existed, the likelihood of Old English being combined with modern Italian to form a slang term is pretty much nil, so it would have to have passed through Middle English to modern English- but we have nothing at long with such an etymology. On top of that, I'm not sure that the slang term predates, so the author's insistence that it has to be directly borrowed from seems unmerited.

The previous etymology wasn't that great- it looks like someone's guess in the 1800's that got passed along by everyone else- but at least it was hedged. Chuck Entz (talk) 17:18, 2 June 2023 (UTC)


 * A 籠 firm, a “cover company”? (Less a bamboo one as in bamboo wife.) Or a 龍 firm because it is predatory? The most sense we obtain if we see therein a 弄 ”trick” or “show” firm. Much more things that can be “long” there than in English, wherein a 1864 story thinks about “long purses” or them keeping distance from justice, or half the rogues in the kingdom belonging to it. Fay Freak (talk) 18:04, 2 June 2023 (UTC)


 * I'm not saying it's necessarily modern Italian; the author mentioned both Latin and Italian. When did firma develop the sense of "signature" in any Latinate variety? That will probably determine whether it is more accurate to call it Latin or Italian. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 18:17, 2 June 2023 (UTC)


 * By the way, more precisely the author said that gelang came from "Anglo-Saxon", which I normalized as "Old English" based on the fact that the former redirects to the latter on English Wikipedia (but I'm not an expert on the history of English). The Phantom Capitalists is another source which indicates: "Gelang was the old Saxon word for fraudulent, and this could be its source." It also mentions "the early usage of 'firm' as 'signature'", in a way that seems to suggest that firm is an obsolete English word; can we find any attestation of this definition? If we can, then we don't need to worry about Latin/Italian. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 18:25, 2 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Isn't this long the same as the use in long con? I always thought it was just a con that took longer than other types to mature. DCDuring (talk) 18:46, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

Tatar
Alexander Vovin says that Khitan has borrowed many words from Korean, so it seems reasonable that Tatar (once a near neighbour) might have done the same.So "Tatar" might have been borrowed from a root similar to Korean 타다 (tada), to ride. Please note that Ottoman Turkish means courier as well as Tatar. Vovin: Map: 24.108.18.81 18:03, 2 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Do you have any source that reliable derives Tatar from the same source as 타다 or is it just your own guess?
 * Also I'd not use the Ottoman Turkish's usage as courier for proof, it is likely a case of later semantic expension from nomadic tribe > nomad > horse rider etc., especially considering the sense "courier" isn't recorded in Old Turkic texts. Yorınçga573 (talk) 16:52, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Scriptorium is a place to try out our ideas for polite feedback. 24.108.18.81 15:50, 5 June 2023 (UTC)

ermines
Any clue as to the origin? It's difficult to search for because both online dictionaries and search engines treat it as a search for "ermine". The OED has (sparse) cites going back to the 1500s (but not earlier), and speculates it's from a plural herminès of herminet, supposedly a diminutive of hermine, but I can't find it (only herminette with a /t/)— perhaps one of our French editors can. (If anyone does find French heraldic sources, maybe you can also check how old ogoesse is; it looks like a corruption of English ogress which looks like a corruption of ogles "eyes") - -sche (discuss) 04:57, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * There's this, even though it only mentions the word in the definition. Chuck Entz (talk) 05:53, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * This seems to go back to a time when English people writing French would whimsically add or remove an s, thus we get Marseilles instead of Marseille. 24.108.18.81 15:18, 5 June 2023 (UTC)

Klingon (surname; Russian?)
When I looked through early 1900s US census records for a recent RFV, almost everyone I found with this surname was from Russia (or their parents were from Russia, or they got the surname by marriage to someone from Russia). Is it a transliteration or ellisization of a Russian surname? (A few other uses findable via Google Books don't have any immediately apparent connection to Russia.) - -sche (discuss) 07:43, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I started that RFV, and I was surprised to find out the surname was real. I agree it looks very un-Russian, but Russia was much larger then, having a direct border with Germany, so we may be getting a Russian transcription of a German or at least Germanic surname.  Russia's borders also extended further in other directions, so Germanic isnt the only possibility.  The ng cluster in particular is very unusual in Russian.  Though it's possible, as you said, that there is a real Russian name behind this that got mistranscribed into Roman letters, I think that's less likely given that there were seemingly several independent Klingon families who moved to the United States at different times.  Thanks, — Soap — 09:55, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I found the Celtic surname Clingan, although direct Celtic derivations into Russian might be few. Otherwise there's German Klinge (blade) and klingen (ring, sound) or Dutch klinken (clink, sound). Possibly an occupational surname for a bell-ringer or metal sharpener? Wakuran (talk) 10:46, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Russia still got around 60 languages with somewhat official status. So it may be any language what so ever. If it is Germanic, it may be a wrong spelled form of Клинген. If im not wrong, the same situation is by the surname Штейфон. Tollef Salemann (talk) 10:56, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * If this were a Russian surname, it would probably be a French name originally. The ending in -on is atypical for Russian surnames, and as Soap said, -ng- is also very rare. Thadh (talk) 10:52, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Unstressed o and a was pronounced identically, I recall... Could there have been some kind of orthographical mixup? Wakuran (talk) 11:01, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * There were Russia Germans with the surname . Search Клингенъ on Google Books. Vahag (talk) 11:39, 4 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Thanks, all. - -sche (discuss) 01:29, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

