Wiktionary:Requests for verification

Wiktionary > Requests > Requests for verification

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{{attention}} • {{rfap}} • {{rfdate}} • {{rfquote}} • {{rfdef}} • {{rfeq}} • {{rfe}} • {{rfex}} • {{rfi}} • {{rfp}}

All Wiktionary: namespace discussions 1 2 3 4 5 - All discussion pages 1 2 3 4 5

Scope of this request page:

• In-scope: terms to be attested by providing quotations of their use
• Out-of-scope: terms suspected to be multi-word sums of their parts such as “green leaf”

Templates:

• {{rfv}}
• {{rfv-sense}}
• {{archive-top|rfv}} + {{archive-bottom}}

Shortcut:

• WT:RFV

See also:

• Criteria for inclusion
• Format for citations
• Standard entry layout
• A list of searchable external archives, useful for finding durably-archived media to quote.

Overview: This page is for disputing the existence of terms or senses. It is for requests for attestation of a term or a sense, leading to deletion of the term or a sense unless an editor proves that the disputed term or sense meets the attestation criterion as specified in Criteria for inclusion, usually by providing citations from three durably archived sources. Requests for deletion based on the claim that the term or sense is nonidiomatic or “sum of parts” should be posted to Wiktionary:Requests for deletion. Requests to confirm that a certain etymology is correct should go in the Etymology scriptorium, and requests to confirm pronunciation is correct should go in the Tea Room.

Adding a request: To add a request for verification (attestation), add the template {{rfv}} or {{rfv-sense}} to the questioned entry, and then add a new section to the appropriate subpage. Those who would seek attestation after the term or sense is nominated will appreciate your doing at least a cursory check for such attestation before nominating it: Google Books is a good place to check, others are listed here (WT:SEA).

Answering a request by providing an attestation: To attest a disputed term, i.e. prove that the term is actually used and satisfies the requirement of attestation as specified in inclusion criteria, do one of the following:

• Assert that the term is in clearly widespread use. (If this assertion is not obviously correct, or is challenged by multiple editors, it will likely be ignored, necessitating the following step.)
• Cite, on the article page, usage of the word in permanently recorded media, conveying meaning, in at least three independent instances spanning at least a year. (Many languages are subject to other requirements; see WT:CFI.)

In any case, advise on this page that you have placed the citations on the entry page.

Closing a request: After a discussion has sat for more than a month without being “cited”, or after a discussion has been “cited” for more than a week without challenge, the discussion may be closed. Closing a discussion normally consists of the following actions:

• Deleting or removing the entry or sense (if it failed), or de-tagging it (if it passed). In either case, the edit summary or deletion summary should indicate what is happening.
• Adding a comment to the discussion here with either RFV-failed or RFV-passed (emboldened), indicating what action was taken. This makes automatic archiving possible. Some editors strike out the discussion header at this time.
  In some cases, the disposition is more complicated than simply “RFV-failed” or “RFV-passed”; for example, two senses may have been nominated, of which only one was cited (in which case indicate which one passed and which one failed), or the sense initially RFVed may have been replaced with something else (some editors use RFV-resolved for such situations).

Archiving a request: At least a week after a request has been closed, if no one has objected to its disposition, the request should be archived to the entry's talk page. This is usually done using the aWa gadget, which can be enabled at WT:PREFS.

You can subscribe to a web feed of this page in either RSS or Atom format.

Oldest tagged RFVs

• No pages meet these criteria.

March 2013

hm5

How in all worlds can this be a valid pinyin syllable? -- Liliana • 17:04, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

In pinyin transliteration, characters are written with a tone number, such as ma3 or li4 (this is to enable the indication of tone where a diacritic can't be used). "Toneless" characters are sometimes written with a "0" or a "5", to indicate that there is no missing tone number, but in fact an intentional lack of tone. An example would be ma5. Since hm is a valid pinyin syllable, and since it typically has no tone, it is properly transcribed in pinyin as hm0 or hm5. bd2412 T 04:14, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

Is it? Since when can pinyin syllables have no vowel at all, in any form? -- Liliana • 07:57, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

If English syllables can, why not Mandarin pinyin ones? —Angr 08:48, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

Exactly. hm5 is one of several possible transliterations of the Chinese way of saying hmm (I suppose a Chinese speaker might ask how in all worlds "hmm" could be a valid English syllable). bd2412 T 12:09, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

Correct, no vowel. From ABC dictionary: "Template:Hani - hm intj. (of reproach/dissatisfaction) humph", also transliterated as hèn (hen4), hēn (hen1), hm (hm5), xīn (xin1). hm and hm5] are variant pinyin forms, the former is toned (neutral tone, so no tone mark), the latter is numberer pinyin. One syllable numbered pinyin is allowed here. Another example of a pinyin syllable without a vowel is character "Template:Hani" - ń (n2), ň (n3), ǹ (n4), ńg (ng2), ňg (ng3), ǹg (ng4) or ēn (en1) (a non-verbal exclamation); ńg intj. What?; Huh?; ňg intj. How come?; Why?; ǹg intj. O.K.; Agreed! --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 12:43, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

I asked a few native speakers who regularly use pīnyīn what they thought. None of them had ever seen any of these vowel-less transcriptions and a few said that they must be mistakes. One who is also fluent in Cantonese said that they would be fine there, but unacceptable in standard Mandarin texts. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 16:03, 16 March 2013 (UTC)

The pinyin is from the respectable ABC dictionary (I couldn't find an online version). Ask your friends to check Wenlin (a must have tool for Chinese learners). You won't find pinyin without vowels in the tables for standard Hanyu Pinyin, and some dictionaries replace with syllables from those tables but it's not what is actually pronounced, so other dictionaries attempt to record the sounds more accurately. Characters like "Template:Hani" or "Template:Hani" are used when what is said is non-verbal, some mumbling like "hmm", "huh?", e-er. The actual tone and pronunciation differs depending on the speaker and the mood. The characters are seldom used in standard Mandarin texts, I agree, you'll notice if you watch Chinese movies/drama with subtitles. Interjections are often omitted or replaced with more formal words. E.g. if a person says "OK" (common in colloquial Chinese), the subtitles will say "Template:Hani" but "Template:Hani" or "Template:Hani" are used when it's important to convey exactly what a person says. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 22:10, 18 March 2013 (UTC)

I note that, although this entry is said to be a romanisation of 噷, zh:噷 includes several possible romanizations, but not this one. - -sche (discuss) 00:09, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

Most likely their source for pinyin is different. Usually hanzi entries are imported from somewhere. I quoted exactly the entries from the "ABC Dictionary" above (ISBN number is 978-0-8248-3485-2), no online version but there's an electronic version incorporated into Wenlin software. Here are two more confirmations

1) 噷@Kxue Please search for Template:Hani (on two lines), hm˙ expresses hm in neutral tone. "Template:Hani" means "An interjection. Expresses reprimand or dissatisfaction".

2) Pleco Dictionary - a world known dictionary producer for PC's pocket PC's and mobile phones - I have an electronic version on my android has pinyin "hm" for "Template:Hani" and an example sentence "Template:Hani" (hm, biétí le) - "Humph, don't bring that up".

I can say the same thing about "Template:Hani", don't make me search for it. :) --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 00:32, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

• If this were pinyin with tone-marking diacritics, this text from Wiktionary:Votes/2011-07/Pinyin_entries would apply: "... a pinyin entry, using the tone-marking diacritics, be allowed whenever we have an entry for a traditional-characters or simplified-characters spelling", and the pinyin entry itself would not be subject to RFV. But this is a member of Category:Mandarin pinyin with tone numbers. Is there a reason to treat pinyin with tone numbers ("bing4") differently from pinyin with tone-marking diacritics ("bìng") as far as attestation requirements? If no reason is found, and editors end up agreeing the pinyin term under discussion does not need attestation, can this RFV be closed as out of scope? --Dan Polansky (talk) 14:31, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

  Pinyin with tone numbers is basically just an alternate spelling of the same pinyin with diacritics. If the diacritic exists, then the tone number exists. If the diacritic exists, but is toneless, the tone number is 0 or 5, which indicates that the absence of an expected 1, 2, 3, or 4 is not a mistake, but that the character is pronounced without tone. It is not surprising that it is incredibly hard to find examples in the wild. That said, here's one. bd2412 T 19:21, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Here is the full reference:

• 2003, Chinfa Lien "Exploring Multiple Functions of Choe³ 做 and its Interaction with Constructional Meanings in Taiwanese Southern Min, in 語言暨語言學, Volume 4, Issue 1, page 90:

  Thus choe³ 做 as in choe³ hm⁵ lang⁵ 做媒儂 'be a matchmaker' in TSM, can be regarded as a 'be' verb.

Cheers! bd2412 T 22:48, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

So is the "5" always a superscript? If so, the entry should be moved there. After all, in chemistry for instance H₂O does not mean the same thing as H.2O. SpinningSpark 23:14, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

I don't think it's standardized in general, but superscripts may be the norm in scientific literature such as this. I've seen full-sized numbers, superscripts, IPA tone symbols, and diacritics, all used for the same sound in different works. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:26, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

I hate to rain on your parade, but "Southern Min" is just the English translation of w:Min Nan, which we treat as a separate language, and which has eight tones, according to the traditional analysis. Although the same methodology applies in both cases as far as using tone numbers instead of diacritics, the actual tones and diacritics don't match. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:16, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

Parade rained upon. It is just plain difficult to find hits when there are tens of thousands of false positives to dig through. On the other hand, this raises the question of whether we should add the Min Nan diacritics (of which hm5, obviously, is one). bd2412 T 15:17, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

妖怪

Two sections up, a request to verify that "yāoguài" meant "a supernatural being, a monster, an apparition; bogy; goblin; demon; a evil spirit" was struck because the hanzi verified the pinyin: but the hanzi was created by the same IP, and the definition (which is what I imagine Eiríkr was requesting verification of) still needs verifying... - -sche (discuss) 03:30, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

zh.WP's entry on 妖怪 links to en.WP's entry w:Yōkai "ghost, phantom, strange apparition". Perhaps explaining why our entry lists so many translations, w:zh:妖怪 says "在歐洲語言中没有完全對應於妖怪的词汇，僅有意義相近的詞彙，例如英語的 monster（怪物）、ghost、spook（鬼）、sprite（妖精）、giant（巨人）、undead（不死生物）、devil（恶魔）、demon、fiend、evil spirit（邪靈）、elf（精灵）、goblin（哥布林）、bogy、fairy（小仙子）。" (roughly: "No European language has vocabulary which fully corresponds to this term...") - -sche (discuss) 03:35, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

I've got the following from well-known dictionaries: monster, devil, demon, goblin, bogy. Just 妖 also gives phantom.

The Chinese Wiktionary also translates into Russian: "оборотень" (werewolf), "нечистая сила" (impure force, devilry); "призрак" (phantom, ghost), "привидение" (apparition, ghost). They all kind of similar and one can tell that it doesn't mean a very specific supernatural creature and also related to Asian mythology, not just European. The choice of words seems to be okey. See also 妖怪#Japanese. The EDICT Japanese dictionary gives "ghost; apparition; phantom; spectre; specter; demon; monster; goblin". --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 03:49, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

This is an umbrella term for any supernatural being in Mandarin. I don't like the definitions as they seem to alternate between specific creatures and creatures in general, when in fact it simply means the latter. They only serve to confuse people. I will simplify the definitions if no one else has any objections. I have also previously issued two warnings to this anon user not to touch the Mandarin entries as he/she seems to make the simplest and most ridiculous of mistakes. Jamesjiao → ^{T ◊ C} 04:15, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

aeronian

Original heading: Category:en:Geological periods

Other nominated lowercase English entries: aeronian (Citations:aeronian), aptian (Citations:aptian), artinskian (Citations:artinskian), asselian (Citations:asselian), bajocian (Citations:bajocian), bartonian (Citations:bartonian), bashkirian (Citations:bashkirian), bathonian (Citations:bathonian), boreal (Citations:boreal), burdigalian (Citations:burdigalian), calabrian (Citations:calabrian), callovian (Citations:callovian), capitanian (Citations:capitanian), cenomanian (Citations:cenomanian), changhsingian (Citations:changhsingian), chattian (Citations:chattian), coniacian (Citations:coniacian), danian (Citations:danian), dapingian (Citations:dapingian), darriwilian (Citations:darriwilian), drumian (Citations:drumian), eifelian (Citations:eifelian), emsian (Citations:emsian), famennian (Citations:famennian), floian (Citations:floian), fortunian (Citations:fortunian), frasnian (Citations:frasnian), gelasian (Citations:gelasian), gorstian (Citations:gorstian), guzhangian (Citations:guzhangian), gzhelian (Citations:gzhelian), hettangian (Citations:hettangian), hirnantian (Citations:hirnantian), homerian (Citations:homerian), induan (Citations:induan), ionian (Citations:ionian), jiangshanian (Citations:jiangshanian), kasimovian (Citations:kasimovian), katian (Citations:katian), kimmeridgian (Citations:kimmeridgian), kungurian (Citations:kungurian), ladinian (Citations:ladinian), langhian (Citations:langhian), lochkovian (Citations:lochkovian), ludfordian (Citations:ludfordian), lutetian (Citations:lutetian), maastrichtian (Citations:maastrichtian), messinian (Citations:messinian), moscovian (Citations:moscovian), olenekian (Citations:olenekian), oxfordian (Citations:oxfordian), paibian (Citations:paibian), permian (Citations:permian), piacenzian (Citations:piacenzian), pliensbachian (Citations:pliensbachian), pragian (Citations:pragian), priabonian (Citations:priabonian), pridoli (Citations:pridoli), rhuddanian (Citations:rhuddanian), roadian (Citations:roadian), rupelian (Citations:rupelian), sakmarian (Citations:sakmarian), sandbian (Citations:sandbian), santonian (Citations:santonian), selandian (Citations:selandian), serpukhovian (Citations:serpukhovian), serravallian (Citations:serravallian), sheinwoodian (Citations:sheinwoodian), sinemurian (Citations:sinemurian), tarantian (Citations:tarantian), telychian (Citations:telychian), thanetian (Citations:thanetian), titonian (Citations:titonian), toarcian (Citations:toarcian), tortonian (Citations:tortonian), tremadocian (Citations:tremadocian), turonian (Citations:turonian), visean (Citations:visean), wordian (Citations:wordian), wuchiapingian (Citations:wuchiapingian), ypresian (Citations:ypresian), zanclean (Citations:zanclean)

Pursuant to the BP, there are 79 geological periods adjectives in lower case to check. A few is attested, but some others like gzhelian can't be found anywhere. JackPotte (talk) 11:05, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Ghezelian gets thousands of raw hits at Google books., some with the and not having an explicit noun that they modify, in the usual mode of geologists referring to such things. CGEL calls that kind of thing a fused-head construction, I think. Whether we call that noun usage seems like a policy decision. DCDuring TALK 11:24, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

The issue is whether it's attestable in lower case. Unlike JackPotte's native French, I don't think English uses these terms in lower case (except for rare writers' errors). Equinox ◑ 19:53, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Sorry, I was too lazy to check the prior discussion. But why have both a proper noun and adjective sense? Adjectives can be used in fused heads that behave like nouns and proper nouns can be used attributively. Are these ever used unabiguously as adjectives, ie, comparatively/gradably "more/very Gzhelian in character" or as predicates? DCDuring TALK 20:21, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Well, the Gzhelian is a bit obscure... but exactly three good, paleontological hits come up for me when I search google books:"it is Maastrichtian". (The Maastrichtian has some truly excellent fossil assemblages, and definitely is one of the best known geological periods.) So yes, I would say that they can all be used adjectivally. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:33, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

We could continue to have the sense(s) essentially duplicated between adjective and proper noun headers or we could simply exclude one and illustrate usage as both modifier and nominal in usage examples, perhaps mentioning it as well in a usage note in the PoS we chose to retain. I personally prefer the economy of just one PoS, preferably adjective in light of the confirming evidence Metaknowledge found, but users may be less confused by having both headers. DCDuring TALK 02:24, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

Metaknowledge, I think you also missed the point here :) The issue is whether it's attestable in lower case. Unlike JackPotte's native French, I don't think English uses these terms in lower case (except for rare writers' errors). Equinox ◑ 01:12, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

I agree with you, and they're entirely unattestable in lowercase AFAICS. I didn't miss the point, though. I was responding to DCDuring's tangent about what POS we should use. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 15:55, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

• I am renaming the heading and adding an express nomination of the lowercase entries at the top. --Dan Polansky (talk) 22:10, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

I spent some time looking for cites and the only one I found was aptian in a French periodical. I think we can safely delete these, as everyone seems to agree that the lowercase forms are uncitable. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 20:40, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

I don't see what else we can do, but mass RfVs now are going to lead to mass deletions because of the absence of significant citation effort. This would be a good time to use this technique to get rid of any class of entries without supporters. DCDuring TALK 22:13, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

As for mass RFVs, the terms were nominated as a group because they were created on 19 March 2013‎ by User:JackBot, presumably exhibiting the same sort of error, if any; and they were nominated for RFV by the bot owner User:JackPotte. Thus, I do not see anything unfair in this particular mass nomination, while I can imagine unfair mass nominations in general. I propose to close this as RFV failed by an admin. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:29, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

犀犬

RFV for both JA & CMN. Added by IP anon known for rubbish. Literally means "rhinoceros dog". Maybe this should just be shot down on sight, I'm not sure. I do find some hits for JA at google books:"犀犬" "の", and some for CMN at google books:"犀犬是". Searching the wider web suggests that this might be specific to the Naruto universe, which would match this anon's known proclivities. -- Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 19:28, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

You're right, this character is from the Naruto universe, both Japanese and Chinese (translation from Japanese). I don't know what the deal is with fictional characters but we do have Cinderella, Thumbelina, etc., so I would keep them but correct definitions.

BTW, if you wish to check for Chinese only results in Google use character "这" or soemthing because "是" is also used in Japanese. Google automatically searches for both simplified and traditional, so a search for "这" will also find "這" (traditional). --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 23:18, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

• Yeah, 是 is used in JA, but I don't think I've ever seen it right after a noun.  :) I'm also most often using Windows' Japanese IME, so entering 是 is a simple matter of typing in zehi and converting that to 是非 and deleting the 非. Meanwhile, I don't know how to make the JA IME on Windows produce (deprecated template usage) 这...
• About this particular entry, I think there's a standard somewhere about criteria for inclusion for fictional universe terms. Ah, yes, I just found it -- Wiktionary:Criteria_for_inclusion#Fictional_universes seems to suggest that anything specific to Naruto, and not mentioned in at least two other fictional universes, should be excluded.

So can anyone say if 犀犬 is mentioned in at least two other fictional universes besides Naruto? -- Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 06:14, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

You can type in 這う (はう) to get "這". Like I said, searches for 這 and 这 work identically. I think Google ignores spaces, so if you don't put quotes around your string, 是 can pick 是非, 這, can pick up 這う. You can't win. :) Restricting to Japanese searches is easier. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 06:22, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

• It's been a couple months. No one has said if 犀犬 is mentioned in at least two other fictional universes besides Naruto, as required by Wiktionary:Criteria_for_inclusion#Fictional_universes. I'm inclined to think that this is a Naruto-only word, and thus a term that does not meet WT:CFI. Any reasoned objections to nuking this? -- Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 23:39, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

OK with me. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 00:07, 31 May 2013 (UTC)

This is a difficult case, but I'm slightly inclined to delete. First, this does not seem to be a Naruto-only word. I haven't heard about 犀犬 before, but the quotes below make me classify it as a mythological/folklore creature rather than a (modern) fictional character.

• 「話に、この犬は犀犬と稱し、これを得た家は富み榮えるといふことであったので、瑤は食物を與へた(...)」 (柴田宵曲 (1887-1966)『柴田宵曲文集』)
• 「(...)犀犬という名の犬で、手に入れた人の家に繁栄をもたらすといわれている。」 (岡田章雄 (1908-1982)『"犀犬" 犬と猫』)
• 「此名犀犬，得者其家富昌」 (in In Search of the Supernatural, a Chinese ancient literature [1])

However, every quote I found takes the form of "such a creature is called 犀犬", in other words, I only seem to get mentions, not uses. This is why I'd rather be for deletion. Any opinions? --Whym (talk) 14:14, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

• My general thoughts are:
  1. The first two quotes in Japanese both apparently describe the same legend, but also basically say "this dog is called [a?] 'rhino-dog'";
  2. These quotes are worded in a way where it could be interpreted that "rhino-dog" is a name instead of a noun;
  3. As you note, these are mentions rather than uses, and thus insufficient for meeting WT:CFI;
  4. Although the third example seems to be the source of the two JA mentions (and says nearly the same thing), it is in Chinese, and thus outside the scope of this Japanese RFV.

So as far as the Japanese entry is concerned, we still have nothing outside of Naruto, and as such, this fails WT:CFI, and we should delete. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 20:20, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

tiddly

Rfv-sense: An alcoholic beverage.