PIE *méh₂trih₂ks actually from *méh₂tēr,
※Sobreira ◣◥ 〒 @「parlez」 20:42, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * 1) LA  says it's from PIE  (empty) through  (notice long i). Also in "Related terms" we have.
 * 2) LA  says it's from PIE
 * Is it too adventurous that comes from  in zero degree (in whatever hellish declension it corresponds) + a suffix  (unknown to me; thus long i); and include it within "her" ?
 * Or a conflation/convergence/rebracketing/resegmentation/re(tro)analysis/surface analysis with/through LA (long i), itself from ?
 * The derivation seems oddly specific, and was apparenly added by a user blocked for long-term abuse. Without sources or explanations, I feel skeptical. Wakuran (talk) 23:01, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Yep. "Oddly specific" applies to a lot of their contributions. If there isn't enough evidence for a reconstruction, they just make something up. They're also known for adding translations to words such as television. I wrote an abuse filter specifically to keep them out of the Reconstruction namespace (and Japanese entries, but that's another story). Unfortunately, there's only so much one can do without shutting down anonymous editing from a significant part of France. Chuck Entz (talk) 00:43, 5 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Assuming this dates to PIE, and isn't just rebuilt with, it would be reconstructed simply as . The Latin -x is secondary, compare . --  02:57, 5 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I removed it ※Sobreira ◣◥ 〒 @「parlez」 07:51, 6 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I've rewritten it as an affixation within Latin. I don't see any particular reason to believe it even goes back to Proto-Italic, let alone PIE. —Mahāgaja · talk 08:14, 6 June 2023 (UTC)

みそじ
This word, historically also pronounced みそち and みそぢ, is spelled 三十 and 三十路, and lemmatised in both entries. The etymologies in these entries contradict each other:

三十: (referencing Kokugo Dai Jiten) Compound of, where the sense of  is used metaphorically as a unit of time, usually expressing a sense of , but also sometimes used to mean.

三十路: Compound of and suffix. The kanji is.

Which explanation of the origin of ち is correct? Also, should these entries be combined? Mcph2 (talk) 11:26, 5 June 2023 (UTC)


 * "Also, should these entries be combined?"
 * Yes. Our general current approach (albeit inconsistently implemented) is to create the main entries for native-Japonic terms under the kana spellings, and use  under the kanji spellings to point readers to the main entries.  Since both  and  are alternative spellings of the modern misoji and archaic misochi readings, we should ideally consolidate at the  and  kana spellings.
 * Re: contradiction:
 * I worked on the entry and dimly remember the research I did for that.  Long story short, the monolingual JA resources  I consulted all described the final -ji as a suffixing element, but none of them mentioned that  is used here as phonetic ateji.  This same  does also show up as a suffix itself, used metaphorically to indicate time, and I went with that when I last edited at.
 * Seeing what Bendono had entered when creating the entry clarifies things -- the JA references I consulted were misleading / incomplete in their entries.  The suffix  (alternative spellings) appears as -tsu as a generic counter (Old Japanese -tu), and this shifted to -chi (Old Japanese -ti) in certain cases that fossilized around number of years → age, such as in modern Japanese.
 * Semantically, I think Bendono's explanation is the better fit.
 * I don't have time today to rework these entries, but as and when I do have time, I'll give it a go if no one else has gotten aroudn to it. :)
 * ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │Tala við mig 22:40, 6 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks! I'll move them to the kana entries for the time being. Mcph2 (talk) 03:06, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Stockport
I noticed that contradictory etymologies appear for Stockport on Wikipedia. claims that the name means ‘market place at a hamlet’ or ‘castle in a wood’ but at it claims that the name comes from the De Stokeport family. We’re essentially claiming in our etymology that it means ‘market town by a house’, which is similar to the ‘market place at a hamlet’ version given at the Wikipedia Stockport article. Which of these etymologies is right? can ‘port’ ever mean ‘wood’? Is Stockport the only existing place name where ‘port’ isn’t used with its modern meaning of harbour but ‘market place’ or ‘market town’ instead? Surely the ‘de Stokeport’ family takes its name from a place called Stockport, simply due to the fact ‘de’ means ‘of’, and so they are probably named after the place rather than the other way around (unless there used to be a place with a similar name that no longer exists that they took their name from)?

I’ve also broached this issue at the relevant talk pages on Wikipedia. Overlordnat1 (talk) 11:34, 5 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I guess "de" could be an article, if the name's derived from Dutch or Low German. Wakuran (talk) 12:44, 5 June 2023 (UTC)
 * The name was attested in 1170. During that period, the elite spoke Norman Old French and the commoners spoke early Middle English. Dutch and Low German weren't in the picture at all. Chuck Entz (talk) 13:06, 5 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Stockport isn't unique for the meaning 'market place'. There's also Newport Pagnell in Buckinghamshire, and there's a Newport in Shropshire. RichardW57m (talk) 14:48, 5 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Good point. I suppose I should've thought of Newport Pagnell. It goes a long way towards confirming my suspicions that 'the market place/town by a house/hamlet' is the correct etymology. --Overlordnat1 (talk) 15:04, 5 June 2023 (UTC)

singulus in single
says that LA is a diminutive of PIE, but there it says it's created by addition of the particle , citing De Vaan.
 * Could be the first one correct? Two possibly correct hypothesis? ※Sobreira ◣◥ 〒 @「parlez」 09:32, 7 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Since the diminutive suffix is, it could be from *sm̥-ǵʰ-ulus (an anachronistic form, but you know what I mean). —Mahāgaja · talk 09:41, 7 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Whereas states that  is from  + distributive particle,  states that  is from .  --Lambiam 09:52, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

tlú
This word isn't in R:DIL, and R:ga:Corpas has only two hits earlier than the 1890s. So where did it come from? None of the languages Irish is in contact with--not even Scottish Gaelic or Manx--has anything remotely like it. —Mahāgaja · talk 21:22, 7 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Macbain's old dictionary speculates about it in the entry on clobha:
 * clobha, a pair of tongs; from Norse klofi, a fork (of a river), a forked mast, snuffers, klof, fork of the legs, "cloven, cleft". The Ir. clobh(a) in Con. and Fol., and the clomh of Lh., seems a Scottish importation, for Coneys says the vernacular is tlobh. In fact, the Ir. word is tlú, tlúgh: "lifter"; root tḷ- as in Lat. tollo?
 * This points to something more recent: published "Notes on the Irish terms tlú and tlú garmaint" in Ulster Folklife 32 (1986), pp. 33–6, if anyone can get their hands on it. Google Books' copy is only snippet view, though from what I can see he does discuss it in proximity to /kl-/ words like those Macbain mentions, e.g. p. 34: "...and tlú is recorded from Donegal. For Manx Wagner gives the form /klau/, which is the phonetic representation of clou, the form given by J.J. Kneen and A. Cregeen. For Scottish Gaelic, the general orthographic form is clobh(a), rendered in east..." I can't see enough to tell if he is saying those words are etymologically related, or just discussing all of them as semantically related.
 * This article on Norse loans in Irish does explicitly derive tlú from the /kl-/ forms (MIr. clobhadh), from Norse.
 * - -sche (discuss) 22:47, 7 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks! —Mahāgaja · talk 09:25, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Gdańsk
We have been discussing Gdańsk, and it is agreed that old theories involving Danes or Goths don't hold up.

The two main theories now involve Proto-Slavic *gъd- (“wet, damp”) or Proto-Baltic *gud- (forest), but there doesn't seem to be much evidence of either one.

Does anyone have more info about *gud- or *gъd-? 24.108.18.81 22:27, 11 June 2023 (UTC)


 * I am inclined to combine the two into single root meaning wetland forest, woodland, swamp, similar semantically to, which has this double meaning. Many place-names in NE Europe refer to moisture, swamps etc.
 * This still leaves the question of whether there is evidence for a root *gud-. 24.108.18.81 23:09, 11 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Just so it's out there, I've added a sourced etymology showing how it's disputed and what most etymologists agree with. Vininn126 (talk) 07:31, 12 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Does it help at all that the spelling Gyddannyzc is recorded in a late 10th-century document? And that there might be something even older. — Soap — 15:09, 15 June 2023 (UTC)
 * That is mentioned in the source I added. Vininn126 (talk) 15:10, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

sepurture
Any idea what the etymology is? Though more recent uses and mentions treat it like an adjective, it looks like a noun in -ure and the earliest uses are of "in sepurture" as if indeed it started as a noun. (Compare the use of overture in heraldry for the posture also, and perhaps better, termed overt.) Is it from a variation on separature (separation) of the wings? One book says "the wings point[ing] different ways" is a defining implication of sepurture. (It's equated with wings expenced, which seems to be related to expanse, expanded.) - -sche (discuss) 01:48, 12 June 2023 (UTC)
 * This is just a qualified guess, but some kind of blend of se- (apart) and apertura (opening)? Wakuran (talk) 11:09, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

Tokophrya
The protist Tokophrya is the type genus of the family Tokophryidae : phrya comes from the Greek οφρύς / ophrýs, "eyebrow", but what does the prefix ''toko- mean? ''. Can you help me please? Thanks Gerardgiraud (talk) 18:41, 12 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Well, means "birth" or "offspring." Not sure if that helps. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 18:51, 12 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks, that helps me a lot. Gerardgiraud (talk) 15:59, 13 June 2023 (UTC)
 * That seems semantically odd, though. It's worth noting that it's probably just tok-, not toko-. And that the family contains two other genera  with names ending in -(o)phryidae, which seem to have somewhat more sensible Greek meanings (possibly helmet and hair) for something related to eyebrows.  On the other hand, I cant find any words with tok- that arent derivatives of the word for birth, even searching on Perseus. Admittedly some of them have wide semantic ranges, like poultry farming and financial interest, but it really seems like it's all coming from the single root meaning birth.   — Soap — 14:48, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

I would like to revisit a long discussion about the PIE word for "in" I had with @Sokkjo/Victar in which neither of us budged and which has sat unresolved, held at User_talk:Caoimhin_ceallach and Requests_for_moves,_mergers_and_splits. I've let it be for a while in the hope that someone would drop by but no one has. I'd appreciate if someone here is willing to give their two cents.

A few questions:

—Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 01:21, 13 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I found no formal policy on syllable structure in PIE, in particular not in WT:AINE. Is there an informal one?
 * What is your view on empty onsets in PIE, ie words reconstructed without a default leading laryngeal?
 * Should *h₁én be moved?
 * If not, should the alternative reconstruction *én at least be given?
 * Is LIPP as bad as Sokkjo/Victar thinks it is?