Any attestation of use of the term in this sense? Seems absent in dictionaries. There is an apparent plural "tiddlies". Searches: google books:"tiddly, and google books:"tiddlies". --Dan Polansky (talk) 14:49, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:37, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

It's really citeable, though. I'll do my best to cite it this weekend. (Sorry.) —Ruakh_TALK 05:38, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, citable [2][3][4]. SpinningSpark 01:42, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

• Cited with the quotes SpinningSpark provided. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 13:10, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

April 2013

ᴕ

Sense 2 in the Translingual section states that this is used as a ligature of the Roman letters o and u (alongside the Greek letters omicron and upsilon). Is this ever the case? I'd imagine that it was informal and/or language-specific usage if so. I'm so meta even this acronym (talk) 16:55, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

It's not a ligature; it's part of Unicode's phonetic extensions, named LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL OU. (It had origins in a ligature, but surely you'd use U+0223 ȣ for that if you insisted on using a character of that.) I've added Western Abenaki to the RFV; that should be ȣ, not the small capital phonetic version.--Prosfilaes (talk) 10:59, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Ah! I hadn't noticed that. I hope this will prevent others from making the same mistake as me. I'm so meta even this acronym (talk) 18:38, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

N.b. #Ȣ. I'm so meta even this acronym (talk) 00:57, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Deleted. - -sche (discuss) 20:21, 14 June 2013 (UTC)

I'm a bit confused. -sche added an item to the RfV and subsequently deleted it. But {{rfv}} was removed. Is the original RfV resolved? DCDuring TALK 16:30, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

I think so, based on Prosfilaes' comment. - -sche (discuss) 21:12, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

I should have followed up on this earlier. The entry as is seems to me to be almost entirely incorrect. It originated as a Greek ligature of omicron and upsilon that found its way into the typesets across Europe and eventually into the w:Uralic Phonetic Alphabet in its small capital form. (The WP page doesn't mention it, but the external link at the bottom shows it, without mentioning what the UPA uses it for.) The Unicode character is not a ligature, it's just a phonetic character. --Prosfilaes (talk) 23:23, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

second-guess

Rfv-sense:

1. (deprecated template usage) (idiomatic) To attempt to predict or anticipate. (Can we [[#Requests for verification|verify]]^{([{{fullurl:|action=edit&section=new&preload=Template:rfv-sense/preload$1&preloadparams%5B%5D=%3Cstrong+class%3D%22error%22%3E%3Cspan+class%3D%22scribunto-error+mw-scribunto-error-dc484ca1%22%3ELua+error+in+Module%3Aparameters+at+%5B%5BModule%3Aparameters%23L-360%7Cline+360%5D%5D%3A+Parameter+1+should+be+a+valid+language+code%3B+the+value+%26quot%3Bexample+sentences+are+for+the+other+sense%26quot%3B+is+not+valid.+See+%5B%5BWT%3ALOL%5D%5D.%3C%2Fspan%3E%3C%2Fstrong%3E&preloadtitle=%5B%5BWiktionary%3ARequests+for+verification%23rfv-sense-notice-example sentences are for the other sense-%7cWiktionary%3ARequests+for+verification%5D%5D}} +])} this sense?)
   • 1957: "As a practical matter, a fertilizer company could not afford to second-guess the Federal Trade Commission or a jury in a triple damage case on so obscure a point." (U.S. Senate)
   • 1995: "MacGregor avoided this trap by refusing to give managers reporting to him the opportunity to second-guess the solution he would be most likely to choose."

The example sentences are obviously for the other sense, which could use some reworking.

I was conflicted about whether to take this to rfv or rfc, because the etymologies are hideous, and there are problems throughout (mostly added by a French IP who seems to have used several similar IP addresses), but the page can't be properly fixed without addressing the issue of whether this is a valid sense. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:49, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Hang on, you do sometimes second-guess what someone is thinking without knowing what they're thinking; that rules out the other definition. Mglovesfun (talk) 12:27, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

That's why a few dictionaries have "to criticize" as one of the two possible definitions, the other being something like "to make a prediction with the benefit of information not available to (another predictor or prediction)".

Either a person predicting or a particular prediction could be second-guessed in either sense.

It could also be used intransitively in either sense. DCDuring TALK 20:20, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

• Clocked out. I can't defend the challenged sense. I think we can rework the entry with a better definition to address MG's valid point. Another opinion? DCDuring TALK 02:11, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

astroboffin

Three citations all from The Register, which is not durably archived and is known for its own quirky slang — does nobody else use the word? Equinox ◑ 10:22, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

The hyphenated form astro-boffin yielded four non-Register cites (two from the Australian paper The Age). The solid form got one hit on Usenet from 1999, under the sense "astrologer/astrology enthusiast." Personally, I don't see a reason to rule out citations from The Register, a prominent online news site that's been around as long as the Usenet archive-hosting Google (maybe even a little longer).[5][6] There's nothing in WT:CFI that explicitly says online media other than Google Groups cannot meet the "durably archived" criterion. I understand that's a common interpretation, but unwritten rules aren't policy. WT:CFI#Independent also says citations only have to be from three different authors. It doesn't specify they must be from three different publishers. Astral (talk) 18:02, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

The theory is that Usenet is not tied to Google, that anyone can archive Usenet. It doesn't matter how long the Register has been around; what matters is if they're durably available, if a link to their website that worked 10 years ago will work 10 years from now, that articles won't just disappear on us. I see no reason to think that.--Prosfilaes (talk) 03:21, 29 April 2013 (UTC).

The Register has an archive of content going back nearly fifteen years. Granted, the URLs of specific articles might change over time, but to regard that as a significant obstacle rather than a mild inconvenience is to overlook the fact that Wiktionary is a wiki, and that it is a simple task to Google an article's title and replace an outdated link with a functioning one. And if a replacement link can't be found, well, you cross that bridge when you come to it. Other viable citations will probably have cropped up by then. My point is that it doesn't make sense to me to rule out prominent news and commentary sites with proven longevity like The Register on the off chance they might not be around in ten years. There's a chance (however small) that Google will fold in the next decade and no one will take over the responsibility of maintaining a publicly-accessible Usenet archive. Some outcomes can be predicted with a reasonable degree of certainty (like the ephemeral nature of Tumblr blogs), but we can't foresee everything, and it's counterproductive to try to base policy around such predictions. WT:CRYSTAL? Astral (talk) 05:30, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

I see the lines differently then you do; by citing physical books, we're citing things that have a life expectancy of at least 500 years. Usenet is a handwave towards convenience with a half-assed promise of durability. Saying that we should accept something because we can't prove it's durable is the wrong way around; we should accept things that we know to be durable only.--Prosfilaes (talk) 08:01, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

How do we no that physical books are durable. In a sense they're definitely not. They won't last literally forever. Yet my kind of talk is not popular here. Mglovesfun (talk) 17:53, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

Durable doesn't mean lasts forever, it means lasting, for a long time. We know that physical books are durable since we have books from a millennium ago, and in the past century or two, libraries have been pretty solid about collecting and safely storing most every book. We have the printed New York Times going back 150 years, with copies in hundreds of libraries, some with histories of archiving materials for centuries; on the flip side, The Register goes back nearly fifteen years and it's held by one source. They're simply not comparable in durability.--Prosfilaes (talk) 00:40, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

How many libraries, aside from a few major ones, have both the space to maintain a collection of every issue of a newspaper ever printed and the resources required to preserve it? Plenty have converted their collections to microfiche. So while the original physical paper technically continues to exist in some archives, the version most people are able to reference is a copy, and if it's a digital scan from microfiche as can occasionally be found on Google News Archive, a copy of a copy.

Books go out of print. They get destroyed in fires and floods. They decay if not shown proper care. Eventually, the remaining copies end up in museums, library archives, private collections, etc., and and the average person is left with only reprints and digitizations of the original text to consult.

Just because a page disappears from the web doesn't mean that every copy of the file ceases to exist along with it: it can safely be assumed that many authors and publishers of online content maintain their own back-up copies, some readers print or download copies for private reference, and of course there's the Internet Archive.

I honestly don't understand the general antagonism toward digital media on Wiktionary. Yes, digital media has its drawbacks, but I don't see them as great enough to warrant completely ruling out an entire category of potential citations. Language is an ever-evolving thing, and unless we wish to confine ourselves to covering only archaic and dated terms, we need the ability to rely on the new digital mediums in which things are increasingly being released. Astral (talk) 01:27, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Who cares about whether it's a reprint or a digitization? The fact is that people still have copies of it and want to look up words from it. I think private collections that might exist are irrelevant, and entirely different from libraries that a large number of people can actually access. If you want the Internet Archive to count, bring it up at the Beer Garden; it's clear the standing consensus is against it, but maybe a new consensus can be established.--Prosfilaes (talk) 05:29, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

(@Prosfilaes, 03:21, 29 April 2013) That may be the theory, but groups.google.com is just deja.com rebranded, http://www.dejanews.com/getdoc.xp?AN=453109123 still redirects to http://groups.google.com/getdoc.xp?AN=451127391 but that gives a 502 error. If google URLs have been durable for your whole live, you're quite young. Google acquired deja.com on February 12, 2001, according to w:List of mergers and acquisitions by Google. --80.114.178.7 19:50, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

I never claimed that Usenet URLs were stable; we have unique identifiers for Usenet unrelated to a URL.--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:28, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

Could you tell us what those "unique" identifiers might be? <Message-ID>@<domain> might look unique, until one realizes how many <domain>s have bit-rotted in just a decade. --80.114.178.7 04:36, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

It appears Pakistan Today reprints many The Register articles. Perhaps it can be cited from that. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 21:46, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

May 2013

makier

Old French: to do, to make. My three best sources don't have it, the Trésor de Langue Française lists (deprecated template usage) maquier as the etymon of modern French (deprecated template usage) maquiller but without any citations for it. Because it's a verb, it's going to be pretty tough to find, assuming it is out there, because of the variety of conjugated forms. Mglovesfun (talk) 18:21, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

You're right, something is off. Some cite Old French (deprecated template usage) mascurer, (deprecated template usage) masqurer as the actual etymology of (deprecated template usage) maquiller, while others cite it as from Old North French (deprecated template usage) maquier, from Old Dutch Template:term/t. I believe if it came directly from Frankish Template:term/t, it would have arrived in Old French as (deprecated template usage) maquer, but I can't find any attestations to this form. --Victar (talk) 21:00, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Maquier and maquer wouldn't really be distinct, as the -i- disappears in many of the conjugated forms. I wouldn't be surprised if makier, maquier or both were out there somewhere, but we have plenty of time to find them (minimum of 30 days). Mglovesfun (talk) 21:12, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

My fourth best source http://gallica.bnf.fr/ only has makier and maquier in etymologies, not in actual running text. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:24, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

I can't find any variation of the word in my Anglo-Norman sources. --Victar (talk) 21:27, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

A Google Books search using "makier" and "etymologie" turns up several sources. It appears the word is actually Old Picard (a dialect of Old French?). The scribal use of k being indicative of Old Northern French dialects prior to the wholesale switch to qu? Leasnam (talk) 18:13, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

Doing that same Google search, I am unable to find a sense that matches the sense that is currently being verified (to fake or counterfeit vs to do). However, I have found two expressions that seem to match: google books:"makier le papelart" (to be a hypocrite) and google books:"makier un plait" (to make a speech). — Xavier, 21:17, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

champian

All four "adjective" senses. They each seem to correspond to one of the noun senses. If the term is not used as a predicate or gradably or comparatively/superlatively, it should not be shown as an adjective. DCDuring TALK 23:08, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

I withdraw my challenge to champian#Adjective sense one ("flat or level and open"), which is merely obsolete and noncomparable, but might be gradable and is used as a predicate. I could find no cites for the other three senses in adjective use. DCDuring TALK 19:46, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps the OED has support for the other adjective senses in modern English, or those senses may not have survived into Modern English. DCDuring TALK 19:59, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Our four adjective senses are so close to the OED definitions that they almost constitute a copyvio. The user who inserted them must certainly have been aware of the OED content ans the noun entries also follow a similar pattern. To answer your question, the OED has, respectively, 5, 1, 5, and 2 citations for these entries. The most recent is 1736. However, nearly all of them are a different spelling, mostly champion. Those that cite champian are (excluding sense#1 already dealt with) [7] for sense#2, but note that the gbooks link does not have the same spelling as OED, and [8] for sense#4. SpinningSpark 22:11, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Also, the OED PoS heading does not distinguish between adjective and attributive noun senses, they are both listed under the same head. SpinningSpark 22:20, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

I personally like to have each sense-spelling stand on its own with respect to citations, though others (eg, Ungoliant, Widisth) disagree. We don't have senses at champion#Adjective (or noun) like those of champian.

And, the OED seems to call anything (?) used attributively an adjective, whereas we tend to discount that as sufficient evidence of adjectivity. Maybe we should just use the attributive-use citations in the corresponding noun definitions. DCDuring TALK 22:48, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

gasometer

Rfv-sense: instrument used to measure the flow of gas. Sounds reasonable, but it's not the word's usual meaning. Ƿidsiþ 10:37, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Searching b.g.c. for "through a gasometer" finds a few cites that I think might be in this sense:

• http://books.google.com/books?id=Rm3mAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA187&dq=gasometer
• http://books.google.com/books?id=t_URAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA177&dq=gasometer
• http://books.google.com/books?id=GwNpEjkRSxwC&pg=PA85&dq=gasometer
• http://books.google.com/books?id=_3k2AQAAIAAJ&pg=PA9&dq=gasometer

What do you think?

—Ruakh_TALK 05:27, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

I think that the classic gasometer gas storage vessel which collapses like a telescope as it empties is so named because one can directly observe how much gas is in it from its height. It follows that the flowmeter meaning probably preceded the gas storage meaning as is indicated by definition #1. SpinningSpark 16:00, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

lac

Is the plural of this Latin word attested? See WT:RFD#lactium, where it was pointed out that many of the GBC hits that seem relevant are actually forms of a different word, not of lac. - -sche (discuss) 21:31, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

As has been mentioned elsewhere, the Oxford Latin Dictionary states that there is no plural, although it does attest the singular in several of its cases. And (to expand on the above), lactibus (which is a theoretical plural form of (deprecated template usage) lac) is, in every instance that has been examined, a form of (deprecated template usage) lactēs, which is plurale tantum. So, we have a purely singular word and a purely plural word, each of which has forms that look like they are forms of the other, so any broad internet searches must be reviewed carefully in translation. --EncycloPetey (talk) 21:45, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Has any progress been made in this area since May? Esszet (talk) 19:23, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

ostensible

RFV for the sense "alleged, having an intention that is possibly but not obviously true". I'm so meta even this acronym (talk) 22:59, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

Widespread use, though not worded very well:

Even Webster 1913 has two senses:

1. Capable of being shown; proper or intended to be shown.
2. Shown; exhibited; declared; avowed; professed; apparent; -- often used as opposed to real or actual; as, an ostensible reason, motive, or aim.

Move to RfC. DCDuring TALK 00:48, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes, those two from Webster both sound fine. The second sense in the entry, as currently written, doesn't express either of those things; indeed, I take it as describing an ulterior motive that one is accused of harbouring. I'm so meta even this acronym (talk) 01:15, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

I think it has come to mean something closer to the challenged definition over these past 100 years.

Collins online thesaurus has:

ostensible, adjective

apparent, seeming, supposed, alleged, so-called, pretended, exhibited, manifest, outward, superficial, professed, purported, avowed, specious

the ostensible reason for his resignation

It definitely can have a negative valence. DCDuring TALK 01:45, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

The synonym pretended follows from an extension of "...often used as opposed to real or actual; as, an ostensible reason, motive, or aim"; however, it is the alleged synonym that I challenge. Certainly, a person can have an ostensible motive in the sense that he pretends to have a (perhaps more moral) motive than the ulterior motive that he actually has; however, to say that a person has an ostensible motive in the sense that he is alleged to have a (perhaps immoral) motive that he has been trying to hide is catachrestic usage which runs contrary to the core "showy" sense (as in (deprecated template usage) ostentatious) of the word ostensible. I'm so meta even this acronym (talk) 11:27, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Well, alleged has the following among its three definitions at MWOnline:

questionably true or of a specified kind : supposed, so-called

<bought an alleged antique vase>

If we don't have that sense, we should. DCDuring TALK 11:46, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Well, we have "supposed but doubtful", which seems to fit. Even if allege(d) can have that sense, I think it best to avoid the word's use in that definition, owing to the confusion it can occasion. I'm so meta even this acronym (talk) 12:54, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

June 2013

sprachraum

Plenty of hits for the German version, but nothing obvious on Google book search for the English. SemperBlotto (talk) 09:18, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

This is tricky: there are more than enough cites of the term in English sentences about languages other than German (for instance, here, here, and here), but they're all capitalized- which means they're still connected with the original German, to some extent. I also found a few cites for a different sense (here, here, and here: the repertoire of language available to a given person- their personal language space. Assuming they really are English, that would mean lower-case sprachraum would fail, but we would need two upper-case English senses. Of course, I haven't checked Usenet, and I may have accidentally filtered out some instances along with the German ones. Chuck Entz (talk) 11:55, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Moved to Sprachraum, new sense added. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 04:59, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

Golden diagram

Can't find anything on Google. Looks like self promotion: single-purpose author, a la WP deletion (Slightly unrelatedly, someone who knows Spanish should probably AfD the page on es-wiki...). Paper referenced is not visible on Scholar. Hyarmendacil (talk) 07:59, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

I agree. The web hits (not durably archived) were mostly word-for-word repeats of the same promotional piece; some were paraphrases. I'm not seeing independent use. DCDuring TALK 02:29, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

• Clocked out DCDuring TALK 02:29, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 04:59, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

cafuné

Brazilian Portuguese sense. SemperBlotto (talk) 10:36, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

Done. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:04, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

Passed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:14, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

cafuné

Sense: caress

It refers to a specific type of caress, the one described by definition 2. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:04, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:14, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

Merida

Added by a known-problematic anon. Every once in a while, they get something right. I'm wondering if this entry might be one of those happier occasions. -- Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 21:34, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

• It's not in Hanks & Hodges's Dictionary of First Names, which while not exhaustive has a whole lot of names from European traditions. Googling around I can find it (or Mérida) as a surname (e.g. w:Fran Mérida) and as a place name in Spain, Mexico, Venezuela, and the Philippines, but as a first name it seems to belong only to the newest Disney princess, at least so far. Only time will tell whether the film's popularity leads to a rash of baby girls being named Merida. —Angr 18:21, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

I've added a few citations. It's not clear whether they refer to men or to women, but I checked a large collection of digitised census records and found that approx. 75% of the people in the database called "Merida Smith" were female while 15% were male (also, 33% lived in the US, approx. half that many lived in the UK, and 1% lived in Canada). - -sche (discuss) 19:34, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Thank you, -sche. Now what of the etym? While it might be ultimately from Latin, this is clearly not just a straight borrowing from Latin. Presumably from Spanish (deprecated template usage) Mérida? -- Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 20:52, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Etymologies of given names can be very tricky, especially of rare names that have no history of being the names of saints or royalty. It's possible that for some girls named Merida, it comes from Spanish Mérida (from Latin Emerita Augusta), while for some others it's a variant of a name like Meredith. WP doesn't say where the Disney princess gets her name from. —Angr 22:33, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Cited. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 04:59, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

biduan

Any takers? (also, other similar words by a permablocked user) SemperBlotto (talk) 18:16, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

I couldn't even find uses rather than mentions for biduous (< (deprecated template usage) biduus), which Century 1913 had.

• Clocked out DCDuring TALK 02:18, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:32, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

Parnassian

Rfv-senses: Noun: "Parnassian language or poetry within Gerard Manley Hopkins' writings." and a correspondingly worded adjective sense. If it is only used in Hopkins' works and in works about his works, it would not seem to me that the citations can be deemed independent. Also, I don't think his works rise to being "well-known works", as good as they are. DCDuring TALK 22:27, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

I've added a bunch of quotes. WilliamKF (talk) 15:33, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

I don't see how the quotes support sense 2 rather than sense 1. But, perhaps more importantly, sense 2 doesn't seem likely to be intelligible to, say, me or a new college graduate. DCDuring TALK 02:00, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

Adjective sense passed and noun sense failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 04:59, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

Zsazsa

No relevant bgc hits for "dear|my zsazsa".​—msh210℠ (talk) 16:38, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

It’s a Hungarian name (= Suzie), pet name for Zsuzsanna (Susan). —Stephen ^(Talk) 22:49, 7 July 2013 (UTC)

Still does not have a verified meaning in English. SpinningSpark 23:41, 7 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 04:59, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

tekkō kagi

A Japanese hand weapon. I can't find three uses of this on Google Books or Groups — whether in Japanese or English text. Equinox ◑ 17:29, 12 June 2013 (UTC)

The source JA term 手甲鉤 I'm not too worried about; I see two citable works right at google books:"手甲鉤" "は", and I'm reasonably certain that a third wouldn't be too hard to dig up if given time.

The EN term was added by our anon. I let it stand in part as I wasn't sure what the practice is for terms about things not usually part of the English-speaking world, such as the specific implements and other accoutrements of another culture. If regular CFI stands and no one can find sufficient cites, then away with the EN entry. -- Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 15:54, 13 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed (English section; the Japanese section was never nominated). — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 04:59, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

analexipathy

Nothing whatsoever in Google Books or even a Web search. Equinox ◑ 02:59, 13 June 2013 (UTC)

Speedied, along with alexipathy- also unattested (except for one use with a different definition and etymology). The definitions are rather implausible and clumsily contrived- I suspect they were thought up after the word was coined, in order to have something that fit the etymologies. The clincher, though was the contributor's user page, which consists simply of "Starting up with a new word (alexipathic)." Chuck Entz (talk) 05:33, 13 June 2013 (UTC)

Closed, speedied by Chuck Entz. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 09:40, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

decrucifier

English noun sense. (French verb exists) SemperBlotto (talk) 11:22, 13 June 2013 (UTC)

Cited. -Cloudcuckoolander (formerly Astral) (talk) 13:57, 13 June 2013 (UTC)

Passed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 09:40, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

vuxê

— Ungoliant ^(Falai) 20:46, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 09:40, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

VuXê

— Ungoliant ^(Falai) 20:46, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 09:40, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

miguxo

One Google Books mention. Many Google Groups uses, none of which is from a Usenet group. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 20:55, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 09:40, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

miguxês

One Google Books use; many Google groups uses but only in non-Usenet groups. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 21:01, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 09:40, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

fikdik

No Google Books hits; only one Google Groups hit from Usenet: [9]. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 21:10, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 09:40, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

tiopês

— Ungoliant ^(Falai) 21:14, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 09:40, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Belgian chocolate

Rfv-sense "An act of scatolophilia involving one participant defecating on a transparent coffee table and the other underneath observing the bowel movement." - -sche (discuss) 04:07, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

I thought the word was scatophilia. Mglovesfun (talk) 08:29, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

It's used in this sense in Another Gay Movie. I have no desire whatsoever to go looking for cites for this on Google, though. —Angr 14:24, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

Well, scatophilia would be the entire paraphilia involving excrement, not just one act with a coffee table. I had a search around for this but I can't find it even on Google Groups (though there are a couple of mentions on the Web), so seems unlikely to pass. Equinox ◑ 14:28, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

I was referring in my post to the red link scatolophilia, which looks like an error for scatophilia. Mglovesfun (talk) 14:37, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

• Clocked out DCDuring TALK 01:45, 24 July 2013 (UTC)
• RFV failed: no quotations provided; as an auxi check, sense absent from several online dictionaries. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:38, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

chingadera

Both language sections (note the RFC). The only English sense that I can easily find citations of is "dirty trick" (which our entry either lacks or words unclearly). - -sche (discuss) 04:46, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

One English sense and all three Spanish senses cited. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 21:49, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

big balls

Really? Countable? Courage/courage? SemperBlotto (talk) 15:11, 17 June 2013 (UTC)

It's just big + balls (plural only). DCDuring TALK 16:30, 17 June 2013 (UTC)

I don't think it means courage, just it's an allusion to it, or can be. Mglovesfun (talk) 17:59, 17 June 2013 (UTC)

balls can be courage but this seems SoP extension of the metaphor, like "you've got to have a lot of balls / plenty of balls to do that"; or like the idea of having a "big" or "small" ego. Equinox ◑ 17:44, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. SOP to sense 3 of ball. Send to RfD (although I wouldn't object to deletion on sight). bd2412 T 21:29, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

If this is SOP then (deprecated template usage) balls needs a usage note indicating common collocations: big can't modify courage, so this is unintuitive.​—msh210℠ (talk) 16:22, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

If that is true then we also need notes at brain ("a big brain" means intelligence, but "big" can't modify "intelligence"), heart ("a big heart" but no "big love"), and all kinds of others. Equinox ◑ 16:33, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

I think I agree with Msh210 on this. I think we already are accustomed to handling this properly where the countable and uncountable usage occurs with the singular form. As in those cases we should be able to address this with countable/uncountable labes and usage examples at the appropriate sense of balls.