 * My two cents: (1) While roots and content words were never vowel-initial in PIE, prepositions, particles and the like might have been, so *én isn't impossible. (2) It's probably safer to keep the page at Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₁én, but I support the hard redirect from Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/én. (3) I haven't seen LIPP myself, but (whose opinion I respect) seems to think it's pretty good. —Mahāgaja · talk 06:44, 13 June 2023 (UTC)

pronunciation of تعداد #Persian
Hi, I have doubts about the current pronunciation given, which suggests Classical Persian as /tiʔdɑːd/. But maybe it should be /taʔdɑːd/.

Hayyim says: تعداد (ta'dad). Steingass says: تعداد taʻdād. Platts (Urdu dictionary) gives: "A تعداد taʻdād, vulg. těʻdād"

Arabic is given as ta'dad by Alsharekh

Hindi borrowing is तादाद (tādād). Tajik spelling is теъдод, but таъдод is a variant.

So has pronunciation shifted from /a/ to /e/ (because of the ع maybe) and not from /i/ to /e/? Exarchus (talk) 18:20, 14 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Yes, it is originally /a/ at least in Arabic, not because of the ع; verbal noun is taKLīM but with geminate verbs taKLāL occurs:, . It may have been raised in Persian very recently, like the name of Iran’s capital , the pronunciation of which natives are unsure about. Fay Freak (talk) 20:51, 14 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Ok, thanks. Exarchus (talk) 21:19, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

clacker
Clacker, with the meaning of a testicle, surely belongs under etymology 1 as it either refers to someone’s balls (testicles) clacking together or comes directly from clackers or clacker balls referring to the toy consisting of metal balls that clack together.

According to Eric Partridge, the Aussie term clacker (arse) came from the fact that when some people fart it can sound a bit like someone twirling a clacker (a mechanical device which makes a clacking sound) around. He rejects the possibility that the word derives from cloaca. I can also find some evidence that clack is occasionally used as a slang term for fart in its own right, so perhaps that’s the true etymology? Overlordnat1 (talk) 11:55, 15 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Well, we have nads as another example of a word for testicles deriving from scientific vocabulary, so i wouldnt rule out the cloaca theory for at least the anus sense. Cloaca > testicle requires an additional semantic shift on top of the shortening of the word, and quite a strange one.  I find the sound symbolism idea strange too, but I guess there's got to be some sort of explanation. — Soap — 16:05, 15 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Actually, given that the cloaca is the all-purpose "that's where it happens" of private parts, i could even see cloaca being the source of a word for testicle. I still think it's unlikely though, as, because it has two meanings, it would most likely need to be borrowed from student slang twice independently, once for anus and once for testicle. — Soap — 16:11, 15 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Medicine students? FYI, one ball hangs slightly lower to evade clacking. is something else about a lodged renal vein but one symptom is pain in the left hand side testicle. Their lead is "nut (the reinal vein)" . That must be mistaken because one infamous limerick ("I once took a shit in this stall") refers to the left ball specifically, indicating that the left hanging lower is common knowledge I am not a doctor and cannot confirm that. Actually I thought your opening line is blunt and offensive. But I can remember it has been told in school way back when and they refered to nutcracking specifically. 2A00:20:6082:200:9B2C:EECF:48C9:5401 10:52, 16 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Amusing and informative as your post is, you seem to be making a case for testicles to be referred to as 'crackers' rather than 'clackers'. In the event that ones gonads aren't of equal weight, whichever one is larger will be heavier and hang lower but not necessarily the left one. It does seem strange that a rather medical term like 'cloaca' would be used as slang and then shortened but I suppose it's just feasible that it was used by Aussie chicken sexers rather than doctors or professors of medicine. The fact that 'clacker' seemingly isn't used as a word for testicle in Australia but it is used that way by some people in the UK and the US, as well as the fact of the semantic shift, leads me to doubt the cloaca➡clacker➡arse➡bollock hypothesis though. --Overlordnat1 (talk) 11:35, 16 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Along with Partridge, the idea that clacker = anus refers to "a mechanical device which makes a clacking sound", i.e. when farting, is favoured by The Australian National Dict (Moore 2016), The New Partridge (Dalzell & Victor 2006), which states "Not a perversion of 'cloaca'", and The Macquarie Slang Dict (Lambert 2004), which says "The idea that it is an alteration of 'cloaca' is ludicrous". I suggest we meld the etymologies into one, citing these sources. Meanwhile, the notion that 'cloaca' has anything to do with testicles shows a misunderstanding of avian anatomy, the testes being very far from the cloaca in birds. "Two things that clack together" as a referent to testicles is supported by the analogous slang terms bangers and knackers.-Sonofcawdrey (talk) 08:31, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

haiya
Obviously, this word was popularized by Uncle Roger, but was it in Jackie Chan Adventures? I think that it was aiya instead of haiya according to Google search. Mahogany115 (talk) 15:56, 16 June 2023 (UTC)

-ize and -idus
I see a similarity between, and ,.
 * Similative verb < adjective + verb suffix. is the similative adjective suffix that the others derive from.
 * Then these following surface analyses would become possible:
 * Then these following surface analyses would become possible:
 * Then these following surface analyses would become possible:
 * Then these following surface analyses would become possible:
 * Then these following surface analyses would become possible:

Does this etymology work? Daniel.z.tg (talk) 00:49, 17 June 2023 (UTC)
 * It's a bit more complicated than that. See Rau (2010) “The Derivational History of the Greek Stems in -άδ-” for an explanation. -- 06:02, 19 June 2023 (UTC)

Mongol
etymonline says Mongol comes from a word mong meaning brave. I cannot find such a word in Turkic or Mongolic, but Chinese 猛 (/mˠæŋX/ or měng) has exactly this meaning. All wiktionary etymologies only refer to the ethnic significance, not the basic meaning. How does a Chinese loan-word sound as a suggestion? 24.108.18.81 05:24, 19 June 2023 (UTC)

Yiddish suffixes
I've been trying to trace the etymology of two suffixes in Yiddish: ־עכץ and ־וואַרג. I've not been able to find any German or even Germanic cognates. Any clues? Not very versed in Hebrew, suffixes or otherwise, so if those two suffixes are of Hebrew origin then some help would be appreciated. Insaneguy1083 (talk) 10:05, 19 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Slavic is as likely a source of suffixes as Hebrew, but I can't think of any Slavic cognates either. —Mahāgaja · talk 10:11, 19 June 2023 (UTC)


 * I stumbled across Irish -acht, but it feels highly unlikely to be anything more than a coincidence... Wakuran (talk) 14:03, 19 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Update: Beider, Origins of Yiddish Dialects, ISBN 9780198739319 p.137 says that ־וואַרג is cognate to German Werk, and that the E => A shift is akin to that of Herbst ~ האַרבסט. Insaneguy1083 (talk) 10:07, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

Dravidian paṭak- and Malayo-Polynesian paʀaqu
Is there any relation between Dravidian paṭak- and Malayo-Polynesian paʀaqu? according to DEDR there are only 5 languages having the word and they are the main 4 costal ones + Tulu with no interior languages having them so I dont think it is a native word. There is a related word in Sanskrit beḍā~veḍā with descendents like Sindhi's b̤eṛī. This map says there are cognates even in Somalia? AleksiB 1945 (talk) 21:06, 19 June 2023 (UTC)
 * This is discussed in notes at Blust's Austronesian Comparative Dictionary entries for *paraqu and *padaw. The name for a type of ocean-going vessel seems like a good candidate for a Wanderwort (perhaps originally neither Dravidian nor Austronesian), but the geographical spread implies something relatively early. This is way over my head, so I can only guess. Perhaps knows more. Chuck Entz (talk) 21:51, 19 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I should also mention that the letters used by Blust are sometimes different from their IPA values (I believe "q" is a glottal stop), but I'm not sure where it's explained on the site. Chuck Entz (talk) 22:03, 19 June 2023 (UTC)
 * By the way: the shaded areas on that map show the distribution of two types of outrigger canoes that probably originated in the Malay Archipelago (used as an indicator of ancient contact with people from that region), not the distribution of cognates. The fact that Madagascar is in a shaded area is no surprise, since the languages spoken there fit in nicely with those found in a specific area of Borneo. There's no reason to doubt that there was ancient contact between Malayo-Polynesian and Dravidian speakers all along the coast of India, since the best way to go back and forth between the Malay Archipelago and Africa involved using the seasonal alternation in wind direction linked to the monsoons to follow the coasts around the Indian Ocean.
 * , As the word has many cognates in Austronesian, only occurs in a few costal Dravidian languages (>IA or directly) and doesnt occur in Austroasiatic why isnt it taken as an Austronesian loan? It isnt that widespread to be a wanderwort AleksiB 1945 (talk) 12:02, 22 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Agreed, the Austronesian peoples are credited as being the first ones to make long-distance deep-sea voyages. 24.108.18.81 02:45, 25 June 2023 (UTC)
 * The boat in question is a river fare. 2A00:20:604A:41F3:65DF:5ED0:D1EB:A51F 10:26, 26 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Late reply to 's ping: I agree that the two "reconstructions" by Blust suggest that we're actually dealing with a wanderwort here. The maritime technology associated with this wanderwort is more advanced than what we would usually attribute to the early Austronesian expansion. There are hypotheses that claim Austronesian voyages out of the archipeliago to the west that supposedly predate the cultural expansion of Hinduism/Buddhism and Indian hegemony of early SE Asian polities, but these hypotheses are speculative and not supported by linguistic evidence. Loans like >  indicate that for larger vessels, the technological spread went from South Asia to SE Asia.
 * For the record, Proto-Austronesian (and Proto-Malayo-Polynesian) *q can be indeed reconstructed as post-velar stop, but the *q in Blust's *paraqu is only based on Javanese/Malay perahu (*q > h is regular). I suspect that this instance of h does not go back to Proto-Malayo-Polynesian *q. Austronesier (talk) 11:34, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

aleshores#Catalan
RFV of the etymology "from ". It sure looks a whole lot like it's from the plural, and our first gloss even includes "in those times" as a meaning. While we're at it, what about the -s in and ? Are those from the plural too? —Mahāgaja · talk 09:18, 21 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I updated the French and . The earliest form  lacked final -s, and CNRTL states that the -s was added as an adverbial marker. Leasnam (talk) 21:58, 6 July 2023 (UTC)

Trimyema
Trimyema is the type genus of the Trimyemidae family. The prefix tri is understandable but I don't know what myema means. Is it "mystery" and, if so, why "3 mysteries"? mystery! Do you have an idea ? Thanks. Gerardgiraud (talk) 09:01, 22 June 2023 (UTC)