There are probably only a small number of plural-only definitions that behave this way, ie, have the same meaning in both countable and uncountable usage. I can't think of another of the dual/pair plurals that works this way and my imagination and persistence are not up to the task of locating examples among the plurals of normal English common nouns. Maybe a review of plural-only senses of nouns that also have a related definition at the singular form would find more examples. DCDuring TALK 16:58, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

My comment above was unclear and even slightly off the mark. Thanks for clarifying.​—msh210℠ (talk) 17:10, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

Changed to RFD. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 23:05, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

niggard

from Talk:niggard

Rfv-sense "false bottom in a grate, used for saving fuel".

I never saw meaning #2 (false bottom to save fuel in fireplace) before, and I don't see that meaning in [10], [11], [12], [13], or [14]. A web search turned out http://www01.us.archive.org/stream/cu31924026538813/cu31924026538813_djvu.txt, but that seems to be Scots or Lallands rather than English. Anyone has sources or quotes for that acception? PauAmma (talk) 09:42, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Added a cite, but I now realise it might not be the right sense: "niggard" could be the adjective (meaning the grate is stingily small). Equinox ◑ 17:43, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Century has exactly the challenged sense, with nigger as an alternate spelling. The give Henry Mayhew London Labour and the London Poor as a source for a cite. DCDuring TALK 00:29, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

Sadly only the first volume has been scanned by Google. DCDuring TALK 00:41, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

Tufts Digital library has it: "niggards, generally called niggers (false bottoms for grates)" DCDuring TALK 00:54, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

• From a catalog of the Great Exhibition of 1851:

  Cooking apparatus, adapted for an opening eight feet wide, by five feet high, and containing an open-fire roasting range, with sliding spit-racks and winding cheek or niggard;

There is also dictionary coverage, (including the OED, but I couldn't read the online scan to get the citations). I think this all makes it a UK term, not particularly Scottish.

It is not necessarily a false bottom, if it can also be a "movable side" or a "cheek". Presumably it is intended to restrict airflow, to slow down the consumption of the fuel or regulate the fire. DCDuring TALK 01:28, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

Passed, citations moved to entry. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 23:05, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

osmotheque

A scent library or archive. Appears to be the (capitalised) name of a specific museum in Versailles, France, and not a generic lower-case term. Equinox ◑ 22:36, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Definition copied off Wikipedia. There seems to be only one such place in the world as per Equinox. Jamesjiao → ^{T ◊ C} 22:55, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 23:05, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

osmothèque

French term. L'(deprecated template usage) Osmothèque is a unique French institution, but I don't think that the uncapitalised word exists. SemperBlotto (talk) 07:03, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. Apparently, the term Osmothèque was coined when they created the museum. Didn't find any evidence that the term has turned to a common noun. — Xavier, 22:19, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 23:05, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

newco

Rfv-sense: A placeholder name for a company, used in textbooks.

The single citation would be consistent with the first definition - and is not from a textbook. DCDuring TALK 15:12, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

The definition in Wikipedia is perfect. Let's use it. The rfv'd def is humbug. --Hekaheka (talk) 21:10, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

As I recall from my law school courses, the rfv'd sense is also accurate:

• 1982, Arthur M. Borden, Going Private, page 3-4:

  A merger can be implemented between the issuer ("Oldco") and a new corporation ("Newco") owned by the proponents, as a result of which Oldco shares not owned by the proponents are converted to cash and Newco shares remain outstanding.

• 2003, William T. Allen, Reinier H. Kraakman, Commentaries and Cases on the Law of Business Organization, page 439:

  In this structure, the acquirer (A) forms a wholly owned subsidiary (call it NewCo). A will transfer the merger consideration to NewCo in exchange for all of NewCo's stock. Then Target will merge into NewCo (or NewCo will merge into Target).

• 2008, Edward D. Hess, Charles D. Goetz, So, You Want to Start a Business?: 8 Steps to Take Before Making the Leap, page 62:

  For this example, we're going to assume that a new company (we will call it NewCo) is going to build brick homes in the $250,000 price range.

Cheers! bd2412 T 21:25, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

• @BD2412, I see little real difference between the RFVed sense and the first sense. -- Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 22:50, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

The citations show not that the term is used for any corporation, but for a newly created one, which brings it very close indeed to sense 1. DCDuring TALK 23:11, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

Let me put it this way. Fido is a common name for a dog, but it is not the common name for "a dog"; i.e., if you were walking down the street and you saw a dog, you wouldn't say, "look, there's a Fido". Newco may well be relatively common as a name given to a newly formed company created to acquire the assets of another company as part of a merger, or for similar business purposes. However, there is no law, nor really even much of a custom, for the naming of companies formed for such purposes. The creators of a company can call it whatever they please. Newco is merely the common placeholder name for such companies, sometimes in real life, sometimes in hypotheticals, just as Fido is a common placeholder name for a hypothetical dog, and Blackacre is the standard law school placeholder name for a landed estate. bd2412 T 23:35, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

I tend to agree that the two senses are distinct enough to merit keeping separate. Thanks for citing the second sense, btw. - -sche (discuss) 23:51, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

The cites look to be for a distinguishable sense. I don't see why would limit it to "textbooks" as it is used in the "real" world of M&A (and news coverage thereof) to refer to a corporate entity that has not been created yet, or does not yet have its final name, or the name of which is immaterial. It needs the labels finance and law. DCDuring TALK 00:26, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

I grant that "textbooks" is too specific, but clearly the term is generally used as a placeholder name in hypotheticals discussing a newly formed company. bd2412 T 01:48, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

It is by no means assured that a Newco is always literally a newly formed entity, as opposed to, say, a clean shell. That is a matter of implementation in many cases. In any event, we are rapidly closing in on good cited definitions, better than those few now at “newco”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. DCDuring TALK 03:14, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

I certainly agree that our definitions are outstripping our competitors. As for this word, I agree that it does not necessarily reference a newly formed entity, but there are many hits like those above where the term is explicitly used to describe a newly formed company. bd2412 T 21:11, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

Passed. Citations moved to entry. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 23:05, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

escopateur

Bin man? In Old French? Did they have bin men in the middle ages? —CodeCat 16:00, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

Complicated isn't it. http://micmap.org/dicfro/search/dictionnaire-godefroy/escopateur lists it but the Godefroy dictionary allows for mention-only cites in Old French and Middle French, as despite the full title of the book 'Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IXe au XVe siècle', it contains citations way beyond the 15th Century, going at least up to the 18th Century (and it was published in the 19th Century). So it passes either as a mention-only word in Old French or Middle French or both, but not neither, but I can't think of a way to decide which one. CodeCat, if you live by the sword you die by the sword too; if you allow mention-only cites you've gotta allow all the errors along with all the correct forms. This term failed RFV and got restored when the rules changed. Mglovesfun (talk) 20:09, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

It's not the word itself I am disputing, it's the meaning. —CodeCat 20:17, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

So it's a question of the accuracy of the translation, is it? Mglovesfun (talk) 20:31, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

My French is not that good, but I would gather a meaning more like "street cleaner" or "street sweeper". —CodeCat 20:43, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

The definition at the link above is "homme chargé à Rennes de la repurgation des immondices déposées dans les rues et places publiques : en 1477, ses gages étaient de 3 livres par an", which definitely sounds like some sort of sanitation engineer, although "bin man" may be anachronistic since trash was just lying around in the street, not collected into bins in an orderly fashion. The date 1477 suggests that we should probably change the heading to ==Middle French==. —Angr 20:46, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

Good call, on all of that. Mglovesfun (talk) 20:51, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

Closed. Dealt with by CodeCat (talk • contribs). — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 23:05, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

deae ex machinis

I found a second citation, but I don't see a third anywhere (and the first citation that was already in the entry italicises the term like it's Latin, not English). - -sche (discuss) 13:09, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

aufschiebbar

I'm seeking verification not of the lemma but of the comparative and superlative, which are vanishingly rare (I can find exactly two hits of the comparative, from 1828 and 1981, and one hit of the superlative, from 1918). - -sche (discuss) 13:22, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

I found this, which I find amusing, but it's not durably archived. Sort of surprising that it's so rare; I'd have thought people would frequently say things like "Dein Termin ist aufschiebbarer als meiner, und Peters Termin ist am aufschiebbarsten von uns allen". But apparently not. —Angr 14:54, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

me gustas

Rfv-sense "(idiomatic, vulgar, slang) You turn me on." removed by an anon as nonexistent.​—msh210℠ (talk) 04:08, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

I think the IP is spot on here; not idiomatic, vulgar or slang, just use of the first sense. Mglovesfun (talk) 07:18, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

And the first sense is SOP, and would be even with the more idiomatic English translation "I like you". I know this isn't RFD, but delete anyway. —Angr 10:19, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

This should be at rfd, because it's simply the second person singular of the verb gustar, with a first person singular object. Granted, the verb works differently than English speakers would expect, but we would need to have a similar entry for every single combination of person and number for the subject and object, to be consistent. It seems easier to me just to convert it to an "inflection of" entry. Chuck Entz (talk) 12:59, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Not even. Gustas should be (and presumably already is) an "inflection of" entry; this is just two words whose meaning is a sum of their parts. —Angr 13:09, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

referencable

Is there any evidence of "referencable" being an alternative spelling of "referenceable" rather than a plain misspelling? See also: Talk:referencable --PanchoS (talk) 11:24, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Cited. It seems relatively rare. Equinox ◑ 17:29, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

We really need the letter ç in English: referençable would make perfect sense. —Angr 17:34, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

We do have it in façade, but *referençable wouldn’t make sense in the lender language either. —Michael Z. 2013-06-25 21:58 z

Thanks! However, the citations might just prove that it's a somewhat common misspelling, finally two of the three citations are related to IT, and programmers are not exactly famous for being spelling experts, see referer... :)

I added some more grammar references on Talk:referencable and an explanation why this clarification is quite urgent for us (on Wiktionary:Tea_room#referencable).

I've been looking around quite much on Wiktionary pages, but couldn't find any policies regarding authoritative answers on whether some spelling is considered "alternative" and when it is considered a "misspelling". But in this case I'd clearly say "misspelling" that shouldn't be further proliferated.

--PanchoS (talk) 19:24, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

Not cited – source no. 3 only mistyped it in one out of at least three occurrences. Try harder, oh noble reformers of English. —Michael Z. 2013-06-25 21:58 z

Source no. 2 also uses spellings de-referenceable (p 881), dereferenceable (p 145), and dereferencable (three occurrences). The guy couldn’t spell and lacked thorough proofreading. If you can only cite a spelling to the letter of the guideline and not well enough to convince anybody, then I would move this to a vote in the Tea Room or Beer Parlour. —Michael Z. 2013-06-25 22:09 z

If a work alternates between using a standard spelling and a nonstandard one, the occurrences of the nonstandard spelling are typically seen as misspellings/typos, not as intentional spellings. If Michael is correct that two of the sources alternate between the e-spelling and the e-less one, those two citations aren't usable. - -sche (discuss) 22:38, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

The mis-spelling seems to occur often in technical books, but that makes it a common mis-spelling, not an alternative one. Do we take inclusionism too far? Dbfirs 06:30, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Often I find that there is evidence (name, institutional affiliation, biographical information) that the authors of technical works that contain this kind of spelling are not native speakers. I would be willing to place an even-money bet on the instances without such supporting evidence, too. In this case, is there enough usage to make it a "common misspelling", but not so much to make it an alternative spelling? We've never agreed on quantitative criteria, but shouldn't the proportion of contemporary usage should be more than 5% to be "common", certainly with more than three contemporary instances. I do think we need to focus on contemporary usage to make a prescriptive-type claim about the word. DCDuring TALK 09:46, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Yes, but being a native speaker doesn't mean being spelling proficient, especially regarding English spelling. Just like the Anglosaxon law system, English spelling and pronunciation are largely irregular rather than rule-based. Still there is something like correct vs. incorrect, but quite many English native speakers tend not to care too much.
So while overall being much less proficient in English, non-native speakers often care more about the few spelling rules there are, just the way they are used to it from their own native language. This holds even more for loan words such as this one. In Romanic languages, subtleties like a 'softening e' coercively determine pronunciation, so native speakers of Romanic languages tend to be accurate about them.
And finally, my native language is German, and I'm definitely less proficient in English than a native speaker, but this didn't prevent me from having a strong feeling that this spelling was wrong, doing a bit of research and filing this Rfv... :) --PanchoS (talk) 20:06, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

I intentionally limited my statement to what seems to be true in my experience: technical articles, conference proceedings etc, authored by non-native speakers seem to contain spelling mistakes in greater abundance than one might expect. It's just a hard-to-support hypothesis that might help in marshaling real evidence. DCDuring TALK 20:29, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Cited or not, I've changed it to {{misspelling of}} because it is one. —Angr 13:49, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

How do you know that it is a misspelling? The available evidence does not suggest it is a misspelling: Google Ngram Viewer: color,colour; Google Ngram Viewer: referencable,referenceable; Google Ngram Viewer: abatage,abattage; Google Ngram Viewer: conceive,concieve. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:41, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

All that shows is that it's a common misspelling, which is what the template says. You know it's a misspelling because it's not sanctioned by authoritative dictionaries. Spelling is artificial and is imposed by external authorities (unlike language, which is native to all human beings and whose nonstandard forms cannot meaningfully be said to be "wrong"). I'm all in favor of descriptivism rather than prescriptivism when it comes to linguistic matters, but orthography (spelling and punctuation) is nonlinguistic and can fairly be called "right" or "wrong". —Angr 20:53, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

I disagre that "You know it's a misspelling because it's not sanctioned by authoritative dictionaries". Mispeling is a real think present in writen language even in the absence of autoritative dictioanries. It can be detceted based on frequency. Mispelings, even comon ones, have very high frequnecy ratio to their mainstream alterntives; Google Ngram Viewer: conceive,concieve has frequency ratio of 1000 aka 1:1000. I disagree with deciding what is and what is not a misspelling using dictionaries. Many mispelings can be easly identfied without any dctionary and even witout looking at corpus frequency. --Dan Polansky (talk) 07:18, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

For better idea, here follows a table with some frequency ratios:

Short Term	Long Term	Ngram	Frequency Ratio in Year 2000
referencable	referenceable	Ngram	8
experiencable	experienceable	Ngram	10
influencable	influenceable	Ngram	16,5
sequencable	sequenceable	Ngram	6
servicable	serviceable	Ngram	156
enforcable	enforceable	Ngram	860
replacable	replaceable	Ngram	190
colour	color	Ngram	3,4
behaviour	behavior	Ngram	2,8
rigour	rigor	Ngram	2

There are three groups in the table. The 1st one is referenceable, experiencable, influencable, and sequencable. The 2nd one is serviceable, etc. The third one is color, etc. They show distinct frequency ratios. --Dan Polansky (talk) 07:50, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

Dictionaries: “"referenceable"”, in OneLook Dictionary Search. finds nothing, so what are the dictionaries that have the allegedly correct spelling but not the other one? I have also explicitly checked merriam-webster.com: referenceable . --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:37, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

The problem with the first group is that the words are so rare that they do not appear in many dictionaries (yet). Of the four, the OED has only experienceable (but not experiencable of course). For such words, I think it's safest to assume that they follow the normal rules of English spelling until we have definite evidence to the contrary. A small number of instances from writers or typesetters who make other errors in spelling would not provide convincing evidence of an alternative spelling. Usage by three writers who are normally careful about spelling would convince me. I don't agree with your edits to influencable and sequencable because I don't accept that ratios alone provide sufficient evidence for such rare words. Try looking at the ngrams for influencability and sequencability. Dbfirs 11:57, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

I don't see the words not appearing in dictionaries should be a problem for anything. I don't accept the view that correctness of spelling is decided by dictionaries. You have said that ratios alone do not provide sufficient evidence, without indicating what other evidence (evidence, not authority) could be used to find out whether a spelling is correct. I don't see anything interesting in the Ngrams that you have linked to; the second one finds nothing at all. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:34, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

Exactly! If sequencable were a word, then sequencability should be also. (.. or am I expecting too much logic in spelling?) I stated above the evidence I would expect: "Usage by three writers who are normally careful about spelling would convince me." Statistical significance of ratios is suspect because of rarity of usage. (See wikipedia:Statistical significance#Signal–noise ratio conceptualisation of significance) Dbfirs 21:03, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

Re: "If sequencable were a word, then sequencability should be also.": Not at all. There is no linguistic law saying that each adjective has to have a corresponding -ness or -ity noun. Indeed, the empirical evidence refutes the would-be law in countless instances. I don't see what makes you think that logic dictates that language obeys that law; if this were a law, it would be an empirical law of linguistics rather than logic. In any case, nothing I have learned in logic courses AKA courses of correct inference points to there being such a law of logic. As for statistical significance, that argument might have some merit, but I don't see you determining any numerical index of statistical significance of the data. As for the writers normally careful about their spelling, I suppose that is an answer to my complaint about other evidence. Can you show that the writers whose quotations are now placed into referencable are not careful about their spelling? Put differently, can you find other word forms that look like misspellings in the works of these authors? --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:17, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

It would be a very irregular word that obeyed the normal rule of spelling in the "--ability" form but disobeyed it in the "--able" form. I know that English spelling is sometimes irregular, but surely not this irregular! If I had access to the works of the authors, or even to the work cited, then I'd be able to check. Dbfirs 17:13, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

...later... To be fair, I am able to see the text of Mark Ambrose's book (a well-written reply to Nietzsche's Will to Power) and he seems to use standard American spelling throughout (except when quoting John Donne, of course). He uses the spelling "referencable" just once. Dbfirs 17:46, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

Passed. It has enough citations; disputing them or deciding whether the term is a misspelling is not an RFV issue. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Colin Tampon

A Swiss person, the equivalent of John Bull. Or just a character from one work? - -sche (discuss) 07:57, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

There are these mentions: [15], [16], [17], [18], but I did not encounter any actual usage. It seems that Colin-Tampon has been used as a nickname in French for Swiss soldiers serving in French military, but there's also the sense "obese, dull". This usage antedates the book. --Hekaheka (talk) 09:46, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

ærumna

Is this attested in English? Are aerumna and erumna attested, and if so, are they more common? - -sche (discuss) 23:04, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

Just delete it. More careless completion. --Æ&Œ (talk) 23:23, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

anonymous

"Without consideration of prestige, title, rank or background"; synonym "on the merits". This doesn't seem distinct from the usual sense (nameless), i.e. IF you consider something without a name, you MUST consider it on its merits. But that's not a sense of the word itself. Equinox ◑ 03:25, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

See Citations:anonymous for a citation (which just happens to be the only citation there is for the word "anonymous"). "On the merits" is a much more precise definition of "anonymous" than the vaster definitions already in the entry. I apologize but something about Wiktionary's templates is making it very slow for me. Kraŭs (talk) 03:40, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

The citation just uses Anonymous in Alcoholics Anonymous and then uses the word anonymity. It is somewhat useful for the concept, but not the word. DCDuring TALK 09:13, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Unstriking. We should get three citations. DCDuring TALK 09:17, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

I'd say that isn't a citation of anonymous at all, Alcoholic Anonymous is the name of an organization, in the same way that a citation for the drinks brand Red Bull wouldn't be a suitable citation for either Red or Bull. Mglovesfun (talk) 20:35, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Houm Päijtsh

Seriously? -- Liliana • 16:21, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Apparently this will be difficult to attest. This is about everything I could find [19]. --Hekaheka (talk) 07:34, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

• I find it curious and ironic that a term, ostensibly so intimately related with the online world, would be effectively impossible to find in use in the wild. After excluding various Wiktionary and Wikipedia echo chambers, I am left with seven hits (google:"Houm Päijtsh" -wikt -wiki -dictionary -glosbe), of which Hekaheka's above is one. Notably, that's just an entry in a terminology database, not even an example of use. Of the remaining six Google hits, one is now a 404, one is an automated translation entry, one is an interactive terminology database that doesn't even have an entry for this term, and the last three are Wikipedia or Wiktionary echoes that squeaked through my search exclusion terms.

I'm under the impression that Kölsch isn't a very widely used language, but even so, I'd expect to find more than this if it were really in use to mean (deprecated template usage) home page.

Delete as a protologism or otherwise fatuous entry. If and when someone can find sufficient citations of actual use, we can re-create the entry then. -- Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 17:48, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

• Well, Kölsch is a very widely spoken language, but it's almost never written except by Wikimedia fans and in Asterix translations. Speakers may very well say something that sounds like Houm Päijtsh when speaking of a homepage, but I bet the spelling that goes through most of their heads when they do is Homepage. —Angr 18:00, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

Probably, and the Finns say "houm peits", but that's not entry-worthy either. --Hekaheka (talk) 14:35, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

• This looks like somebody's attempt at spelling out a term they heard used in speech. I find it significant that it uses a different orthography than all of our other Kölsch entries. I'm really surprised at the "sh", since Kölsch speakers are pretty much all also speakers of Standard German, which always uses "sch". Of course, I couldn't find any uses of "Houm Päijtsch", either. The "ij" looks fishy, too- but I don't know enough about the orthography to be sure. Chuck Entz (talk) 19:05, 28 June 2013 (UTC)
  • For what it's worth (which isn't much), the Kölsch Wikipedia main page is called Houpsigk, and on that page I found the trigraph ⟨eij⟩ in two words where standard German has ⟨ei⟩: bevölkerungsreijch for standard bevölkerungsreich and jeijstisch for standard geistig. I also found ⟨sh⟩ in Shtadt for standard Stadt and Jelsenkirshen for Gelsenkirchen and Duisbursh for Duisburg. I can't discern any rhyme or reason for when ⟨sh⟩ is used and when ⟨sch⟩ is used; both occur for standard German /ʃ/ as well as standard German /ç/ (which are usually merged into a single phoneme by people who speak Kölsch-influenced standard German and therefore I assume are merged in Kölsch itself). —Angr 16:25, 29 June 2013 (UTC)
    • I should have been more clear: the main problem I have with "ij" is that it's a single-character ligature, not "i"+"j". This could potentially cause problems with searches, if it's normally spelled as two letters. Chuck Entz (talk) 17:22, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

abscond

Rfv-sense: To evade, hide from.

The captain absconded his responsibility.

+ one contemporary citation along the same lines.

This feels obsolete or otherwise a mistake, but usage could prove me wrong. DCDuring TALK 17:37, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Passed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

made in Japan

I suspect that the two non-literal senses should be combined the way I combined the two non-literal senses of made in China. Or are they distinct? - -sche (discuss) 21:15, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

Merged. Archaic label changed to dated. 1970s isn’t archaic by any stretch of the word’s meaning. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

impeevish

"Not peevish; impassive." Cannot find in Google Books; also, how is "impassive" an antonym for "peevish"?! Equinox ◑ 05:28, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

• Tosh. I would have just deleted it. SemperBlotto (talk) 07:07, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

• RFV failed, entry deleted. —Ruakh_TALK 14:30, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

admiraless

Looking especially for independent cases of use that are not proper names; I find recurring quotes of James Fenimore Cooper. google books:"admiraless", google groups:"admiraless", “admiraless”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:18, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Found some cites, but pretty much all of them capitalize it. -Cloudcuckoolander (formerly Astral) (talk) 18:35, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Passed. Moved to Admiraless. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:17, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

loaded dice

Rfv-sense An unfair advantage obtained by manipulating rules or insider influence.

See also cited figurative (or metaphorical) usages for the adjective (deprecated template usage) loaded, and the archived rfd for (deprecated template usage) loaded dice on the talk page (not strictly applicable to this sense). — Pingku^dimmi 14:37, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

This is not difficult to cite,

• And the Market News, as well as other city papers anxious to sell space, helped to swell the bubble until Rockhaven became one of the loaded dice all speculators love to play with.
• The riverboat gambler's most intriguing insight on the stock market is that all investors use loaded dice if they only knew it.
• Slave states have always won. They have played with loaded dice—loaded with Slavery.
• Fate, on the other hand, refers to events that fall out in a manner predetermined by a higher power (the loaded dice of the gods).
• From the beginning they were playing against the natives with loaded dice. But in economic competition even a trifling advantage has a cumulative effect...
• In 1973 ABC opted for more of the album market, enlarging its vision to include the more specialized philosophy of artist development, the dominant ideology of the record industry of the 1970s. With loaded dice a few throws are as good as 20 honest ones.
• The jury (to change metaphors) would dispense the justice that had so far eluded them, equalizing the odds in a world of loaded dice.
• In the contest to wear down the patience of the missionary, the Turk has always played with loaded dice.

It may be necessary to strike the word "unfair" to make some of these cites fit, but they are still a separate metaphorical meaning. While I am here, I don't see the point of making the reader look up "loaded" and "dice" separately to try and divine the normal meaning from the multiple senses at both entries. If this is kept, I think that the in-entry definition should be restored. SpinningSpark 17:22, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

Here's a fairly straightforward cite:

• 1972, Melville Jean Herskovits, Cultural Relativism: Perspectives in Cultural Pluralism, page 56:

  In fact, the need for a cultural-relativistic point of view has become apparent because of the realization that there is no way to play this game of making judgments across cultures except with loaded dice.

Cheers! bd2412 T 03:44, 9 July 2013 (UTC)

Passed. I added two of Spinningspark’s citations to the entry. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:17, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

abit

Rfv-sense : (deprecated template usage) (obsolete) Template:third-person singular of. Claims of Chaucer. --Semper amore (talk) 14:43, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

The Yeoman's Tale, l.1175

He is so variaunt, he abit nowhere.

Other hits in Chaucer seem to be = "habit", as in clerical garb. But this does seem to be an attestation of the 3rd sing present of abide

— Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 21:23, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Since we consider everything before about 1500 (I don't remember the exact cutoff) to be Middle English, we need to either find something later, or convert it to Middle English. That's assuming we can find the one cite needed for Middle English, of course. Given that the Yeoman's tale passage would work just as well with the French verb habiter, what do we know about whether the Old French equivalent made it into Middle English, and whether it ever lost its h? Chuck Entz (talk) 22:10, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

A quick check at the Middle English Dictionary at the University of Michigan shows more than enough cites for a Middle English entry. Chuck Entz (talk) 22:27, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Moved to Middle English section. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:17, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

wordwrapper

Looks like tosh to me. Any takers? SemperBlotto (talk) 15:16, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

There's a software sense, but nothing for this definition on Google Books or Usenet. Best to wrap this word up and toss it in the trash... Chuck Entz (talk) 15:58, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

The etymology makes it seem like the contributor is simply trying to present a superficial imitation of a real entry. I could find usage on Usenet for a definition relating to the "wordwrap" function in text-presentation software. DCDuring TALK 16:22, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:17, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

July 2013

autarcheia

Spanish. Not in RAE and all bgc hits are for transliterations of Ancient Greek. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 20:22, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Move the content to "autarquía, which is easily attestable, and delete this one. --Hekaheka (talk) 01:19, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. After reading the talk page, I suspect calling it Spanish was an accident, and the contributor actually meant (Ancient?) Greek. But, in any case, we don’t include entries for Greek transliteration. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:39, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

clean coal

"Coal which has been cleaned up to make it environmentally acceptable".
This is a very vague and dubious definition. Is it coal that has been washed etc, and by what standard is it environmentally acceptable. The Wikipedia article give a lot more meaning, and seems to cover the entire industry and not just a specific supply of the stuff. Is the term US specific. Is there more than one definition needed. --Dmol (talk) 00:56, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

I believe it to be more of a process than a tangible thing. It's not that someone sits down with coal and a scrubbing brush, more that the coal is prepared before being burned in specially designed furnaces with fume extractors to recover soot and pollutant gasses from the exhaust, &c &c. It's a noun in the same mould as "Democracy". ref http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_coal_technology.

A cousin of mine who works in the field of environmental engineering has remarked to me that "clean coal" is, charitably, only relative to the normal process, and uncharitably, a contradiction in terms. But that's opinion, not etymology or definition.

– Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 01:17, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Since only the first definition existed when the term was RFVed, and the nominator specifically mentioned it’s the definition that is dubious, only that definition has been deleted. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:39, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

XXL

Translingual, roman numeral. Doesn't follow standard rules for Roman numerals and seems highly unlikely. May be difficult to attest. -- Liliana • 15:36, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Speedy. --Hekaheka (talk) 19:45, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:39, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Bagup

Any takers? Caps looks wrong. Why would it be uncountable. Grammar needs tweaking. SemperBlotto (talk) 15:48, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

It's a trademark, so must meet WT:BRAND, which is highly doubtful. Found on the Web: "BagUps(tm), a trash bag system that dispenses a constant flow of bio-degradable trash liners while automatically re-lining the trash receptacle with a new bag after the old bag is removed." Equinox ◑ 15:54, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:39, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

baraghtan

The only hit on Google Books is a mention. This might pass as a Manx noun, though, if we allow mentions from that book... - -sche (discuss) 08:42, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:39, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

graney

From the same book as the preceding. All hits for "feel|feels|feeling|felt graney" use the personal name Graney, not this adjective; ditto for the hits of "is graney" I looked through. - -sche (discuss) 08:45, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:39, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

mid hundreds

low hundreds, high hundreds

A number between 134 and 166? Who determines this? Equinox ◑ 15:16, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

While we're at it, I added RFVs to the two in the subheader. The specificity is silly, but if they weren't specific, we'd have to RFD them. They'll go to the gibbet either way. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 23:21, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

The terms inherently imply an unspecified number, and the current definition builds on the rationale that there are three terms, and the scale between 100 and 200 can be split in three parts with the limits being 133.333... and 166.666..., and the given definitions are rounded up or down from that. If it seems to be more appropriate to have a less specific definition, another alternative for low hundreds may be "an unspecified number between 100 and 199 that is rather close to 100 than 200". Or, as with dozens, "a large number".

I also noted an issue of "criteria for inclusion" on my talk page, whereof I think this has "clearly widespread use", which can be seen on googling low hundreds and high hundreds. Mikael Häggström (talk) 11:57, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

• The terms are in clearly widespread use. Whether specific boundaries can be stated in the definitions is unclear, but those stated make sense. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:45, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

These terms are the sum of their parts, anyway; one can also say "temperatures will be in the mid seventies (Fahrenheit)" or "his approval rating was in the low thirties", etc. New York Magazine has "A counter at the exhibit, set to zero on March 8, is now in the low three thousands." I agree with Metaknowledge that this should be listed on RFD if it passes RFV. - -sche (discuss) 17:13, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

I thought mid hundreds meant an interval hundreds wide, centered on 500. I guess it would depend on context, eh? DCDuring TALK 17:47, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

Or in degrees Fahrenheit 105 degrees ± 2, other interpretations being fatal, either quickly or slowly. DCDuring TALK 17:51, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

• Yes, the string of words is in widespread use- but using what definition? The problem is that low, mid, and high are relative terms, with their exact meaning depending on context, and on the conventional expectations of scale for the type of thing being measured. The current "definition" is a rule of thumb, not a definition. It may work for many cases, but it's not inherent in the meaning of the term.

It's already got two choices in the definition, but it would need more to be comprehensive: for instance, it's entirely possible that "hundreds" might be in opposition to "hundred-ten's", instead of "two-hundreds", so that low hundreds might mean 100-103 (or thereabouts). Also, if you split the categories, low mid and high mid might reduce the range of low, mid and high.

I think all one can say for sure is that low is lower than mid and high, mid is lower than high and higher than low, and high is higher than mid and low (try saying that ten times fast!). Attaching numbers to these is making them seem more precise than they probably are in most people's usage. Chuck Entz (talk) 19:22, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

I agree that the given numbers in the "definition" makes seem appear inappropriately precise, so I think it's a good idea to change the phrases into something that emphasizes the relative differences from the other entries. For low hundreds, perhaps it could be something like this: "an unspecified number between 100 and 199 that is rather close to 100 than 200, as opposed to mid hundreds and high hundreds", but perhaps there are other suggestions? "Hundreds" in this sense may theoretically refer to 100-109 or 100-900, which may deserve mentioning, but I haven't seen any such usage. Mikael Häggström (talk) 09:01, 7 July 2013 (UTC)

I've used this latter suggestion in those pages now, but further comments are still welcome. Mikael Häggström (talk) 07:50, 8 July 2013 (UTC)

Closed as resolved. The definitions have been made less specific. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:39, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

foxtrot

Rfv-sense bubble wrap. Seems ridiculous, but not quite a shoot-on-sight. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 23:18, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure how to filter it from all the uses of foxtrot, so I looked for "Foxtrot216", which this is supposed to be shortened from: not in Usenet or Google Books with anything like the definition given (hardly at all with any), and apparently only exists on the web as part of the definition- one would think something in use enough to be recognizable as an abbreviation would show up somewhere. Add to that the use of the military alphabet and random numbers in film industry slang, and the attribution of the term to an "Avant-garde documentary filmmaker" who's not notable enough to be even mentioned in Wikipedia, and it's hard to discuss with a straight face. I think this is just a lame attempt to get a certain name mentioned, and should be dispatched to oblivion forthwith. Chuck Entz (talk) 19:48, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

And it's been there for more than four years, inserted by an anon. DCDuring TALK 20:36, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 12:39, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

agency

Rfv-sense: "bond issued by a US government-backed entity, such as Fannie Mae"

I know that Fannie Mae is an agency, but could not find evidence of it issuing agencies. Or is this financial slang? --Hekaheka (talk) 07:11, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

It might be short for "agency bond", I suppose. I haven't found anything for it yet, but it's hard to filter out the other senses. Chuck Entz (talk) 07:18, 8 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

navicella

Rfv-sense: pod

— Ungoliant ^(Falai) 03:19, 7 July 2013 (UTC)

Unclear which sense of pod, but maybe pod as in a small watercraft? Mglovesfun (talk) 11:59, 11 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Obama's Law

Unsure how this should be treated. Most uses are mentions ("Dodd-Frank is known as Obama's Law in the Congo") and not first-hand uses - but given the current state of the Congo I don't think we can expect any first-hand uses in published texts. Also, does it pass SoP? I mean, we don't include Obama's Healthcare Law; is this much different? Hyarmendacil (talk) 10:52, 7 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

holophony

Rfv-sense:

• A musical texture in which two or more parts fuse into a single entity, as the synthesis of simultaneous sound streams into a coherent whole.

Actually, this is just what's left after I trimmed off a good bit of encyclopedic content- including a link to the coiner's home page (I don't think the IP who added this is same person, so I'm assuming it wasn't for promotional reasons). I couldn't find anything for this in Google Books or Usenet, but it seems to have been contributed in good faith, so I'm bringing it here. Chuck Entz (talk) 07:13, 8 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

crowdcontest

I suspect this may be real, but 1) I've only found one Google Books hit (dated 2013, so it may just be too recent), and 2) the definition needs to be cleaned up, which would need more information about usage to be done correctly. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:14, 9 July 2013 (UTC)

I have radically trimmed the definition because it was noodling waffle. I don't think this term meets our requirements at all. Equinox ◑ 01:38, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

I think you amputated a bit too much (it's hard to resist, I know, when you've got such a bloated mass of verbiage to start with). The term is an outgrowth of crowdsourcing, so it probably needs to include the idea of soliciting something of value from the participants. My version doesn't quite hit the nail on the head, either, though. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:29, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

codecessor

Nicely formatted entry and all, but the word seems to be a clear neologism. Nothing meeting WT:CFI that I can see. Equinox ◑ 01:35, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

Neologism? Perhaps. Nothing meeting WT:CFI? Not quite so; nothing is a strong word! Thanks for the formatting comment! :) I've intuitively used it in 3 or so peer-reviewed publications since 2008 where nobody complained of its non-existence. Google shows that there is another independent use. I hadn't known until last week of the word's status as I naturally assumed it exists; and was told I was understood what I meant. I've then done a search... Wiktionary's WT:CFI general rule "A term should be included if it's likely that someone would run across it and want to know what it means." motivated my inclusion of it here given that the publications exist using this word. I've also submitted an entry to m-w.com. Granted, it fails some of the attestation criteria; and also perhaps is a COI on my part; sorry about that. But I've explained my motivation to boldly put it in. If it's put down as a neologism at an RfD, let it be; I won't fight for it. I'll wait until it catches on (if ever)---I am a very patient man. :) Let the community consensus here decide. Peace.--Mokhov (talk) 14:46, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

By your own admission, the word is still a neologism, but let us know when you find other people using it. It's not really an antonym of predecessor; that would be the non-existent word "postdecessor". Dbfirs 23:15, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

I will surely let you know if more usage comes to be... :) However, I think "predecessor" is a correct ("near-"?)antonym since it is an antonym of "successor", which, in turn, is a synonym of "codecessor" as a "co-successor" :) I am not sure what "postdecessor" would be though unless it's a successor of a successor (or of a codecessor), which is redundant. I, however, digress... so I will leave the neo-semantic discussions at that. --Mokhov (talk) 23:35, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

If your neologism has an exact synonym in standard English, why not use the normal English word? Dbfirs 06:26, 11 July 2013 (UTC)

If it were really exact, I would have just used it as I am quite familiar with it. That's why I provided the definition of the intended meaning as: "A (technically) co-descendant notion or concept, but not necessarily a close sibling to concepts alike emerged around the same timeframe from the same or similar predecessor concept(s)." This is not an exact synonym of "successor". --Mokhov (talk) 13:46, 11 July 2013 (UTC)

Delete. Protologism. No usage found independent of Mokhov. SpinningSpark 09:49, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

It seems the RfV has transformed into the deletion debate, so perhaps it should be moved to the RfD section. Speaking of which, does Wiktionary have a practice to userfy entries like Wikipedia does? (BTW, there seems to exist one independent usage of me I could find at www.bsd.org.cn, but not widespread for sure). --Mokhov (talk) 13:25, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

This should remain in RFV; the vote "delete" above can be ignored. The question of whether this is attested is decided by our WT:ATTEST policy in conjunction with evidence. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:12, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Moved to User:Mokhov/codecessor per request above. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Viroidales

I see no evidence that this exists as a taxonomic term, nor that it exists with this capitalization in any language, thought viroidales seems to be an Italian inflected form. DCDuring TALK 15:00, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

unguiltness

Freedom from guilt. Note this is not the similar word unguiltiness. Equinox ◑ 18:46, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

Curiously, there is an entry for unguilt#Adjective, but not with the sense 'unguilty'. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:53, 11 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

akrobata

(Portuguese) correct spelling is Template:l/pt. This is an internet spelling at best, but I can’t find anything. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 01:59, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

cospobre

— Ungoliant ^(Falai) 03:49, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

female penis

I request attestation showing that "female penis" means "clitoris". This will be a bit tricky. A sentence saying "clitoris is a female penis" does not do for attestation, IMHO, as it is really just saying that "clitoris is a female analogue of penis", for some analogy. Furthermore, even if someone refers to clitoris as "female penis" without mentioning the word "clitoris" in the same sentence, this could be quite readily seen as sum of parts, but again, not as a penis that is female but as a female analogue of penis. --Dan Polansky (talk) 19:05, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

I'd say the current citation is definitely no good, it just says that guy thought he'd found a female penis (but was wrong). Mglovesfun (talk) 17:51, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

No, it's rubbish. The clitoris has very little in common with the penis anatomically or functionally. There are some hits on a Google book search, but they seem to be either mentions or sum of parts. SemperBlotto (talk) 18:18, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

As for relationship between penis and clitoris, there is W:Clitoris#Clitoral and penile similarities and differences. Some sources seem to claim homology between penis and clitoris, including http://facstaff.unca.edu/cnicolay/BIO108/108-11-sex-evol.pdf. --Dan Polansky (talk) 19:19, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

The penis (or at least the glans) and the clitoris develop from the same embryonic structures, and so they are essentially different versions of the same thing. So, yes, the clitoris can technically be thought of as a "female penis" to some degree. Actually, it'd be more accurate to describe the penis as a "male clitoris," since the embryonic starting point for both sexes is femalelike (chromosomal males congenitally insensitive to the male hormones that cause the differentiation of sex organs will end up with partially or fully feminized genitalia).

Whether people actually use the phrase "female penis" to refer clitorises is another matter. -Cloudcuckoolander (formerly Astral) (talk) 02:07, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

I wonder whether the pseudopenis of the female Spotted Hyena counts. —Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 07:25, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

cactussed

Nothing obvious on a Google book search. SemperBlotto (talk) 06:54, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Groups has this, this, and this. Here is a whole discussion. It's also spelled cactused, which may be the correct spelling (in Groups here, here, and here). "Cactused" shows up in Books here and here as a verb. The last seems to be a pretty good explanation of the origin of the term. In Groups, there's also this unambiguous use of the verb. We already have an adjective sense of cactus that goes with these. The main questions remaining are whether cactussed and cactused are adjectives in their own right vs. participles of the verb, and how we treat them as far as lemma, alt spellings, misspellings, etc. Chuck Entz (talk) 17:26, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Cited and moved entry to cactused, since that spelling gets more hits on Google Books. Cloudcuckoolander (formerly Astral) (talk) 09:28, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

Passed. Untagged by Cloudcuckoolander (talk • contribs). — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

laptop hobo

There are some citations at Citations:laptop hobo, but I do not think they are from durably archived sources. --Dan Polansky (talk) 20:43, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Cited. -Cloudcuckoolander (formerly Astral) (talk) 23:25, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Passed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

speak truth to power

Really? Maybe it is a US thing? SemperBlotto (talk) 07:15, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

Yes, it's a US (politically liberal) thing, but the usage here bears little resemblance to the nominated definitions. It has much more dramatic, heroic (detractors would say histrionic and melodramatic) overtones: speaking out about injustices and other wrongs in the face of powerful interests that want to protect them, regardless of consequences. Chuck Entz (talk) 07:48, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

The phrase originated as the title of a pamphlet made by the Quakers (Society of Friends) in 1955, concerning a Christian view of the Cold War. Since then it has become a vague cliche used by people of many different persuasions--left and right, political and religious, corporate and academic. It needs a solid definition or group of definitions in order to mean something. Rick Riffel (talk) 02:59, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Wiki has definitions for so many phrases, idioms and proverbs, and the definitions are usually objective. Some kind of definition is necessary for "speak truth to power", and "truth to power". I assume the latter can be spoken, heard, conveyed or done with in other ways. I also assume one can hear or see a truth to power where none is intended. Rick Riffel (talk) 22:00, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

I put some citations from this millennium on Citations:speak truth to power.

Of the two definitions we have, the second ("To reveal facts about an authority or a superior.") is not one I am familiar with and does not fit the citations I've found so far very well.