 * You mean "three initiations into the mysteries/three initiations/three instructions" on the basis of ? Seems unlikely, but you never know. How about three muscles, mussels or mice? Or three things shaped like the letter M? There don't seem to be any Ancient Greek words that end in, at least none in R:LSJ that I can find. —Mahāgaja · talk 09:55, 22 June 2023 (UTC)
 * On Google I found the following passage: "So far, only one of the symbionts has been given a binomial name. The others are still referred to by Greek letters, as was formerly customary for cytoplasmic elements…" from this paper (though the passage doesn't appear on that page), so is it possible that the name Trimyema really literally just means "3 M"? —Mahāgaja · talk 10:04, 22 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Clearly, they changed the name due to trademark concerns. 😄
 * ...actually, the more I think about this, the less of a joke it becomes in my mind -- I could really see a company's legal team being that persnickety about things. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │Tala við mig 16:08, 22 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Examining the various drawings that I have compiled to illustrate the Trimyemidae page, I notice like 3 cilia ribbons arranged in 3 spirals (drawings 1, 3, 5, 7, 8, E, i). Do you see the same as me? And, it doesn't seem like a coincidence, Kudo's description says "somatic cilia are in 3-4 spiral rows". Can these 3 ribbons be linked to the genus name Trimyema? Gerardgiraud (talk) 17:49, 22 June 2023 (UTC)

Meaning of Atchafalaya
The etymology of Atchafalaya is missing from the Wiktionary entry so named. The Wikipedia article contains a credible etymology. May I suggest deriving an etymology from the source cited in the Wikipedia article titled “Atchafalaya River”? The source listed in the latter article is cited thusly. 34.99.124.64 13:20, 22 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I think so, moreover another site here gives the same meaning "long river" (from the Choctaw language). Gerardgiraud (talk) 18:14, 22 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I've added it. I was able to confirm here that is an older term for 'river' and here and here that  (which we already have an entry for) means 'long'. —Mahāgaja · talk 19:44, 22 June 2023 (UTC)
 * @Mahāgaja, I'm not familiar with that notation -- the website indicates hʋcha with an initial vowel of, while your spelling hvcha above seems to use consonant instead.  Which is correct?  ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │Tala við mig 01:38, 23 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I was just discussing this issue with Kwamikagami at Grease pit/2023/May. Apparently $⟨ʋ⟩$ is standard but $⟨v⟩$ is widely used as well. Among our currently existing Choctaw lemmas, $⟨v⟩$ seems to be more common, which is why I used it at Atchafalaya, but both occur, and if you or anyone else wants to change it to ʋ that's fine. Maybe someone should go through all our Choctaw entries and move the ones with $⟨v⟩$ to $⟨ʋ⟩$, and add (hard or soft) redirects from $⟨v⟩$, but that someone isn't going to be me. —Mahāgaja · talk 06:43, 23 June 2023 (UTC)
 * The Choctaw constitution uses $⟨ʋ⟩$ (more or less -- there's a serif on the right end of the stroke that makes that side look a bit like $⟨ʊ⟩$). I suspect $⟨v⟩$ is a substitute of convenience. kwami (talk) 06:55, 23 June 2023 (UTC)

Greek Sauros/saura
Since Greek usually does not preserve initial /s/ from PIE, I don't think σαυρος is a native Greek word. I feel like it could be a loan from an Indo-European language, since the form matches ser- in Latin serpens, Sanskrit सर्प सरट( which I also want to find etymology for, only attested in Hindi भीमसरट . I think there is an IE root *-ser or a similar form, and is related to the root of reptile and herpeton.

A similar thing probably occured with σοφός and Latin sapio.
 * The entry is at ἑρπετόν. Wakuran (talk) 11:28, 24 June 2023 (UTC)


 * The more you pile on top of the comparison it does not make it any easier. See for example the minor study by Vaclav Blazek (2021) about Greek σαύρα f. & σαῦρος m. “Lizard” arguing a Semitic origin in the respectable and often speculative Journal of Indo European Studies, where he does not arrive at a definite conclusion.