The early rhetorical use of this to dramatize the role of dissident seems to be losing its force as the term is now used to encourage corporate cultures of candor. DCDuring TALK 23:03, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

This search for "whistleblower" with the term probably would provide some support for the second sense. DCDuring TALK 23:09, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Passed. The citations page doesn’t mention which sense the citations refer to, so if anyone wants to remove a sense or merge the two, feel free. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

ѹньшиина

I'm not disputing the term itself but its spelling. The double и looks like it might be a mistake, especially as the head= parameter lacks it. Is anyone able to verify the correct spelling? —CodeCat 17:06, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

There is a reference in that entry for a reason [20]. The lemma form is a normalized spelling ignoring the typographical distinctions among the different symbols for /i/. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 18:18, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

Since I can't read the reference, what does it say? Why did you initially create this with the head parameter not the same as the page name. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:12, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

It's a dictionary of OCS in Russian (also translations to Czech and Greek are given in the headwords). On the page 741, right column, the third headword from the top is the lemma as above. The number in the parentheses (1) indicates how much attestations does this word have - only one. Its entry also contains an excerpt from Codex Suprasliensis (abbreviated as Supr, in Cyrillic that would be Супр) where this word is used. In the quotation the second /i/ is written with a diaeresis, and the normalized lemma entry contains simply two ии letters. The headword was different because I accidentally a letter, due to the haste in which these entries were made. Anyway, the entry should be moved to (deprecated template usage) оуньшиина (unĭšiina) per Unicode 5.1 (which was released after this entry was created..). --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 23:32, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

Would you happen to know anything about the etymology of the word? —CodeCat 23:39, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

It's from (deprecated template usage) ꙋнии (unii) which is listed on the previous page of the one linked above, with an attestation of (deprecated template usage) ꙋньшє (unĭše) in Supr, which would presumably be a genitive form, onto whose stem -ina suffix was added. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 01:27, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

I've moved it to the form with оу instead of ѹ. —Angr 19:25, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Passed. Untagged by CodeCat (talk • contribs). — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Caesar

Sense 2: "The government; society; earthly powers". I've never seen the word used in this sense, and I don't believe the biblical quote is supporting it; to me it just means "give to the Roman Emperor that which is the Roman Emperor's". Are there any other supporting quotes? Hyarmendacil (talk) 19:26, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

I'd just speedy delete it. It's quite a well known citation (I'm not even a Christian) where Caesar refers to the Roman Emperor. I can find the whole citation if anyone feels it's really necessary. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:06, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

It definitely refers explicitly to the Roman emperor (at one point Jesus asks, "whose picture is on the coin"). Theologically, that can be extrapolated into a statement on the relationship of Christians to any earthly authority, but that's on the level of ideas, not words. Using symbolism has no effect on lexicography- otherwise we'd have to add a definition to cover every well-known literary work that uses a metaphor:

Noun

happiness

1. A warm puppy.

Chuck Entz (talk) 22:27, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

This seems like a reasonable RfV. There might be some context in which the NT reference is used this way, as Judas/judas is in fairly broad contexts and Quisling/quisling was. DCDuring TALK 22:47, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

Possibly: “Christs come and Christs go, but Caesar is forever,” from a song I don’t remember. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 23:04, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

I've added cites that support the sense. It seems difficult to characterize the appropriate usage context. It is probably more common in religious contexts, but it is used outside of strictly religious contexts. DCDuring TALK 23:22, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

Why do you think "Caesar's laws" would support the sense 'the laws of the state' and not 'the laws of Caesar'? Mglovesfun (talk) 10:31, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

There is also Caesar non supra grammaticos. SpinningSpark 00:42, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

@MG: Because I took the trouble to exclude citations from translations of Latin works, from works about Roman history and law, from works about the New Testament and the history of the Christian church during the time of the Roman empire and to read the remaining citations to find those that did not in fact refer to the laws of Julius Caesar. DCDuring TALK 11:39, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Re: "to find those that did not in fact refer to the laws of Julius Caesar" it looks like they refer to the laws of Julius Caesar to me. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:41, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

If it really meant "the government" you should be able to use it in a modern context: Caesar capped benefits to £500 per household per week in 2013. Now I think about it, I don't even know what "The government; society; earthly powers" means. Sounds like three different senses on one line, and also I don't know what "earthly powers" means. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:58, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

There are lots of words that are only used in limited ways. A low-frequency word is intrinsically not part of most people's idiolect and therefore doesn't seem natural. An expression that is derived from a metaphor/metonym seems to inherit restrictions from its origin so that not all use seems apt. DCDuring TALK 22:25, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Consider a closely analogous case: sense 5 of crown:

"Imperial or regal power, or those who wield it."

Treasure trove automatically becomes property of the Crown

One can hardly say: "The King sought to increase the Crown" though one could say "The King sought to increase imperial power." That might be a criticism of the definition, but I doubt that any definition that captures most of the usage is going to also capture the restrictions on apt usage without losing legibility and intelligibility. DCDuring TALK 22:37, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

You've prompted me to expand our entry. - -sche (discuss) 02:19, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Looking at a random selection of entries, it's hard to find a definition that, on close inspection, doesn't need improvement. I wish improving English entries based on lexicographic standards coincided with more people's interests here. It only sometimes corresponds to mine. DCDuring TALK 02:55, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sating such a thing is impossible, just this, Caesar, seems not to be used this way. Mglovesfun (talk) 20:45, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

I have four citations in which it is used that way. Would you like to discuss them? DCDuring TALK 21:24, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

The 1957 one is especially good, IMO. I think this sense is plausible. I don't think Chuck's "warm puppy" is analogous, because I don't see citations like "I hired someone to feed my happiness while I was on holiday" or "I petted my happiness". - -sche (discuss) 03:42, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Passed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

præférence

I tried some misscan spellings, but no luck so far. ‘Præ‐’ spellings, in early modern French’s case, tend to be excluded to the 17th century. Also, many of the spellings that use é’s today lacked é’s back then. --Æ&Œ (talk) 20:52, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

kiwanja ya ndege

This was entered by a user with no knowledge of Swahili and seems spurious. A mistake for (deprecated template usage) kiwanja cha ndege, most likely (that would literally mean "the airplanes' plot of ground"). —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:12, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

tembo-bahari

Protologism at use in sw.wikipedia, but not in durable media AFAICT. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:27, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

kulungu aktiki

Same as above. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:30, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

elki

As above. If it exists, I assume it means "elk", not "moose". —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:32, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

In European usage, elk is the moose. The wapiti (the US elk) is sometimes considered conspecific with the red deer, which is the main species referred to as deer in Europe without a qualifier (the other species are the roe deer and the fallow deer. This apparently is the result of the most common US deer (the white-tailed deer) having no counterpart in Europe, so it took over the word deer, displacing the wapiti, which took over the word elk. This left the original elk as the loser in this game of musical chairs: it ended up with a borrowed American Indian name. This is sort of like the phonological concept of a w:chain shift, but applied to the lexicon. Chuck Entz (talk) 05:14, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

nguva aktiki

As above. I hope there aren't too many more of these... —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:34, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

It's valid! Sw-wiki has a page, and there's a cite here. It appears to be an alternate or dialectal name (?) If no-one here knows Swahili, I can do a more-or-less decent cite using Google translate. Hyarmendacil (talk) 09:22, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Sorry to crush your hopes, but that's not how RFV works. See WT:ATTEST. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 16:08, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Ah, sorry, I thought Swahili was an LDL. Hyarmendacil (talk) 05:30, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

No, Swahili doesn't need that. Real words (actually used, unlike this) aren't too hard to cite, IME. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:36, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

slothu

As above. This is just ridiculous. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:36, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 13:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

mume

This is not a Latin adjective. I am unwilling to accept this. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 05:06, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

I agree. The specific epithet in taxonomic names is, by definition, either an adjective in the nominative case, a noun in the genitive, or a noun in the nominative, in apposition. This would seem to be the last of the three, so even if you accept the assumption that taxonomic names are Latin, this would still be a noun in the nominative case, not an adjective. I'm not so sure it's a case for rfv, though. It's probably best to just convert it to a translingual proper noun, and forget about Latin. Another problem is that apricot is a mistranslation. The species in question (w:Prunus mume) is sometimes referred to as "Japanese apricot" (when it's not called a "flowering plum"), but it's not the same as the true apricot (w:Prunus armeniaca). Chuck Entz (talk) 05:39, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Move to Translingual DCDuring TALK 01:04, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Closed. Language changed to Translingual, POS changed to noun and definition changed to {{rfdef}} (per Chuck Entz’s comment). — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

zoutch

"zoutches" and "zoutching" get no hits. The hits of "zoutch" that aren't gibberish seem to be mentions. The first few hits for "zoutched" are actually hits of "water-zoutched". - -sche (discuss) 05:46, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Most of what I found were about people named Zouch, and the place called w:Ashby de la Zouch. There was this, but it refers "water zouch", in what seems to be a noun sense. It's a bit more than a mention, though. Chuck Entz (talk) 08:57, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

倩

Rfv-sense for "cia'2" (Teochew) POJ reading. This doesn't look like a Pe̍h-ōe-jī reading to me and it isn't cited. Bumm13 (talk) 17:55, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

yellow dog

Rfv-sense "socially conservative and economically liberal person". - -sche (discuss) 22:15, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

I share your skepticism. I never heard it. I don't know how to try to cite it. DCDuring TALK 23:08, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

US Political term: ref. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_dog_Democrat –Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 23:55, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Yes, but that isn't the definition which is subject to RFV. - -sche (discuss) 00:34, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Oh, of course. Yes, I see the problem. From looking around, I see that Yellow Dog has split into two meanings, politically. One is generalised from "would vote for a yellow dog if it was on the Democrat ticket", and means anyone who would rather vote for the worst possible option in party X than anything in party Y. Attestations include this on FreeRepublic for "Yellow Dog Republican", although this is immediately challenged on the ground that "Broken Glass Republican" is correct. (Can't use any term which is tainted by association with them... whoever "they" happen to be.)

On the other hand is the idea that the Yellow Dog Democrats are an ideological subset of Democrats with a definable set of attitudes beyond being "rusted on". eg. this from 2003, especially in contrast to the "Blue Dog Democrats", who started out with a particular ideology. But even then, it appears to be used as meaning socially and economically liberal, as opposed to the (relatively) socially and economically conservative Blue Dogs. I suspect this use comes from not long after 1995, in reaction to the Blue Dogs who were founded to espouse more conservative ideologies and attempt some sort of rapprochement with the Republicans.

I wonder if there is some sort of "... Dog" bloc, united generally by social conservatism but divided by economics, per [21]. That would explain the extant wording of that sense in the entry. Pure speculation, however.

All use of "liberal" and "conservative" are, of course, in the US political senses, which may or may not have anything to do with liberalism and conservatism as defines ideologies (as opposed to tribal markers).

But you're also right that this looks to be non-trivial to disentangle. Does anyone know a scholar of US Political Science to ask? –Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 01:44, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

gain- words

gainbuy

The metadata attached to the two quotations which are currently in this entry is wrong: they're both from the same work (google books:"gainbuy man" demonstrates this) and that work is centuries old. It seems, in fact, to be the same work by Richard Rolle, translated by Misyn, that was the only one to use the RFV-failed spelling gainbuy, as pointed out by Visviva on Talk:gain-buy). - -sche (discuss) 21:16, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Who says we don't have PoV-pushing at Wiktionary? DCDuring TALK 23:17, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai)

againbuy

All Google Books hits seem to be, upon inspection, instances of "again buy", instances of "again" in one column of a page and "buy" in an adjacent column, or typos or scannos of "again by". The entry previously contained one citation, but it was spurious: the metadata was wrong (the work was from ante 1910, not from 2008) and the quotation itself used the two words "again buy", not a single word meaning "redeem". - -sche (discuss) 21:22, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

gainset

RFV-sense of the current definition, "to set against, to oppose". "Gainset", "gainsets" and "gainsetting" appear to mean something in the context of audio engineering / sound technology, but I can find no support for the current def. The only citation in the entry is from the Middle English period. - -sche (discuss) 01:23, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

I've added an EME citation (1594) in form of gainsetteth. Leasnam (talk) 12:55, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Passed as Middle English. Post-1500 citation moved to Citations:gainset. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

gainyield

AFAICT, this term has only been used once: in the 1300s by Richard Rolle. - -sche (discuss) 01:25, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Per NED, the noun is attested thrice in EME (and Scots); the verb, however, may be as above. Leasnam (talk) 14:04, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Readded as Scots. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

gaingive

Mentioned by one or two dictionaries but never used, AFAICS. - -sche (discuss) 01:26, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

gaincover

It's mentioned in the Handbuch der englischen Wortbildungslehre, and it's present as a rare scanno of "gain cover", but is it ever used? - -sche (discuss) 01:28, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

gaincall

This word is quite rare; I've put a couple of citations on the citations page, and a few more are available via google books:"gaincalling"... but many are Middle English or Scots. I'd be surprised if six modern English citations exist, let alone if enough citations exist to support all six of the definitions the entry currently has. - -sche (discuss) 01:57, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

The second cite is definitely Scots IMO, but the first cite isn't genuine Middle English. Don't let the date fool you; it's grammatically modern, must be a translation or scribe's copy from post-1500ish. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 02:03, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

A word translated from earlier English (i.e. Middle or Old English) into Modern English and kept (--not swapped out for a different word) is the same as a use, correct? The transcriber could have easily used recall, but chose use of gaincall instead... Leasnam (talk) 13:24, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

gaincope

The only citation I can find is the one in the entry. That means we're 1/3 of the way towards attesting 1/3 of the senses... - -sche (discuss) 02:42, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Citation moved to Citations:gaincope and word added to Appendix:English dictionary-only terms. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

gaincome

The citation which was in the entry was actually Middle Scots. There's a lot of noise/chaff on Google Books. This term might be just barely attested, though. - -sche (discuss) 03:04, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. I’m not so sure the cite is Middle Scots though. Looks like slightly dated/dialectal English or at least modern Scots, despite the original date. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:20, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

with-child

This is probably attested as a variation of the phrase "with child"... not as a verb! - -sche (discuss) 02:55, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

it is a verb derived from the phrase "with child" Leasnam (talk) 14:07, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Citation moved to Citations:with-child. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

with- words

withdrive

RFV of the "repel" sense. Of the six citations currently in the entry, the first doesn't make sense to me, the second (minus a stray comma) actually does seem to use the current definition, and all the rest are errors for "withdraw" — in one case, the speaker immediately corrects themselves and says "withdraw". On which note, should we add a sense like "{{context|nonstandard|rare in the present tense}} to [[[withdraw]]]]"? - -sche (discuss) 03:36, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Bit removed from the definition. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

withturn

This has only one modern English citation, and I can't find any more. (Following the ISO, we define anything from before 1500 as Middle English; see Wiktionary:About English#Etymology.) I suggest it be moved to (deprecated template usage) withturnen as Middle English; the MED has several citations of both senses of that word from the 1400s. - -sche (discuss) 05:04, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Moved to withturnen and converted to Middle English. Post-1500 citation moved to Citations:withturn. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

withgang

None of the inflected forms get any hits, and most hits of "withgang" are Middle English, Scots, mentions, or scannos of "with gang". - -sche (discuss) 06:49, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed, sadly. The entry was very well formatted. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

I've preserved most of the content by converting it to a Scots entry; it does seem to be attested in Scots (it may also be attested in Middle English). - -sche (discuss) 19:53, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

withjoin

Has one Middle English(?) citation of the split spelling with Ioyne, and one old but modern English citation of withjoyne. I can't find any other citations, though I may have missed something in the sea of scannos of "with join(s|ed|ing)". - -sche (discuss) 07:00, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Moved to with Ioyne and converted to Middle English (perhaps should be with Ioynen or some other spelling. I’m not familiar with Middle English). Post-1500 citation moved to Citations:withjoin. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

withnay

AFAICT, it's mentioned in a few dictionaries, used in a couple of Middle English works ("withnay her fruyt" in ?Palladius?, "withnay thou never my rueful boon" in Pearl), found (spuriously) as a scanno of "with, nay" and "with - nay", and...that's it. Must we withnay it entry into our dictionary? - -sche (discuss) 07:00, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

withsafe

I can't find nay use of this at all, even as a Middle English word. I didn't try that many variant spellings, though. - -sche (discuss) 07:09, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

withseek

- -sche (discuss) 07:12, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

capitol

Rfv-sense: The building in Washington, D.C., where the Congress of the United States meets.

What are some of the lowercase uses of this sense? How many are they in comparison to those of Capitol? --Dan Polansky (talk) 14:12, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Is the temple of Jupiter in Rome really a common noun? Mglovesfun (talk) 16:20, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

I've added that sense to this RFV. I think both the "template" and the "Congressional building" senses belong in the majuscule entry. - -sche (discuss) 23:35, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Temple of Jupiter sense moved to Capitol. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

manga

Rfv-sense: (countable) A comic originating in Japan, regardless of the artistic style.

I seek attestation of English sense referring to any comic originating in Japan. Other online dictionaries do not seem to have this sense; see also “manga”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. The questioned sense was introduced in diff on 7 April 2011. --Dan Polansky (talk) 14:31, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Oh wow. I can't believe I need to do this.

• Merriam-Webster : a Japanese comic book or graphic novel
• Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary Japanese comic books that tell stories in pictures
• Online Etymology Dictionary "Japanese comic books or graphic novels,"

And that's just dictionaries that add no qualifiers to the definition - those that do still define manga as Japanese comics first and foremost. Like, for example:

• Collins a type of Japanese comic book with an adult theme
• MacMillan Japanese comic books or cartoons with stories that often contain a lot of sex and violence
• Longman Japanese comic books. The pictures in the stories usually go from right to left in the same way as Japanese writing, and the characters often have very large eyes

I also searched Google Books for good measure, and never mind the results - its search algorithm will just outright substitute "Japanese comics" for "manga".

This is a frivolous nomination and it must have taken an enormous amount of carelessness to let it go through. If anything, the entire English section needs to be rewritten to stop giving undue weight to definitions that most users of the word would find incorrect. Squeal (talk) 08:59, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

So cite it. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 10:37, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, you have given us several references (mentions in dictionaries) but we need citations (actual uses in the real world). SemperBlotto (talk) 10:39, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Once again, this is a frivolous nomination based on ostensibly false argumentation and I'm pretty sure the "clearly widespread use" clause is in the rules for the exact purpose of stopping people from wasting their time citing every word listed (not to mention stopping people from wasting other people's time demanding citations of everything). But fine, just this once. I'm not going to run away from an opportunity to make a point. Squeal (talk) 14:15, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Several times I've been surprised when people here express doubts about words that seem rather ordinary to me, like “androgynously”. But don’t consider attesting them a waste of time. Doing so enriches our dictionary with more examples, making it better. ~ Röbin Liönheart (talk) 00:35, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Santalusia

Swahili Tbot entry; doesn't actually seem to be used. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 16:52, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 14:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

plough

Sense 2 of plough: "(US) A horse-drawn plow (as opposed to plow, used for the mechanical variety)". I have never heard or seen that American English distinguishes two senses of /plaʊ/, spelling it plow to refer to a mechanical one and spelling it plough to refer to a horse-drawn one. I'm pretty sure it's always spelled plow in en-US for all meanings. —Angr 16:08, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

• I've seen (deprecated template usage) plough used in Am En, but only as a semi-archaic-looking variant of (deprecated template usage) plow, and never with any distinction in meaning. Sense 2 sounds fishy to me. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 20:11, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

At COCA plough is still used in contemporary English, but, after excluding use in proper nouns (The Plough and the Stars, w:Schering-Plough, the constellation, etc, totalling 1/3 - 1/2 of uses), it seems more often used in historical contexts and fiction, where indeed it often refers to horse- or ox-drawn ones. In any event, COHA shows that plow has progressed from 5% of total usage (plow + plough) to majority by 1900 to 80-90% of usage over the last fifty years.

I would characterize current US use of plough as literary and historical. DCDuring TALK 20:36, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Label (literary or historical in the United States) added to first sense. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

kuketo

Sense 1 of kuketo

Out of all the sources that I've found for this entry, 99% of them say this word means cupcake. I can find virtually no sources that say that this means HTTP cookie or anything of the sort. Maybe someone else will have better luck than me? Otherwise, I'd say to delete the first sense and keep the cupcake translation as that is the valid translation according to more than 10 sources. Razorflame 22:04, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

amuser

RFV-sense "Rogues who carried snuff or dust in their pockets, which they threw into the eyes of any person they intended to rob; and running away, their accomplices (pretending to assist and pity the half-blinded person) took that opportunity of plundering him." - -sche (discuss) 07:48, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

This sense seems to be directly taken from Barrère and Leland's Dictionary of Slang, Jargon and Cant (1889, p.37 s.v. Amusers):

• Amusers (English and American), thieves, who formerly used to throw snuff or pepper in a victim's eyes, while an accomplice robbed him, under pretext of rendering assistance.

Farmer & Henley's Dictionary of Slang and Colloquial English (1927, p.10 s.v. Amuse) has:

• ... Whence amuser, a cheat a snuff-throwing thief; one that decieves. (Ash and Grose)

And Eric Partridge's Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English (2013, ed Beale) has:

• amuse, in late C.17–18 c, is to throw dust, pepper, snuff, etc., in the eyes of the person to be robbed; an amuser is one who does this. B.E.

–Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 08:08, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

It's a special usage of a general older sense. We've had this discussion before at amuse (see here). I've taken the liberty of replacing a specific usage in one work with the more general older sense of which that was a special case. Technically, this is almost covered by sense 1 since the most of the meaning is given at the amuse entry. I suppose we could add dozens of particular slang senses, but I think they are all covered by the older meaning. Dbfirs 11:52, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

...later ... Sorry, in my rush, I'd removed the template before allowing further discussion here. I've restored it as sense 3, but I suggest that this sense be deleted, or used as an example of sense 2. Francis Grose was a satirist, and seems to have introduced this specific meaning partly as a joke, though there's no doubt that the word was used to describe such thieves, and others who used similar techniques. Dbfirs 12:13, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Personally, I think it should stay, even if marked as obsolete or archaic. While the derivation from the primary sense of amuse to the specific one of someone who uses distraction as a cover for theft is obvious enough when shown, it's not necessarily clear without specific mention. It's clearly derived, but it's just as clearly specific and distinct. I would like this sense back in the entry for amuse as well, for the same reason. Even if as a subsense of one of the existing senses. —Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 12:24, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

We could certainly extend the sense, or add the Francis Grose as a citation to illustrate usage. As I mentioned, I don't think Grose intended it as a serious definition, but others might have taken it to be so after 1785. Dbfirs 12:38, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for clearing up the definition, Dbfirs. As for the "sandy" sense: as per usual RFV practice, it can stay iff there are words that use "amuser" with that sense, distinct from the general sense that's just been added. - -sche (discuss) 19:15, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

• 1993, Stella Cameron; [Only by Your Touch] p.88

  "He should have knowed better than to tangle with you, Miss Lindsay. Where did you learn to be an amuser, then?"

• 2013, Michelle Lovric; [The Remedy]

  "Valentine watches the bunch of amusers close around the politician, the leader already dipping into his pocket for the snuff to fling into the eyes of their victim."

I did a search for anything likely in Google Books between 1750 and 1900, and found not a damn thing... as I suspect Dbfirs predicted. But the previous two cites show that even if no-one at the time used the term in anger (or at least, not in print), it is now used retroactively for period flavour. I even tripped over a mention of the term being used in the movie Gangs of New York. —Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 10:13, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

Yes, Francis Grose seems to have had more influence than I had expected. In view of your excellent research, I reverse my opinion and agree that we could have a third archaic slang sense. Dbfirs 13:25, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

Seems we allow cites from durably archived non-written material, a Gangs of New York citation would be fully acceptable. Mglovesfun (talk) 22:41, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

Quotes for Bill 'The Butcher' Cutting (Character) from Gangs of New York (2002)

Boss Tweed: I don't know. I think maybe we should hang someone.
Bill: Who?
Boss Tweed: No one important, necessarily. Average men will do. Back alley amusers with no affiliations.

Will that do? —Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 08:49, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

It fits the general sense 2, and might, or might not, be intended in the Francis Grose sense. Dbfirs 09:59, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Passed. Citations added to the entry; since every cite is recent, I changed the label from obsolete to historical. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

1811 dictionary words

sell a bargain

Cant sense. - -sche (discuss) 19:20, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

arch duke

Rfv-sense "comical person". - -sche (discuss) 19:24, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. I’d expect it to be an alternative spelling of archduke, but every cite I could find capitalises it as Arch duke or Arch Duke (and even these are rare, with the hyphenated or joined spelling being much more common). — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

ard

RFV-sense "hot". The only uses of "he was ard", "it was ard" I can find use it as an aitch-dropping form of "hard": "he was 'ard of hearin'", "it was ard, real tough", etc. - -sche (discuss) 19:27, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

autem

I don't see anything on the first several pages of Google Books searches for "an autem", "autems", "to autem", "at autem", "in autem" that seems to support this sense. - -sche (discuss) 19:38, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

alderman

RFV-senses "a turkey" and "a potbelly". - -sche (discuss) 04:39, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

Sense 2 converted to say it is only used in alderman in chains and alderman hung in chains, both trivially citable. Sense 3 failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

trap (verb)

RFV-sense "To crossdress convincingly as a female." I'm not sure how to search for examples of this. See also the old RFV of the noun, above. - -sche (discuss) 21:13, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

Googling for "crossdress trap" gives many results. More if you turn off SafeSearch. (Many more, and very NSFW.) Is the request specifically for the verb sense? I would note that the noun definition is kind of messed up right now: Sense 12 gives a sporting definition, but an example for the otherwise missing crossdressing sense. Which sense is still listed amongst the translations. —Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 21:28, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for catching that. - -sche (discuss) 22:12, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

I suspect that it's not that no-one could find attestations, but that no-one looked. (It does basically come down to googling transvestitism and recording that you did so.) From what I can see, "trap" as a noun meaning specifically "a crossdresser or pre-operative transexual who passes as female" is widespread and common (in the appropriate circles).

Here: have some links from the first page of the google results (SafeSearch on):

• http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20121010183054AAFRQ3V

  "16 Year Old Becoming a Trap/Crossdresser?"

• http://forum.gamerage.com/grandchase/forums/p/144905/2070106.aspx (playing on the "trap=crossdresser"/"Its a trap!" pun)
• http://reignofanarchy.blogspot.com.au/2010/09/difference-between-traps-crossdressers.html

  "The Difference between Traps, Crossdressers, and Transvestites"

• http://trap-cafe.com/index.php?topic=681.0 (the website is even named "trap-cafe")

  "...and having a girlfriend who likes traps and help me in make up, borrow her clothes..."

More examples are available for the searching. —Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 22:24, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

None of those citations are durably-archived, though. I did try searching for examples in Google Books, but found nothing. There might be citations on Usenet, though. - -sche (discuss) 22:35, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

Also those aren't for the verb trap, these are clearly for the noun. Mglovesfun (talk) 22:36, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

If this passes, how are we going to explain the lack of a noun sense? That'd be a rather glaring omission. —CodeCat 22:38, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

Too hypothetical for me to answer. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:15, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

I suspect this usage is new (within the last couple of years), and hasn't had time to get into enough printed works for it to show up on Google Books. And that Usenet is of diminishing use for this sort of thing these days. (The cool kids are all on web fora now.)

Yes, the examples are all for the noun sense: I submit that the noun sense is, despite no-one proving so here, well understood and widely used. As a verb, I suspect only as a back formation from the noun. —Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 22:44, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

I checked Usenet for "trap" and all its inflected forms + crossdresser and crossdress and all their inflected forms. All the uses I found were of other senses of "trap". I have previously checked books. Neither the noun nor the verb seems to be used outside of a few web fora. It seems to be simply too rare to be includable. - -sche (discuss) 23:23, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

I strongly disagree. It appears to be widely used and understood in the LGBTQ scene. It is not showing up in books because it is too new. It is not showing up in Usenet because Usenet is simply not useful any more for newer words -- it has over the last few years become largely moribund. When you say "a few" fora, they are fora for crossdressers, transvestites and transexuals. I submit that this term is a known term of art in these communities, and is known outside of it. And no, I'm not going to do more searching on this topic while I'm at work. I'll have another look this evening, and try and get a better handle on what the concept "permanently recorded media" means when the definition excludes precisely those locations where this term is found. I presume you're not claiming that the term is not widely used in the relevant communities, much less that it is not used at all, just that it's not in the predefined allowed references? –Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 00:00, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

I am indeed stating that the term is apparently not used in the sorts of durably-archived media that are allowed by Wiktionary rules (books, magazines, journals, Usenet, songs, films)... and efforts to revisit our rules to allow web fora have been opposed by people who note that it would open the floodgates to all kinds of spelling and other errors. - -sche (discuss) 00:33, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

... in a way which allowing Usenet does not. (My irony meter just exploded.) I'll have another look when doing so won't get me fired or arrested. –Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 01:42, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

2008 https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/transgender-news/WOPR0F3ZomE/discussion

• "The disturbance started over the word trap. Until recently, I was completely unfamiliar with any use of this word to mean transgender or transsexual people." ... "A couple of younger people in my twitterverse have used the word trap in this way. One trans woman self-identifies as a trap."

That's all I could find in Google Groups, which I must say is a pale shadow of what it was. And I'm surprised to have found so much, because, like I said, this term gained currency since greater Usenet became moribund.

I dunno if this is any common. Usually one would say pass, the respective sense of which I added a while ago. -- Liliana • 21:44, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

From what I've seen, it does not appear as a verb. trap appears as a noun, with a number of qualities, one of which is the ability to pass. So all the above is less a defence of the verb sense (which I think does not apply and can safely be deleted), and more of a "hey, I didn't even realise this sense was going to be deleted from the noun until it had been!" –Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 05:06, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Eurotrash

RFV-sense "A controversial style of modern opera focusing on sexuality and the sociopolitical." The linked-to WP article has been deleted/redirected, and google books:Eurotrash opera turns up hits for the other two senses, but not AFAICT this. - -sche (discuss) 23:17, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

The search string eurotrash regietheater seems to get what you need. w:Regietheater is where the Wikipedia link redirects to. But note that the contributers to this forum thread argue that Eurotrash and Regietheater are not synonyms and Eurotrash cannot even be defined simply as bad Regietheater. SpinningSpark 00:17, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

I had tried google books:Regietheater Eurotrash, actually. IMO all the hits there use sense 1 of Eurotrash (that is, they're dismissing Regietheater as low-quality or low-brow entertainment), not a separate operatic sense. - -sche (discuss) 00:45, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

boxo

Portuguese. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 04:58, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

Portuguese Wiktionary does have it... as Galician! Wonderfool entry, probably entered without due care and attention, just delete it? Mglovesfun (talk) 10:33, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Note that the Galician entry in the Portuguese Wiktionary does not mention this sense. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

ngeli

Inaccurate meaning for one thing, but this word doesn't exist at all AFAICT. It seems to be a confusion with a tense marked by the infix -ngeli-. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:27, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

What do you make of these: [22][23][24]? There are quite a few cites with this as a standalone word. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

apothecary's bill

Seems to only be used when referring to actual apothecaries' bills, or when saying something is "as long as an apothecary's bill", which doesn't show "apothecary's bill" to be idiomatic. - -sche (discuss) 19:49, 26 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. I spent some time looking for citations, and all I could find were these: [25][26] (and I’m not sure they are for this sense). — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

arbor vitae

RFV-sense "penis". google books:"his arbor vitae" turns up exactly one hit. - -sche (discuss) 20:04, 26 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Citation moved to Citations:arbor vitae. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

das

Translingual -- Liliana • 22:54, 26 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

mank

RFV-sense "man milk" (supposedly literal milk from a male's nipples, as opposed to (deprecated template usage) man milk). - -sche (discuss) 05:52, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

I'll note that it links to the deleted page w:Baby Mank, which isn't exactly a vote of confidence for the reliability of the word.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:29, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

That used to be a redirect to the list of characters on Wonder Showzen, which suggests mank may have been used only on that show, in which case it would need to meet WT:FICTION. —Angr 15:32, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

Having done a pretty extensive Google Books search, I find nothing at all. There is clearly a surname, Mank, although even that is probably not particularly widespread. bd2412 T 00:45, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

cℓ

dℓ

ℓ in the sense of "symbol for the liter" failed RfV, so these should go as well. -- Liliana • 09:23, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

ℓ as liter shouldn’t have been deleted. It is used at least in Japan. See the entry of U+3397 (㎗) in the Unicode document CJK Compatibility (3300–33FF), and you’ll find that it is equal to U+0064 U+2113 (dℓ). — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 05:37, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

Another source for the cursive ℓ for litre : [27]. — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 00:57, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

Both failed. Even if ℓ as liter were to be kept, these would need their own citations. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

adult

Rfv-sense "A person who lives outside the parental home." That may be part of the connotation of being an adult, but it's not a separate meaning. If a 35-year-old still lives with his parents, you can't say he's not an adult, except under the No true Scotsman fallacy. —Angr 15:28, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

I don't think this definition fits. Certainly an 8 year old at boarding school is not under any definition an adult, any more than a 37 year old who lives with his parents is not.

There is, however, probably room for a legal sense or two; as someone declared an adult for legal purposes. (ie, tried as an adult, or of someone legally emancipated from their parents before legal majority.) Probably should include the normal legal definition as well: someone over the age of majority (18 or 21, usually). This legal sense is not exactly congruent with the biological one: biological adulthood is a gradual onset, whereas legal adulthood is something you do not have at 23:59 on the day before your birthday, and do have a minute later. –Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 00:03, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

I think it's total nonsense: added in this edit along with "A person whose parents are deceased." which has already failed this process. What next, "a person who is five foot or taller?" Mglovesfun (talk) 10:11, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I'd just have deleted it, but I suppose we have to wait to see if anyone finds some obscure usage that suggest this meaning. Dbfirs 08:30, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Failed. Incidentally, a legal sense could be added for people above the age of majority. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

alotropa

Needs three independent uses spanning more than a year. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 20:49, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Humm..I could only find one source for this word. When I added it, I thought there where a lot more. I'll go ahead and ask for this page to be deleted. Razorflame 21:27, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Closed. Speedied by Metaknowledge (talk • contribs). — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

ngeli (English)

Whoa, I didn't realise that there was an English L2 on this page as well. See #ngeli above. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 20:52, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Well the pdf on the page does use it. Is that really a published work? I can't vouch for it. Also if it's just an error surely a published error isn't protected by "all words in all languages" because it is nevertheless not a word in any language. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:31, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Cited. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

муравей

Rfv-sense: a special motorcycle with three wheels. To me this just seems like a brand name of a motorcycle, like e. g. Vespa. No proof of generic use is given. -- Liliana • 21:26, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

It's just because of the funny name for a motor scooter people use it in the lower case all the time and often as an animate noun, jokingly calling it an "ant", rather than Muravey. "Я купил себе муравья" rather than "Я купил себе Муравей". - (I've bought myself an ant). There are heaps of Google hints in this usage. I haven't checked Google books. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 08:33, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

It’s good. You can see one at ru:w:Муравей (мотороллер). —Stephen ^(Talk) 09:23, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

Liliana is questioning lower case usage for the brand name, if I understand correctly.

Insects are animate nouns in Russian, motor scooters and their names are usually inanimate, "муравей" is a notable exception (inanimate lower case is also OK). Besides, this type of scooters were called "муравей" even when the actual model names were different. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 09:33, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

The Wikipedia article above capitalizes it as Муравей (Muravej) throughout. Mglovesfun (talk) 10:01, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

Hmm, three cites were added, but it seems they're all in quotation marks? So it seems people don't really consider it part of the lexicon. -- Liliana • 12:50, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

They do, very much so. In books they put quotation marks to mark another meaning of "ant". Similarly, to how the oldest w:Zaporozhets car is called "горбатый" ("hunched", "hunchback", see the top picture to understand why), a type of bus "гармошка" (a small Russian button accordion, see entry), "бобик" (name of a dog) - a type of jeep. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 13:40, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

I think it has now been cited, but the encyclopedic information ("some models were called differently...") can be removed. --Vahag (talk) 19:43, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps worth noting that models officially called differently, colloquially are still called "муравей"? --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 21:11, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

OK, that may qualify as a dictionary information. --Vahag (talk) 13:46, 31 July 2013 (UTC)

This brings to mind the w:Volkswagen Beetle, which is often referred to as simply a "beetle" or a "bug". I wonder if we should have entries for those. Chuck Entz (talk) 14:33, 31 July 2013 (UTC)

That's a good analogy. The best I could come up with is hoover/Hoover. Yours is better. Mglovesfun (talk) 14:38, 31 July 2013 (UTC)

Passed. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 00:45, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

alotropo

Per #alotropa above. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 22:33, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Cannot find any sources to verify this term. Will mark it for deletion. Razorflame 03:05, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

• RFV failed; no quotations at Citations:alotropo and at alotropo; deleted on 30 July 2013 aparently on the creator's request. --Dan Polansky (talk) 12:50, 14 September 2013 (UTC)

non-verbal leak

I had deleted the entry as a protologism, but the creator sent me an e-mail saying it has been used since the “70th” (70ies I assume) and provided this link, which has a few PDFs of articles from periodicals. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 00:14, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

All those links seem to be by, or about Goodfield so don't seem to meet CFI as they are not independent, even assuming they meet the durability criterion. If the term is used only by one person it is still a protologism even if he has been using it since the 70s. SpinningSpark 10:37, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

I think if we can three different cites from three different authors, that's enough. Even if the cites refer to one of the other authors. But they have to be non-mentions too. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:54, 31 July 2013 (UTC)

Cited. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 18:22, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Passed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 09:48, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

*g8

-- Liliana • 18:24, 31 July 2013 (UTC)

I just failed *fish as uncited since January 2013. There are other suspect ones in Special:Contributions/194.83.24.240, *t for example, it might be real but searching for it would be almost impossible. Anyone care to vouch for it? Mglovesfun (talk) 21:34, 31 July 2013 (UTC)

Hmm?? This seems like a random abbreviation to me. Sure people use it, but only when theyre trying to write quickly. I mean sometimes I write "Switz" or even "Sw" for Switzerland and everyone knows what it means but no one would expect to find them in a dictionary as variant forms of Switzerland. Soap (talk) 02:27, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

August 2013

ueber

Is this really German? I would assume that in Germany the character "ü" is always readily available, and the spelling "ueber" would be used by speakers of other languages whenever they have the need to write "über". If this is indeed considered German, then we would potentially need an entry for every word with "ü" in it: gruen, fuer, Muehle, Fuehrer. ... --Hekaheka (talk) 18:15, 1 August 2013 (UTC)

I think they should be turned into redirects or leave as "alternative spellings". In any environment where Umlaut is not available (it's rare now), letters "ä", "ö", "ü" and "ß" are spelled "ae", "oe", "ue" and "ss". The German Wikipedia mentions this possibility but says that it's not possible to do it with Finnish or Estonian, that's possibly why the confusion. "ae", "oe", "ue" and "ss" are also sometimes used for transcribing German words/names into other Roman based languages, especially "ß" (when "ß" is written in all caps, it's always written as "SS", e.g. spaß -> SPASS). That's the official rule, although in English letters "ä", "ö" and "ü" are often replaced with "a", "o", "u", so "uber" is not German, but "ueber" is still German.

Re: we would potentially need an entry for every word. No need to create them on purpose, IMO. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 02:49, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

Just a little mention here (in German): Darstellung von Umlauten (representation of umlauts) --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 02:57, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

It's worth noting that some old words may have "oe" and others as the correct and the only spelling, like Goethe (pronounced as "Göte"). --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 03:02, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

See WT:T:ADE#dafuer. The spellings with "ss" instead of "ß" must be allowed as soft redirects, because they're standard in Switzerland. The spellings with "ae" instead of "ä" are more debatable... I would be inclined to make a special alt-form-of template that either includes or links to a note about the circumstances under which they are used, and use it on entries like this. But I wouldn't go out of my way to create them... - -sche (discuss) 03:26, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

I reformulated the entry according to the lines discussed in connection with "dafür". Please have a look and comment. --Hekaheka (talk) 04:31, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

I think a separate usage note is too wordy; I've compacted the information into a simple template and exhibited it in [[dafuer]]. - -sche (discuss) 05:56, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

I like the template. Can it also add to some umlautless category? --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 06:41, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

It might be worth mentioning in the template that the use of ue etc. instead of ü is also found in archaic spelling, e.g. [28] and s:de:Lutherbibel/Lukasevangelium (1546)#XI. (verses 11 and 12). (While searching for examples, I came across this book which always uses ae, oe, ue instead of umlauts but nevertheless uses ß correctly, resulting in such perverse spellings as vergroeßern.) —Angr 15:05, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

@Angr: I've worked a mention of archaic use into the template as best I could; feel free to improve the wording.

@Anatoli: what would the use of a category of umlautless terms be? - -sche (discuss) 01:18, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

@-sche. On a second thought, I don't think it would be too important. "German alternative forms" would do just fine. There are too many reasons for misspellings or alternative forms. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 01:24, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

Kept, modified to use the "when umlauts aren't available" template. Trivially citable. - -sche (discuss) 20:06, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

scolapasti

Italian: (US, slang) Alternative spelling of scolapasta. (a colander)

-- DCDuring TALK 16:02, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

Well, there are exactly 3 Usenet cites that use the form, all as a singular [29], though it'd hard to be certain from the quotes what the definition is, or whether it fits the geographical context given. Two of them seem to be based on the idea that a crazy person would wear it on his/her head. Given the context, it could be a deliberately wrong form used for humorous effect. I think someone who speaks the language well enough to catch the nuances would need to look at these. Chuck Entz (talk) 18:23, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

Oops! I missed the obvious reference to Pastafarianism. Chuck Entz (talk) 18:48, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

kotataberry

This doesn't seem to be attested. "Kotata" by itself gets one good hit and a couple of possibly passable hits. - -sche (discuss) 00:41, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Ameriginal

The etymology is bizarre (Latin + Middle English for a designation of Native Americans?) and nothing on Google Books suggests that the word even exists. - -sche (discuss) 02:07, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Amerigines

As above. - -sche (discuss) 02:08, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Note Talk:Amerigine and Talk:amerigine#RFV_.E2.80.94_failed. These protologisms were added by one user in 2008. - -sche (discuss) 02:12, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

I've cleaned up the etymology to make sense, but if "Amerigine" has failed RFV I fully expect "Ameriginal" to do so as well. —Angr 09:30, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

RFV-failed, deleted. - -sche (discuss) 20:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

ask for it

Discussion moved to WT:RFD#ask for it.

emperrado

Noun. Looks very unlikely to me, but I don't know any Spanish. Hyarmendacil (talk) 06:59, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

• I don't know any Spanish either, but a priori what's so unlikely about a noun meaning bower or arbor? —Angr 09:36, 4 August 2013 (UTC)
• Not in Spanish Wiktionary. Google translate doesn't know it. No obvious hits (in Spanish or Portuguese) for the noun sense in Google book search (though an adjective exists). SemperBlotto (talk) 09:42, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Moved to Template:l/es, the correct spelling. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 18:50, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

teleshopping

Rfv-sense: Shopping by means of a computer network.