 * This is not make-a-wish. I want for example México and America to be related but there is no source for such a claim that I'm aware of. These entries are no basis for a trivial comparison, they rather speak against it ex silencio. It takes one second to the idea, it's hardly worth mention, except when the thought grows more involved, it can come dangerously close to conspiracy, eg. how would Greek borrow from Sanskrit? No way. I also want American raccoon and to be related because of the consonant structure so the tentative etymon of moon-valley in Mexican Nahuatl would really be the forbidden district of the last dinosaurs, because I read too many Mickey Mouse comics at a young and impressionable age. Eventually,  can be taken to suggest that your suspicion does not hold up to my sus pensieve feory; unless it was borrowed multiple times. 2A00:20:6049:A40:1F2D:1C09:4337:EE02 07:24, 24 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Never have I said it was definite, nor was it a borrowing from Sanskrit( that was given as another example), nor did I say I "want" them to be related. I just offered a possible, and very vague explanation to how this word COULD have originated.
 * Using sophos and sapiens was not related to the semantics, but rather an example of a similar form that COULD have been borrowed, and if so, likely from another EUROPEAN IE language. Stegotyranno (talk) 14:25, 24 June 2023 (UTC)
 * It seems like no Greek entry is complete without the sentence "Beekes argues for a pre-Greek origin" somewhere in the etymology.  He may be right about this one, though only because I don't see any obvious IE cognates .... Greek does have initial s- as a reflex of some clusters, I think, but that means that the PIE word would need to have had two consonants at the beginning, and we'd expect to see cognates in other branches that point to that.  I don't think the serpens etymology really works either,  unless we  know that the PIE root we list, serp-, actually comes from ser- plus a suffix (and even then the vowel would be unexplained). — Soap — 08:10, 24 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Indeed, the usual PIE sources for Greek initial σ are *ky-, *tw- and *ty-, so that's where to go when looking for cognates of, , and . And yeah, Beekes saying "pre-Greek origin" is like a doctor saying idiopathic: it's just a smart-sounding way of saying "I don't know". —Mahāgaja · talk 08:23, 24 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Beekes probably knows more about Proto-Greek than most etymologists, so if he cannot reconstruct a plausible Proto-Greek candidate ancestor, it is actually (IMO) more than likely that the term had a substrate origin, which is a stronger statement than “I don’t know”. In this case Beekes gives, next to the argument that no such term is found in Furnée’s work on Proto-Greek, the specific argument that there were no lizards in the PIE world, so that it must be of local origin. --Lambiam 11:43, 26 June 2023 (UTC)
 * There are snakes in the PIE world, which are by evolution lizards and share mamy features, including their range, with them. The steppes of the PIE people(s) is populated today by plenty of reptiles, albeit not very noticeable ones. Even if there is no reptiles, many of the roots that led to moderm words for reptiles come from roots related to sliding, slithering, crawling, etc. Stegotyranno (talk) 15:39, 26 June 2023 (UTC)
 * By the way, I am not denying the possibility of Pre-Greek, Non-IE origin Stegotyranno (talk) 15:40, 26 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Lizard range.png
 * There certainly were lizards in the PIE world, regardless of which of the main hypotheses of the Indo-European urheimat you adhere to. And even if there hadn't been, that isn't an argument against a language having an inherited word for lizard, since words can change their referent over time. Both the American English word and the Australian English word  are inherited from Early Modern English, even though the 16th-century English-speaking world knew neither Turdus migratorius nor Gymnorhina tibicen. (Like Stegortyranno, I'm not arguing that  is inherited, only that "the specific argument that there were no lizards in the PIE world, so that it must be of local origin" is invalid in both its premise and its conclusion.) —Mahāgaja · talk 18:44, 26 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Blažek points out that the personal names of exist in Linear B, precluding IE derivation, and suggests to connect it with Akkadian— traces back to Old Akkadian glosses, apparently, and he reconstructs a hypothetical undiminutized early Akkadian , similar to , . A relation to Linear A su-re and symbol #11 on the Phaistos diskos is suggested, entirely uncertain. 84.185.117.11 15:59, 4 July 2023 (UTC)

Etymology of 'protelean'.
It is a word applied to certain parasites. 106.200.13.251 03:57, 25 June 2023 (UTC)


 * A theory. (or ) means “having reached its final form”. So perhaps pro-telean parasites are life forms that are parasitic before having reached their final form – i.e., in their larval stage.  --Lambiam 11:24, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Magius
Probabilmente il nome della gens il cui nome era Magius, è di origine sabina, come tutti i nomi terminanti in -ius, e derivava dai sacerdoti di Mercurio dediti all'interpretazione delle interiora degli animali, attività molto importante presso i Romani. 2.34.86.56 07:50, 28 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Tutti i nomi? Pènso che Ignatius venisse dalla gens Etruschi. 2A00:20:600E:2866:20B6:14AC:3B8A:5CDB 10:39, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

פֿאַראַן
I've been drawing blanks on a Germanic etymology for this. I'm not sure how plausible פֿאַר + אַן is. Definitely not Hebrew, and probably not Slavic. What kind of compound word are we looking at here, if even that? Insaneguy1083 (talk) 02:33, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
 * : Probably equivalent to . Chuck Entz (talk) 03:10, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
 * @Chuck Entz: The Yiddish word doesn't really have the sense of "before" or "forwards" though? Insaneguy1083 (talk) 03:30, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Not directly, but it's easy to imagine a semantic development "be put forwards" > "exist"; compare . How is used syntactically? Can you add an example sentence or quote from a Yiddish text? —Mahāgaja · talk 05:59, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I found this from https://www.vgregion.se/yi/:
 * עס זאָל זײַן פֿאַראַן מוזיק, טעאַטער, טאַנץ, פֿילם, קונסט, היסטאָריע און אַנדערע מינים קולטור אומאָפּהענגיק פֿון װוּ דו װױנסט.
 * Which Google Translate puts to be "There should be music, theater, dance, film, art, history and other kinds of culture regardless of where you live". It looks to me like "זאָל זײַן פֿאַראַן" would correspond to English "should be" or "should exist". Another sentence:
 * דאָ איז פֿאַראַן װײַטער אינפֿאָרמאַציע װעגן די שטיצן מע קען קריגן כּדי צו גרינדן און אָנפֿירן אַ פֿירמע
 * Or "Here is more information about the support you can get to establish and run a company" in English. "דאָ איז פֿאַראַן" would seem to be the equivalent to "here is more" or maybe "here exists more".
 * So maybe it's some sort of semantic development like "here lies before you" > "here exists"? Insaneguy1083 (talk) 07:05, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
 * That seems very likely. Another parallel is, from . —Mahāgaja · talk 08:59, 29 June 2023 (UTC)