I don't think this is how the term is used, based on my review of usage. The main meaning seems to be something like "home shopping in response to television, especially infomercials and home shopping channels." Sometimes this is extended to include internet shopping, but not very often. But I may have missed the right additional search terms to get the challenged meaning, which is in any event not something I've heard in the US. DCDuring TALK 11:35, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

• See also WT:TR#teleshopping. DCDuring TALK 11:56, 4 August 2013 (UTC)
• At present, sales revenues of offline teleshopping still greatly outnumber those of online teleshopping. Based on the most recent available statistics, the sales revenue for offline teleshopping, including telephone marketing, TV, and radio, totaled an estimated $529.1 billion [30]

• There are those who believe that it is teleshopping via the Internet which represents the channel of the future as opposed to PC-based Internet usage. [31]

• In particular, shopping refers to a set of activities in which consumers seek and obtain information about products and/or services, conduct a transaction transferring ownership or right to use, and spatially relocate the product or service to the new owner. Teleshopping, in turn, refers to a case in which one or more of those activities is conducted through the use of telecommunication technologies. Today, much attention is focused on the Internet as the technology of interest [[32]

• Teleshopping includes searching for vendors, comparing prices, browsing vendor Web sites or electronic shopping malls with multimedia displays of products, and selecting and ordering products [[33]

• Teleshopping requires a telephone connection, either to call in an order orally or by fax, or to place an order while surfing the Web. [[34]

• Tele-shopping allows users ot shop from the comfort of their homes. For example, a user with a computer and Internet access can connect to a database server to browse a multimedia catalog and order products. [[35]

SpinningSpark 14:13, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

I would regard this sense as dated in current usage, having been superseded by "internet shopping". Dbfirs 16:44, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

It feels dated to me, reminding me of videotext/viewdata/teletext, but some of the business/sociology/regulation usage seems relatively current DCDuring TALK 17:20, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

These excellent citations argue for a sense that includes both internet and television broadcast, not for one that excludes television, as the challenged sense does. The usage that excludes internet shopping, including only television-based home shopping also seems to exist, though possibly limited to business people, as perhaps all the senses are. DCDuring TALK 17:16, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

shambari

Does not seem to exist in either English or Japanese. There's a presumably unrelated word Shambari which seems to be a mythical Indian person, and an Indian surname. Mglovesfun (talk) 16:00, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

It's definitely a word, it's out there on the net. Whether it can be cited or not is another question altogether. By the way, the ety is not "Japanese", it is sham+shibari. SpinningSpark 18:23, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

I would challenge the second sense though. It is covered by the first sense and the cite has no quote. I cannot find the publication from the info given either. SpinningSpark 18:40, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

匕

Rfv-sense for first Vietnamese reading, as it's not from Nôm Foundation like most of these readings are that aren't from the Unihan Database. The second reading is from the Nôm Foundation site. Bumm13 (talk) 19:48, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

夂

Rfv-sense for first Vietnamese reading, as it's not from Nôm Foundation like most of these readings are that aren't from the Unihan Database. The second reading is from the Nôm Foundation site. Bumm13 (talk) 05:18, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

hala

An old Hawaiian Pidgin entry, converted to English. I don't know, it's just that phrases in Hawaiian get lifted now and then but I'm not clear that this works as a word on its own with that meaning. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:24, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

викифицировать

Quite doubtful. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 19:22, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Why is it doubtful? --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 20:08, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

• RFV passed. No further input in almost two months. It's neologism, like in English. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 03:55, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

yiffest

Alternative spelling of yiffiest. How is that even possible? The final -y of yiffy can't just disappear, or can it? Mglovesfun (talk) 15:10, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

Note that the creator of this entry also made this edit: [36]. Looks like dodgy guesswork. Equinox ◑ 15:17, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

I've never heard of "yiff" being used as an adjective. It's either a noun or an interjection in my experience. —CodeCat 18:09, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

Or a verb in the Furry scene, I understand. —Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 20:42, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

It's almost certainly an error resulting from confusion between yiff as an attributive noun ("yiff drawings") and yiffy as an adjective. The two words are both distinct, but they certainly shouldn't merge with each other just by adding a suffix. I'd say that "yiffest" seems wrong to me but could have some use as a nonce word the same way you'd say "I got an orange smoothie" ----> "yeah, well I got an oranger one" (where orange is a noun but is reinterpreted as an adjective in the second sentence). Soap (talk) 18:35, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

har

{{wrongscript}} was reverted for reasons I don't understand. As such, an RfV will have to do. -- Liliana • 22:22, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

The Latin alphabet was used to write Tatar at two different points in history, and the letters h, a and r made it into the alphabet both times, so har’s script seems OK. It may, however, not be citeable, so RFV does seem like the appropriate forum. - -sche (discuss) 19:26, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

I've set all the other Tatar terms tagged with {{wrongscript}} to point here; all must be citable per WT:CFI. Mglovesfun (talk) 10:06, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

They should be linked to from here or else people won't find them. -- Liliana • 11:36, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

Ok, looks like I gotta come to rescue again:

yaratu‎

töpesinde‎

töpesi‎

töpege‎

töpeden‎

töpede

töpe‎

tiş‎

süzlek

süküt‎

curd‎

belän‎

aba‎

a voce‎

But you're gonna have to put in the links yourself. I certainly won't do that. -- Liliana • 21:30, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

I used |fragment=har, so na. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:40, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

I've formatted the <pre>-coded section above, which is I think what Liliana meant by "put in the links". - -sche (discuss) 01:34, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

I can't confirm the existence of "хар" (Cyrillic) or "har" (Roman). Both references are invalid, they are not not about Tatar. Snow in Tatar is кар (qar). --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 01:24, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

süküt, töpe (and deriviatives), tiş and some others are not (Volga) Tatar but Crimean Tatar. Delete [[a voce‎]], curd - bad entry and invalid references. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 02:11, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

Moved some of the listed entries, which I was able to confirm to Crimean Tatar, reformatted. If happy with the move, please remove rfv/rfd tags. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 02:45, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

rank

Ety#2 sense#2 (chess) one of the eight horizontal lines of squares on a chessboard [the corresponding term for a vertical line is "file"].

In what way is this distinct from ety#2 sense#1? I would be surprised if there are any quotes out there which can make a distinction between senses #1 and #2. SpinningSpark 11:11, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

It is a subsense of sense 1. “rank”, in OneLook Dictionary Search. shows that the fuller dictionaries have either a sense or a subsense for the chess (and checkers) sense. DCDuring TALK 15:47, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

So do we have a formatting style for sub-senses? SpinningSpark 18:26, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, we can use indentation to make it sense 1.1 rather than sense 2. I've done so. Equinox ◑ 18:41, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. Striking request. SpinningSpark 19:50, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

Subsense is probably underused. It can make our longer PoS sections a little more comprehensible. DCDuring TALK 21:33, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

Having recently encountered one of the shorter Oxford dictionaries (I don't know the official name but it's bundled with the Amazon Kindle e-book reader), I agree: they manage to combine tiny snippets of useful encyclopaedic information with a very terse and hierarchical format for definitions. Equinox ◑ 21:55, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

The question Spinningspark raised about what citations would support the existence of a subsense is interesting. I find it difficult to address. Presumably one would need to find attributes or combinations of attributes unique to the subsense supported by the citations. I'd be inclined to follow the lemmings if the word is used in the context claimed, because the difficulty in finding citations unambiguously supporting distinct attributes is quite high. If no other dictionary has the subsense, then we need to face the problem creatively. DCDuring TALK 22:05, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

It is very easy to find chess related cites and such a subsense undoubtedly exists. I have chess books on my own bookshelf which use the term repeatedly. No, my original request was not for cites to support a subsense, but cites that support a separate sense altogether. I suppose it is still an open question what counts as a sub-sense. Should we have sub-senses for a body of soldiers?, police on parade?, ships in a convoy? All easily citable. Maybe the chess sense is different because it refers to the squares of the board rather than the pieces arranged on it. SpinningSpark 08:06, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

That's what I was trying to say. For "existence", read "distinct, separate existence". Your conjecture might be right. Sometimes I don't even notice such common metonyms. DCDuring TALK 12:38, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

cupcake

RFV of the verb, which was RFved previously and failed, but was re-added recently. It's been a while since the last RFV, so more citations may have become available. Some are in Citations:cupcake, but: the Big Bang and Information Week citations support an intransitive sense meaning "fail", while the Network citation seems more like a transitive verb meaning "crash". All three are from the same year. - -sche (discuss) 00:56, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

I don't know if you noticed but this edit removed a 2012 citation that is not on the citations page. This (just barely) gets a span of a year. SpinningSpark 09:00, 10 August 2013 (UTC) to 10:04, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

I removed that citation because I can find no evidence that it is real rather than made-up, and it seems like it was faked (or perhaps genuinely written or transcribed) by someone who didn't speak English: "a obsolete", "can lengthy"... - -sche (discuss) 23:47, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

The publication CFO Weekly Briefing does seem to exist but is not published online. I would be inclined to assume good faith and that the quote is poorly transcribed. However, there could be some question of whether these newsletters are durably archived (they are sent out by e-mail), or even archived at all. SpinningSpark 09:59, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

This cite [37] does not exactly support the given definition but would seem to be related

• His aides—if they're any good, and I'/code>, so na. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:40, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

m sure they are—have acquired my identity hours ago and cupcaked me through half a dozen mil/pol databases in the time he and I have been away on the moors.

Not sure what it does mean though. SpinningSpark 09:58, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

Since "mil/pol databases" can't be found anywhere in a Google search, I suppose it's made-up "hacker" jargon. He must have got "cupcake" from somewhere though. Equinox ◑ 12:58, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

mil/pol is obviously shorthand for military/police- not a standard abbreviation, but the kind of thing one might do to save typing. Cupcake does seem out of place, though. Chuck Entz (talk) 13:49, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

Agreed on mil/pol. The quote is from a work of fiction so one would not necessarily expect real databases to correspond to those in the plot. The characters are not expected to be real people after all. SpinningSpark 18:17, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

dag

Sense: to think. The normal word for "think" is (deprecated template usage) dink and there is no cognate of this verb in Dutch either. —CodeCat 18:45, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

It's perfectly real, and there is a cognate in Dutch, namely (deprecated template usage) dacht. Not surprisingly, this verb was originally an imperfect, and still sees its principal use thus. But now I have to go and rustle up citations for you... —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 19:04, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Cited. It looks like it's a bit archaic, but I don't know enough Afrikaans to be sure. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 19:17, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

What you cited is the past participle, which isn't what I'm disputing; the archaic preterite seems ok too. But is "dag" ever used as a present tense or as an infinitive? In other words, does it deserve a lemma with its own set of inflections? —CodeCat 19:56, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

It isn't. (Well, maybe colloquially, but it's hard to weed those uses out.) But as you may not have noticed, I put a context label on it to indicate that. So the sense itself is fine, because the past participle can't be a past participle of anything other than (deprecated template usage) dag. It's like finding three citations of "he metaknowledged" — that could only be the past tense of an English verb "to metaknowledge", so it's sufficient for attestation. A preterite can't have a past participle, so there needs to be another sense. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 20:18, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

One of the books you cited in fact says that (deprecated template usage) gedag (as well as (deprecated template usage) gedog) is an alternative form of (deprecated template usage) gedink and therefore the past participle of (deprecated template usage) dink. There is no such infinitive as (deprecated template usage) dag, this is just an irregular past participle. —CodeCat 22:05, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

That's a weird way to think of it, because of course it's not a "real" alternative form, but I guess I don't care enough to argue it, and admittedly I can't find present tense uses. We should have a usage note at (deprecated template usage) dink to explain all this and you can move the citations somewhere, not sure where. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:49, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

lewe

The verb. As far as I can tell, the normal form of this verb is (deprecated template usage) leef and that's the form that would be etymologically expected as well; I don't think any Afrikaans verbs end in unstressed -e. If this exists, is it a full lemma, or just a single form? —CodeCat 19:08, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Please stop tagging these. I would call this cited on the basis of common use - just look at google books:"om te lewe". —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 19:19, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

makrosporangio

Ido. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:46, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

That isn't a valid request for verification if you don't provide a reason for wanting verification. Razorflame 22:54, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

On the contrary, one doesn't need to specify a reason for wanting verification; the implicit/default reason is that the RFVed word seems unlikely to be attested in the language in question. (If a user posts a lot of RFVs in a short time, especially for terms that can clearly be demonstrated to be in use, some or all of the RFVs may be speedily closed, but that isn't what's happened here.)

I assume MK checked and found the same thing I've found: that this term is listed in a couple of dictionaries, but doesn't seem to have been used anywhere durable. - -sche (discuss) 23:26, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

Implicitly any request refers to what is laid out in Wiktionary:Requests for verification/Header. Mglovesfun (talk) 15:20, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Both this section and the below section have been deleted. Razorflame 03:57, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

mikrosporangio

As above. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:52, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

That isn't a valid request for verification if you don't provide a reason for wanting verification. Razorflame 22:54, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

kiloöhm

Afrikaans technical protologism. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 05:09, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

I don't see how kiloöhm is any more of protologism in Afrikaans than kiloohm is in English. —Angr 10:26, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

I don't know about Afrikaans, but this is far more dubious as an English spelling. Although one cite is given, it could easily be a typo/scanno. Neither de:Georg Ohm nor the unit de:ohm take an umlaut, even in German. I would like to extend the RFV to the whole entry. SpinningSpark 11:05, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

I think the trema is indicating diaeresis, not umlaut. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:14, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

@Spinningspark: Well it could only be diaeresis. You can RFV the whole entry if you like, but then you should best create a new section.

@Angr: It's more of a protologism because English (deprecated template usage) kiloohm is actually used, and Afrikaans (deprecated template usage) kiloöhm hardly at all. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 15:57, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

Really? What do Afrikaans speakers call the kiloohm then? Just kilohm with one O, as SpinningSpark says English-speaking electrical engineers do? —Angr 14:34, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

A quick search of Afrikaans Wikipedia shows only "kilo-ohm" (probably not much help, as it is a pretty minimal -pedia). SemperBlotto (talk) 15:08, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

That would seem more likely in terms of Afrikaans orthography, although I don't know if that's citable (I'll try). Unfortunately, Afrikaans is not a language used much for science and scientific terms may be rarely used for the sam reason that normal day-to-day conversation rarely uses them. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 15:15, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Well, I checked, and I came up with two cites at Citations:kilo-ohm, one of which is durable and the other seems to be a non-durable copy of a durable work, but I'm not quite sure. I also found a couple cites here, but I don't know if they're durable. So somebody ought to look these over and if they find three of these cites that meet CFI, we can move the entry to kilo-ohm. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 15:32, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Is Afrikaans an LDL? If so, it would be sufficient to find it in a dictionary, which is quite plausible. Considering it's a language of instruction at several universities and doubtless numerous technical universities/technikons, it ought to be findable in electrical engineering textbooks (though I suspect that, as in English, the abbreviation kΩ will be orders of magnitude more common). —Angr 16:21, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

It’s not, I’m afraid this will need three uses. I’ll try to find some, Afrikaans is pretty cool. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:28, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

No luck. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:19, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

What do you think of the kilo-ohm cites? (See my last comment in this thread.) —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 19:49, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

kiloöhm

Opening separate thread for English as suggested above. Unlikely spelling in English. The diaeresis makes sense, but I have been an electrical engineer for more than forty years and have never seen it used. EEs never pronounce it this way in any case, they always say kilohm. At the very least it should be marked archaic. SpinningSpark 18:34, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

Google Books, Groups and Scholar all get nothing. I can't even think where else to look. Mglovesfun (talk) 09:52, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Oh it's a Doremítzwr entry; he's become famous since he stopped editing for making stuff up, especially archaisms that look right but aren't actually used. Mglovesfun (talk) 09:55, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

I could see the New Yorker using this spelling (do they have searchable text archives?) That wouldn't make it standard though. DTLHS (talk) 17:13, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

tábąąh jádí

Are there any non-protologistic entries in Category:nv:Antelopes? —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 06:51, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

I think you missed the fact that this appears in the Navajo Wikipedia. I can see sources for this, those few. I don't think that this needs verification. Razorflame 22:56, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

The Navajo WP doesn't cite any sources, though, does it? Articles on other Wikimedia sites do not in and of themselves verify terms. The Navajo editors over on nv.WP may have made the term up—and the Navajo may be fine with that, but we don't accept terms in any language until they've entered some kind of use, or at least been mentioned somewhere durable. After all, if this term is only used in the nv.WP article on the animal, it's not the case that "someone would run across it and want to know what it means". - -sche (discuss) 23:19, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedias make up all sorts of terms. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 23:39, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

Agreed, Metaknowledge hasn't 'missed' it's appearance in Wikipedia, just its not relevant. Other Wikipedias use protologisms. Mglovesfun (talk) 09:49, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

warwood

Moved from RFM. Original posting:

Fictional-universe only term, should be Appendix:Moby-Dick/warwood. See also Talk:cryptex. Mglovesfun (talk) 09:31, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

—Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 21:50, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Moby Dick is a well-known work. Are we sure this is a nonce word? — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 22:40, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Melville may have had a specific species in mind: there's a pair of Proto-Polynesian roots that happen to be homophones in many of the Polynesian languages: one for brave/warrior and the other for a tree with dark-colored, very hard wood (originally w:Casuarina equisetifolia, but transferred to w:Acacia koa in Hawaii). He's known to have spent time in w:Nuku Hiva, w:Tahiti and w:Hawaii, all three of which have the pair of homophones in question.

Even so, it looks like the term itself is his own coinage: perhaps for the exotic, "primitive"/"tribal" imagery, and perhaps to avoid using foreign names like koa or toa. There's a Warwood place name/surname that muddies things up a bit, so I can't be completely sure- but I haven't been able to find anything outside of Melville. There's a reference in a description of scrimshaw repeated verbatim in several books, (only available as snippets), but it could easily be borrowed from Melville. Chuck Entz (talk) 07:23, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

I've added two citations. Presumably this just means something like "wood that is used for war". DTLHS (talk) 22:51, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

The Moby Dick citation is independent of the other citations that DTLHS and I have found. It apparently refers to a specific, but unknown, type of wood, whereas war-wood is a kenning meaning "spear" or "shield,"[38] used in translations of heroic poems like Beowulf. I've moved the citations for the latter sense to Citations:war-wood, since it only occurs in that form. -Cloudcuckoolander (formerly Astral) (talk) 15:10, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

• This [39] quotes Melville with the unhyphenated spelling; "...little canoes of dark wood, like the rich warwood of his native isle."
• From [40]

By and by, nor spare a sigh

Though worlds of warwood leafmeal lie.

• I have also found "sweet warwood" in a patent [41] but I guess this is an error for "sweet wormwood".
• SpinningSpark 22:12, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

Yes, it's an error for sweet wormwood. That, along with sweet annie and annual wormwood are by far the most common common names for the species. It looks like a spellchecker error, except I can't imagine it's common enough to show up in spellchecker dictionary files. Very odd.Chuck Entz (talk) 01:19, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

More likely a simple error from a non-English speaker. SpinningSpark 12:39, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Engornät

-- Liliana • 19:28, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Croton

The entire English entry with the following def:

1. {{context|New York City|historical|lang=en}} The main water supply pipe to a building or apartment

I suspect this is a response to usage that mentions a "Croton" supply to buildings, which I would argue is merely an attributive reference to the Croton aqueduct, and to the water, not the pipe. In the same way, I might refer to the DWP supply to the apartment building where I live, without needing to define the pipe as a "DWP". I don't really want to spend the time at the moment to sift through the evidence to be sure, so I'm bringing it here.

I should also mention that this was originally given a proper-noun POS, which is inherently incompatible with the definition, and that it also contained a separate etymology with a noun that was an exact copy of the translingual section. I came very close to just reverting the whole edit. Chuck Entz (talk) 01:33, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

There might be room for an English L2 section for Croton as a toponym, for the river, watershed, etc. I don't think that we would do dams, aqueducts etc. I can't imagine that someone is willing to do all the work that is probably required to engage in a probably futile search for attestation of the challenged sense.

BTW, Dewap would be attestable as "A bond issued by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power". DCDuring TALK 12:39, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

I found one cite that almost supports the existing sense: an NY Times article (1879) referring to a broken Croton pipe. I'm guessing that the search range could be temporally limited to between 1840 and 1939, but more recent fiction might use it to add historical flavor.

Since we seem to like proper nouns so much, I'm willing to add and cite the metonomic sense of Croton as something like "the NYC water supply". DCDuring TALK 18:56, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

It's not much fun to try to cite things when the JS for displaying quotations doesn't work. DCDuring TALK 19:24, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Try hard-refreshing. Our ULS killer with many random innocent victims has been removed. I am working on a new version with predictable mass innocent victims. Keφr 19:29, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Hard-refreshed, cleared my cache: No joy. DCDuring TALK 21:49, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

I see. It works if I have no cache at all: FF private window. DCDuring TALK 21:53, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

But only for a few minutes. DCDuring TALK 22:44, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

I seem to be having a problem with this particular page, but I haven't isolated a cause. Nothing seems wrong on the page. DCDuring TALK 14:21, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Problems may be solved. Who knows why? Though I copied the WebFonts killer from Keφr's js. DCDuring TALK 20:27, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

come round

Rfv-sense: To make a regular circuit.

What day does the garbage man come round?

I don't think this is distinguishable in real usage from another sense "To visit one's home or other regular place". DCDuring TALK 14:00, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

To me there are some connotations of stopping at a place as part of a regular run or circuit, for example, the bus coming round to pick people up, or the postman coming round, or the district nurse coming round to check on grandma. But maybe you're right: maybe it is the same sense as "Want to see my new driveway? - Yeah, I'll come round for a look." If so, the "other regular place" part of the definition needs to be clarified. This, that and the other (talk) 09:25, 25 August 2013 (UTC)

I think I didn't state my objection clearly. My problem is that the usage example could easily fit the sense "to visit someone's home or other regular place".

In "regular place" I would include place of work, study, or regular attendance, a neighborhood, a club, etc. I don't know what other words would help, but would be happy to hear suggestions. DCDuring TALK 11:32, 25 August 2013 (UTC)

goroto

I'd say that this in practically nonexistent: not in my dictionary, not even in any wordlists, no hits on bgc or ggc. Whoever closes this, don't forget to delete the plural too. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 19:46, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

mirror polisher

RFV on the single sense of "A " who engages in mirror polishing"; the generic sense of one who polishes mirrors is a sum of parts. If this fails RFV, please remove it from WS:female homosexual. --Dan Polansky (talk) 11:47, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

See mirror polishing for the lesbian connection. DCDuring TALK 18:20, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

I'd say that, according the current definition of mirror polishing, two bisexual women or a bisexual woman and a lesbian, or generally, two women with whatever sexual orientation, rubbing eachothers vulvas, are also mirror polishers. If the "mirror" doesnt only refer to "mirrored" (as in "same sex") genders rubbing, males can also be mirror polishers. --80.114.178.7 19:58, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

curious

Rfv-sense - bisexual. SemperBlotto (talk) 21:17, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

I changed the definition to bicurious Pass a Method (talk) 08:59, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

flexible

Rfv-sense - bisexual (noun). SemperBlotto (talk) 21:19, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

The citation just added (2012, Mary Elizabeth Dallas: "We can now finally argue that a flexible sexual desire is not simply restricted to women") in my opinion does not support this sense. The sexual desire is not bisexual itself; it is merely flexible (willing to vary) in the standard sense. Equinox ◑ 07:56, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

I can't any other sources so you can delete it if the 2006 source is found insufficient. Pass a Method (talk) 08:19, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

See also heteroflexible and the WP entry. Apparently, flexible is to be distinguished from bisexual. — Xavier, 21:34, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

wife's best friend

Request attestation per WT:ATTEST. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:18, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

Everything in Google Books seems to be shake hands with the wife's best friend (humorous slang for going to urinate, possibly Australian). Equinox ◑ 01:09, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

piece of pork

I request attestation per WT:ATTEST. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:19, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

There are 3 cites on the citations page now (thanks to User:Cloudcuckoolander). So, cited. Equinox ◑ 11:46, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Hespanha

I forgot why I included the Occitan form; I can’t find a mention of this in other Wiktionaries. I guess that I miraculously found it in Google books, but which exact book, I do not know. --Æ&Œ (talk) 21:37, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

kkk

RFV of the Korean section. I doubt this is actually used in Latin script; the correct entry would be at ㅋㅋㅋ. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:51, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

imporsa

Any takers? SemperBlotto (talk) 16:11, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

I've notified the user in question. Mglovesfun (talk) 09:48, 25 August 2013 (UTC)

I think the words comes up in some old west coast folk songs, but as these songs were passed on by word of mouth, I cant find anything on paper. Hope this helps.

semi

Verb sense: (Wiktionary and WMF jargon) to semi-protect. SpinningSpark 22:00, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

w:Talk:Chelsea_Manning/Archive_5#Semied Fiskjuice (talk) 14:45, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

That page doesn't meet WT:CFI#Attestation, so we still need three more citations. Mglovesfun (talk) 15:33, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

klika

The slang section (separate etymology and senses) of klika, added without comment/source, is quite surprising to me. I was unable to find those meanings in on-line “Hantec dictionaries” (nor I have heard them before, but that obviously proves nothing). So I’d like to have it attested somehow. --Mormegil (talk) 17:51, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

transreption

All I can see on the web are some dictionary definitions that use the exact same wording. Some examples of actual usage please. SemperBlotto (talk) 07:10, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

The single result in Google Books is https://www.google.com/search?q=%22transreption%22&btnG=Search+Books&tbm=bks&tbo=1 where it uses the term in anger exactly once:

• "Since this is a somewhat silly example, I've used the active:ncodeToString tool to provide the simplest transreption available for any Java object: turn it into a string."