Etymology of 'मज़ाक़' (mazaaq)
It means "joke" in Hindi. It's an Arabic borrowing, however the original meaning is something along the lines of "taste" or "palate". I was wondering whether the meaning of this word could have been influenced by the etymologically unrelated 'मज़ा' (mazaa) meaning "fun", borrowed from Persian. Thanks. Themisto99 (talk) 08:25, 29 June 2023 (UTC)


 * The same sense development is seen in → . Vahag (talk) 09:13, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I think the sense development is something like "palate" → "taste, nice perception" → "wit, humour, pleasantry". Compare the senses of Persian maẕāq. Vahag (talk) 09:20, 29 June 2023 (UTC)

त्योर etymology
तिरः from https://www.sanskrit-lexicon.uni-koeln.de/scans/csl-apidev/servepdf.php?dict=MW&page=447 seems probable भारत्पराक्रमि (talk) 11:38, 29 June 2023 (UTC)

Origin of word, 'teensy'
i would like to offer up another possibility than the one i found here. i'm an American who immigrated to the NL over 20 years ago. the word here for 'toe' is teen(pr tain). the word for a small toe(such as a baby's) would be teentje(TAIN tshuh). anyone else see a similarity to this word and the word, teensy? as many of you know, the Dutch were one of the original settlers in America. i'm not saying that this was DEFinitely the origin of the word, but... 2A02:A46C:27B7:1:6DC9:5EA7:5B59:30AF 13:33, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
 * That's interesting, but as far as possible we require information such as etymologies to be referenced to some reliable source. At the moment, both Merriam-Webster Online and the Oxford English Dictionary say that the word is a variant of teeny. — Sgconlaw (talk) 14:20, 29 June 2023 (UTC)
 * There seems to be variants of this word that share little in common except the high front vowels /i/ and /ɪ/. For example I found a nursery rhyme called Ipsey-Wipsey Spider, a rare spelling of ipsy-wipsy, itself a rare variant of itsy-bitsy.  But we also have the same nursery rhyme showing up with titles like Incy-Wincy, Eensy-Weensy, and yes, Teensy-Weensy as well.  Why the /s/? We seem to like adding a spurious /s/ to baby-talk words (oftne but not always a double plural -sies). Just a wild guess on my part, but maybe teensy is a blend of teeny (if we assume that it's a variant of tiny) and itsy, which comes from little with the aforementioned -s- to make it sound even more childish. — Soap — 15:53, 30 June 2023 (UTC)

Kaohsiung & Google n-grams
(1) Is my initial conclusion that 'Kaohsiung' originates (in English) around 1945 actually correct? (This is based on the actual cites I found plus then-current ROC policies as I understand them.) (2) If not, can you find 'Kaohsiung' from before 1945 in a specific cite? (3) Is there anything I can do to tell Google about their wrong dates on books in Google Books? I do this all the time with Internet Archive. (4) If you couldn't find anything from before 1945, is there some kind of disclaimer that needs to go with Google n-grams when used on Wiktionary (as I use it in the 'Further reading' section, or perhaps as a 'Reference')? I think a reasonable person might "believe" the Google n-grams and therefore think that there's pre-1945 existence for the English-language term 'Kaohsiung'. Kaohsiung, 1900-1945 Thanks, please ping me if you have a comment on any of this. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 14:16, 30 June 2023 (UTC)
 * (3) - No, probably not, I've raised issues with books in the past when it was still possible to reach people at Google and was fobbed off, now it's pretty much impossible to get through to anyone there in first place. —Al-Muqanna المقنع (talk) 00:38, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

אָן אײַנזעעריש
This is found as one of the derived terms for אָן, but I can't find any solid proof for the existence of a certain "אײַנזעעריש". Certainly that double E looks highly unusual. I suspect this might have something to do with German Einsicht and einsehen, but Google Translate returns the phrase as "without insight". And beyond some dictionaries and online flashcards, I cannot find any actual Yiddish source using this term to mean "inconsiderate". The Swedish Wiktionary entry for אָן parrots the exact same thing, so for now I'm calling it bunkum.

OTOH, "אומבאטראכט" is given by Google Translate to mean inconsiderate (as in, literally אומ־ + באטראכט, but considering betrachten just means "to consider" in the literal sense, I'd say Google Translate was just doing some calqueing there. What are some known and actually used Yiddish terms that mean "considerate" or "inconsiderate"? Insaneguy1083 (talk) 17:46, 30 June 2023 (UTC)


 * As to the "double E", see also, which is attested. (In I think these belong to different syllables,so perhaps  is perceived as four-syllabic.)
 * Not uses but mentions: the term is found in the English-Yiddish part of Weinreich’s Modern English-Yiddish, Yiddish-English dictionary as a translation of “unreasonable”, while just is given as a translation for both “indulgence” and “understanding”. In the Yiddish-English part,  is glossed as “consideration, indulgence”.  --Lambiam 08:32, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
 * @Lambiam:, the root of , appears to be derived from 🇨🇬, so we could picture as something more like "geschehenisch", hence the double E.  is cognate to 🇨🇬. We might be able to picture  as something like "ohn einseherisch", but again, I've not seen any source that actually uses the term. It's found in the Verterbukh like you mentioned, but nowhere else that I can find. Insaneguy1083 (talk) 10:26, 13 July 2023 (UTC)