Frankly, almost every instance I see in Google search is related to NetKernels, which makes me suspect it's mainly a specific jargon. There are, however, traces around for wider use, as http://www.isocat.org/files/archive.html

• "2010-4-7

  The 922 revision provides the following functionality:

  ● worked around the Relax NG transreption error"

... Ah, there's http://www.infoq.com/articles/netkernel-intro, which contains what might be the source of the term:

• "However, at the logical level, code is not aware of physical level types. This leads to a new concept called transrepresentation. If a client requests a representation type that an endpoint does not provide then the microkernel can intermediate. When a mismatch is detected, the microkernel searches for a Transreptor that can convert from one type to the other.

Transreptors turn out to be very useful. Conceptually, a transreptor converts information from one physical form to another. This covers a significant amount of computer processing including:

...

The key point is that this is a lossless transformation, information is preserved while the physical representation is changed. [...]

In addition, transreption allows the system to move information from inefficient forms into efficiently processable forms, for example, source code to byte code. These transitions occur frequently but only require a one-time conversion cost and thereafter can be obtained in the efficient form. In a formal sense, transreption removes entropy from resources.

So we have evidence as to the etymology of the word (contraction of transrepresentation), and some evidence that it's used in the wild, but not a lot, and probably not that would survive the standards for verification.

-- Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 07:32, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

transrepresentation

Rfv-sense - sense as above. This word does actually seem to be used in the real world, but with a meaning relating to transsexuality. SemperBlotto (talk) 07:13, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

ye'l

Obsolete form of "ye'll". No matches in Google Books for ye'l be. Equinox ◑ 08:36, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Nahuatl

Rfv-sense: "(US politics) All persons descended from pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Western hemisphere." Seems awfully unlikely to me. —Angr 10:22, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

I'm not entirely sure what this even means. Would that include Irish, Welsh, English (and so on) people that predate Christopher Columbus? I suspect I'd be part of the Nahuatl in that case, admittedly I don't know my family history that far back, but it's absurdly likely (probably 100% in statistical terms) that I would meet this definition. Mglovesfun (talk) 20:59, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Don't be disingenuous; it's clear enough what the definition is trying to say, namely that "Nahuatl" is a term used in U.S. politics synonymously with Native American, American Indian, Amerind, First Nations, etc., but perhaps including the Eskimo and Aleut (who are usually excluded from those terms). But I've certainly never encountered this usage and find it rather difficult to believe. —Angr 22:09, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Wasn't disingenuous; it says "Western Hemisphere" rather than "the Americas". It comes across to me as being very deliberate. It doesn't look like words chosen at random to me. Mglovesfun (talk) 22:15, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

See sense 2 of Western Hemisphere. —Angr 22:19, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Going on further, does it really mean "all persons" like a collective noun, "the Nahuatl" (like the French, the Irish) or "a person". If the latter, move the sense to Nahuatl#Noun. But that's if it's attested of course. Mglovesfun (talk) 22:23, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

• Sounds like pure tosh. Sans cites, kill on sight. If a citation can be found, I suspect that this usage will ultimately be tracked back to one poorly educated (or deliberately obtuse) politician who misused (misuses?) the term. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 22:46, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

FWIW, that sense was added by Geoffreybard (talk • contribs) in this edit. After his first (logged-in) edit on 2011-02-13, he was very active for the rest of that February, markedly less so the following months, with his last edit in June 2011.

Randomly checking another of his other edits, I see potential for problems... c.f. arahant, where he misunderstands and mischaracterizes the meaning of (deprecated template usage) bodhisattva (and which he initially also misspells). ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 23:02, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Cursed second law of thermodynamics! Mglovesfun (talk) 23:04, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Probably not completely tosh. I suppose some Mexican nationalists might claim that they speak for all the indigenous peoples, by virtue of being descended from one group of them. Still, I have my doubts they would use the term itself in this way. Cites will tell. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:02, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Appendix:Proto-Indo-European/swer-

Only Germanic descendants are given, which isn't enough to establish this as a root of PIE origin. It also doesn't really establish it as a root at all, because there is only one descendant word, not several with related meanings. However, the "what links here" list does show that other entries also link to this, so the entry may be valid, but incorrect or incomplete. —CodeCat 16:45, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Seems the main Germanic stem is represented by Template:term/t and Template:term/t, with Template:term/t being a derivative of the latter. Would Avestan xvara count as a cognate? Leasnam (talk) 19:02, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

How would rfv even work for an unattested word? Would we have to look for examples of the word not being attested? If so it fails to appear in every text ever, so it's clear widespread use (literally every durably archived piece of writing ever). What I'm really saying is this isn't an RFV matter. Mglovesfun (talk) 20:51, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

It doesn't have anything to do with attestation but with verification. I am asking others to verify the correctness of this entry. —CodeCat 21:01, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

You haven't read Wiktionary:Requests for verification/Header, which is a bit frightening if even you haven't read it. Has anyone? Mglovesfun (talk) 21:03, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Now that this thread has started here, I guess it can stay here, but in general I'd say the etymology scriptorium is the place to discuss the accuracy of reconstructed forms. —Angr 22:01, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

I think we've had these at WT:RFDO before. I don't see by what criteria we're supposed to assess validity though. Reconstructed forms really need their own CFI as obviously if they meet WT:CFI#Attestation then they're not reconstructions at all. So, by what criteria? Mglovesfun (talk) 22:17, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

ブルマ#Etymology 2

I'd like to request help finding citations for Japanese ブルマ used to mean “winter solstice”, as a borrowing from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Latin (deprecated template usage) bruma. I found a mention on page 3 of this PDF, but no proper usage quotes as of yet. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │ Tala við mig 23:51, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

The etymology (from the Latin (deprecated template usage) brūma) suggests that it may also be spelt (deprecated template usage) ブルーマ (burūma). I'm so meta even this acronym (talk) 21:51, 1 September 2013 (UTC)

groupos

Dunno where to start really. I can see one attestation here for Groupos. The link in the entry, apart from not being durably archived, makes Groupos look like a company name. Again in the link I found, it looks like a company or a product name. There are lots of scannos for groups and grupos (Spanish) but possibly nothing that backs this up. Also is there a singular groupo/Groupo? Mglovesfun (talk) 16:23, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Might be a trademark originally — I can't tell — but seems promising. The linked site does show a singular ("Has anyone ever ordered a Sram and Shimano road groupo from one of the companies off of Alibaba?"); then a brief scan through Google Books found "These new groupos advance Campy's battle for market ...[dominance etc.? word inaccessible] (1986), "Most roadies go for Shimano or Campagnolo groupos." (2006), and — this one strongly suggesting a trademark — "Sets of components (called Groupos) are made by one manufacturer and as such are all one quality." Equinox ◑ 16:46, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

LOL - groupos is a generic term for any set of bicycle parts. It is not a trademarked or licensed term, all cyclists and manufacturers use the term. Why don't you ask on a cycling forum? Good luck 198.103.184.76 14:16, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

Why? Because it wouldn't help, that's why. Mglovesfun (talk) 14:22, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

Groupo: All the drivetrain components (usually from the same company like Campagnolo or Shimano) needed to turn a bare frame into a complete bicycle (e.g., crank, chain, derailleurs, brakes, etc). Also called group. WritersCramp (talk) 11:59, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

That may persuade people that it's credible, but it will still fail without references to durably-archived sources, which include books (we usually find those through Google Books), most physically-published newspapers and magazines, and Usenet (we usually find those through Google Groups). See WT:CFI for the complete requirements. Chuck Entz (talk) 16:43, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

feminine

RFV of the adverb section. Perhaps I'm missing something obvious, but I can't think of how this could be used as an adverb (rather than an adjective), and so have a hard time searching for examples of use. google books:"moved feminine" turns up nothing relevant, compared to google books:"moved quickly". — This unsigned comment was added by -sche (talk • contribs).

The adverb is femininely surely? SpinningSpark 08:45, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

It's defined as an adjective too (of or pretaining to...) Mglovesfun (talk) 12:58, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

How is that relevant to the adverb sense? SpinningSpark 16:33, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Very. He’s talking about the adverb sense. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:42, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

google books:"behaving feminine" has enough hits. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:37, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

• ...the most feminine scoring group of males is an adverb on scoring.
• Martin looks the most feminine is an adverb on looks. SpinningSpark 17:57, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

• I can't see the last citation: is it saying Martin gazes at things in a most feminine way? Or is it saying that Martin seems feminine? Almost any adjective can be used with the latter sense of "looks". I can find examples of "Roger says nothing but looks obdurate", and even discussions of things that "look adjectival" and "look adverbial" (lol!).

  "Behaving feminine" ... well, I'll yield if others are convinced, but it seems to me that many adjectives can be used after "behaving", too: "behaving beautiful" gets a few pages of hits, "behaved dumb" gets a few, even "behaving contrarian" gets one. - -sche (discuss) 20:40, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

• The best illustration of how look functions here is to use an adverb-adjective pair to substitute for feminine, and see which one looks right: "Martin looks the most happy" vs. "Martin looks the most happily". The same goes for behave: "behaving happy" is a little unusual, but it works. If you try "behaving happily", the meaning shifts- it's another way of saying "behaving, and in a happy manner". As for "the most feminine scoring group of males": it doesn't help that it's suffering from Hyphen-Deficit Disorder, but imagine a test whose results range from "happy" to "sad", and compare "the most happy[-]scoring group of males" with "the most happily[-]scoring group of males". In all of these, we're dealing with stative constructions: the subject isn't doing, the subject is being. Chuck Entz (talk) 05:55, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

on

Per my talk page. Is this used in Dutch Low Saxon, or only in German Low German? I've seen it, but Low Saxon spelling is so variable, and this word is so short (and homographic to other common words), that it's rather difficult to search for. - -sche (discuss) 01:34, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

September 2013

larina

Definition:

1. a lady; a woman of high social class.

Gives as etymology:

From Latin (deprecated template usage) lares.

Three things are highly suspicious:

1. (deprecated template usage) lares is a plural of (deprecated template usage) lar, a deity associated with a household, among other things- not a singular of any word for lord
2. The very comprehensive Lewis and Short Latin dictionary at Perseus doesn't have larina.
3. The IP who created this also created created the entry for the given name Larina, with the same etymology. They have edited nothing else beyond a few related entries.

It's possible that both words are post-classical, in which case the references I have wouldn't include them whether they existed or not- so I brought this here.

I tried searching Google Books, but there are lots of mentions of the name and scannos for Latin. Searching for larinae (the expected nominative plural/genitive singular form) brought up a subfamily of gulls and another subfamily of beetles, as well as scannos for Latinae. There was no hint of anything supporting this entry among hundreds of hits I looked at, but there are lots of hits I didn't get to. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:58, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

Nothing remotely likely in Niemeyer's Medieval Latin Lexicon --Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 04:07, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

Looking through some baby name sites [42] says it is Greek meaning seagull, [43] says it is Latin meaning seagull, [44] says it is a variation of Laraine or Lara which it claims is Latin but our entry says Russian, [45] says it is a Russian diminutive of Klara or Larissa, and [46] does not have Larina, but has Larin as a male name derived from Lawrence. No consistency there then except they all consistently fail to verify our entry. SpinningSpark 08:01, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

Baby Name websites, as a rule, make "wild guesswork based on complete working ignorance" look like active scholarship. The more relevant link I can think of is the connection to Russian, either as a variant of Lara, or as evidenced in Eugene Onegin as the surname of Татьяна Ларина (Tatyana Larina). --Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 08:13, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

Gaffiot, a Latin-French dictionary of a similar stature to Lewis & Short has no entry. Mglovesfun (talk) 01:38, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Wt/meu/bamahuta

Zero Google hits (in quotes). SemperBlotto (talk) 07:21, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

Referenced and moved to bamahuta. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:02, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

Probably meant WT (Wiktionary) meu (language code) and then the word. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:26, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

That's what page titles look like on incubator:. The contributor might have thought that we work the same. -- Liliana • 14:53, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

Passed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

crash crop

Any takers? Looks like a protologism to me. SemperBlotto (talk) 18:51, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

Yes albeit a weird one, doesn't even make sense because it has the same definition as cash crop but I'd expect it to be like a humorous opposite of cash crop. A crop grown to be destroyed in order to keep prices up. Mglovesfun (talk) 19:12, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

It may look like one, but it isn't. It's easy enough to find examples like [47], [48], [49], [50], [51], [52], and [53]. The hard part is figuring out whether they're intentional or just absent-minded errors. The brain tends to look for ways to simplify things, so similar sounds in the same position tend to get made even more similar- it's the principal that makes a lot of tongue-twisters work. In fact, I'm sure if you were to say "cash crop" a bunch of times in a row, quickly, you would find yourself saying "crash crop" after a while. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:16, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

I gave this a go and you're right :). Mglovesfun (talk) 09:32, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

I would say they are typos. Most of them use the phrase cash crop elsewhere in the document, which seems an unlikely variation in style if they are supposed to be synonymous. The fourth one is definitely a typo as it is a misquote of this article from the Boston Globe. SpinningSpark 00:05, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

inspiration

Rfv-sense: "Breath"

When I saw this, it took my inspiration away. I had to catch my inspiration. Its simplicity was an inspiration of fresh air. DCDuring TALK 13:01, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

DCDuring's turns-of-phrase are downright inspirationtaking! This sense is not in the OED, The Unabridged Random-House Webster's, or any dictionary at onelook.com. · (talk) 19:29, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Could it be an error for the first sense (breathing in). I just replaced the French sense 'breath' with 'inspiration' (i.e. breathing in). Mglovesfun (talk) 20:29, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

I had a hand in the challenged sense, I just discovered. It was originally buried in the middle of a long definition copied from Webster 1913 in 2004 (which can be found at OneLook). I split that into three parts in 2009. Maybe there is or was some usage not as silly-sounding as the above casual examples. We might have to look to pre-1913 writings to find it. DCDuring TALK 23:13, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

All the examples relating to breathing that I've found thus far are in a technical sense (and in technical works): inspiration + expiration = respiration. And then it's usually in terms of signs and symptoms: "weak inspiration", "laboured inspiration", "shallow inspiration", &c. –Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 23:56, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Maybe we can interpret sense 1 as an uncountable sense and sense 2 as the corresponding countable sense, which is probably technical. I wonder if the countable sense is also contemporary. DCDuring TALK 00:33, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

Not too easy to cite either sense, but sense 2 is cited and sense 1 has two cites. If nobody disagrees with the notion of one sense being uncountable and the other countable, this could be closed. DCDuring TALK 00:59, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

gutter

Rfv-sense: "A ditch along the side of a road."

It is possible that this is true, but I've never heard the word used this way. Of course, I'm just a city-and-suburbs boy and would call such a ditch a ditch, limiting gutter to the low bit, usually next to a curb. Is it UK? The image exactly fits my understanding of the term, though the image alone does not convey the meaning. DCDuring TALK 13:56, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

• Not really a ditch; but it's the part that collects rainwater from the street's camber and directs it to the nearest drain. SemperBlotto (talk) 16:06, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Basically it's due to the camber of the road. But this is sense #1 "A low area, especially by the side of a road adjacent to a curb, to carry off water." so it does need verifying; if this does exist it needs citations. Not quite sure how to achieve that since they will likely support #1 and #2 at the same time, where #1 definitely exists. Mglovesfun (talk) 16:31, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

It would take an unusual citation, certainly. But a "ditch along the side of the road" is not the same as a good definition of gutter. The new def 1 allows for the gutter to be distinct from the road, rather than part of it, which, on reflection, seems wrong. I'll reword def 1 unless someone thinks that's wrong. DCDuring TALK 17:46, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

• Joe and his friends were going home after the pub closed. They saw the headlights of a vehicle. They all jumped into the gutter, squatted in it until the vehicle drove passed them. If you read the whole passage it is quite clear they are hiding in the gutter, which rules out the camber of the road. May be limited to Africa (the book is set in Sierra Leone). SpinningSpark 18:18, 3 September 2013 (UTC)
• ...otherwise known as the ditch that ran beside the road. (Japan)
• Culverts are generally to be preferred to open cross drains, sometimes called gutters... (US, 1839) SpinningSpark 18:35, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

That (ie, Sierra Leone) looks like a second, somewhat ambiguous cite, with the one already in the entry. Some gutters have been used for sanitary sewage and are usually deeper. I'm used to paving, but hard-packed dirt, presumably the same as the principal surface of an accompanying road, might also be an adequate surface for drainage. DCDuring TALK 18:36, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Also, the cites don't really belong here. They belong in the entry. Our new sense-id links get us to the relevant sense. DCDuring TALK 18:38, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

I'm putting them here for discussion, I'm still not sure what's going on with this entry. I don't see how you can think the Sierra Leonne quote is ambiguous. The meaning is plain if the whole page is read. SpinningSpark 18:49, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

• They must have thought they were going to get broadsided, because in their panic, they backed across the road into the gutter, and there they sat, stuck. (US) SpinningSpark 18:49, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Ditch: "a long narrow excavation dug in the earth (as for drainage)".

How could one tell that the gutter referred to in the citations was a "ditch". The Japan citation is not consistent with that as a car wheel is unlikely to get stuck in a dirt channel, it would be hard to characterize a dirt channel as being just a bit wider than a car tire (as a narrow dirt channel usually forms a V), a direct channel is unlikely to be covered with movable plates, etc. The Sierra Leone citation provides almost no information about the configuration of the gutter relative to the road. The 1838 US citation refers to a cross gutter, which is not consistent with my sense of the word and the definitions, which seem to have the gutter run in the same direction as whatever reference surface may be mentioned. The US citation explicitly refers to ditches for drainage by the side of the road, apparently not integral with the principal surface of the road. DCDuring TALK 19:26, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

I would say the The Sierra Leone cite can be read as a ditch from context. The fact that they hide in it for one thing. For another, it's Sierra Leone so hardly likely to be something high tech. If that's not enough, elsewhere in the book we have Joe and salieu were digging a gutter to drain the water settling round the house. Which while not connected with a road at least shows the author is means gutter=ditch in this work. It is asking a lot for a quote which uses the word in this sense and immediately follows it with a dicdef. SpinningSpark 22:14, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

I have tried to word sense 1 to include the full range of such possibilities. I think that it would even include the "gutter to drain the water settling round the house". DCDuring TALK 00:14, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

It never hurts to have citations on the Citations page, even (or especially) if they don't exactly fit existing definitions or are ambiguous. Our definitions are not timeless unchanging bits of perfection, in case you hadn't noticed. That a citation is not a good illustration of current definitions should remind us that most usage does not really support very elaborate definitions. DCDuring TALK 19:32, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

I can't be asked to spend time nicely formatting cites for an entry you might decide to delete. SpinningSpark 22:14, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Citations should always be retained, as they always give clues about some aspect of meaning, even when they do not support a particular definition. For example, I found a citation referring to a single gutter in the middle of a street in Paris. This would seem to have a bearing on the challenged sense referring to a gutter as being an area of a road intended for traffic, suggesting that the "traffic" element is probably incidental, though surprising to those familiar only with modern two-channel road design with camber and curb. The cross-gutter cite would compel us to make sure we do not exclude such a gutter configuration. Using the templates like {{quote-book}} makes it relatively painless to achieve pretty formatting by cutting and pasting from the google search page, deleting the extraneous, and adding tags like "title=", "year=", etc. DCDuring TALK 22:49, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

• I think that the citations that support the idea of an unpaved gutter also show that such a gutter is intended for drainage (possibly of sewage, BTW). That would argue for combining sense 2 and sense 1, eliminating any mention of paving or curbs in the main definition, relegating them to an "especially". Also a gutter could be in the center of a road or run across it. "Channel" may give too specific an idea, but I can't think of a better common word. DCDuring TALK 22:58, 3 September 2013 (UTC)
• I think this is just an expansion of the bowling-derived sense. Soap (talk) 02:08, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

  How do you know that the bowling sense isn't derived from the ditch sense? SpinningSpark 14:46, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps he's joking. DCDuring TALK 15:42, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

gutter

Rfv-sense: "The part of a street meant for vehicles."

There are two cites, one of which seems to clearly support this definition, the other being ambiguous. Two more? DCDuring TALK 15:46, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Rfv-sense: Adjective: "Suitable for the gutter; vulgar, disreputable."

AFAIK, this is the figurative sense of the noun, which is used attributively. I don't think it is gradable or comparable or is used as a predicate. DCDuring TALK 21:58, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Regarding the adjective, this occurred to me too. But how would we define the noun? If it's a noun that's only used attributively, then perhaps it's just an uncomparable adjective instead. Mglovesfun (talk) 16:25, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

You can choose from the two adjoining senses, the one marked figurative which I added and the pre-existing one, which I had overlooked. One of the usage examples shows a use, fairly common in the US, as a substantive. We don't need both of the senses. DCDuring TALK 17:10, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

A gutter can be in the middle of the street. I don’t think either quotation unambiguously supports the given definition. —Michael Z. 2013-09-17 15:28 z

It seems to me that some contributor was struck by the usage with traffic and made that fact the center element of a definition, whereas it seems to me to be a consequence of a certain configuration of street-drainage design. Such a configuration is sufficiently far from my normal experience that I forgot that I have seen gutters that run in the middle of a street and transverse to the flow of traffic, as at an intersection. Perhaps I would/should have RfDed it instead, because it is a poor definition, building on a non-essential aspect of some gutters. DCDuring TALK 12:54, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

file allocation table

Defined as a generic term, but Google Books rather suggests this is a proper noun referring to a specific file system. Proof of generic use is not provided. -- Liliana • 15:48, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

[54] uses the term in connection with Unix and describes something which is definitely not the usual Microsoft/IBM FAT system. [55] uses the term generically as does [56]. SpinningSpark 21:46, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

grognard

Can someone verify this meaning ? Thanks in advance. Sir Lothar (talk) 11:26, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

Sense nos. 2 and 3 seem to be over-specified. A list of evidence that one is a grognard doesn’t constitute a definition of the term. —Michael Z. 2013-09-17 15:23 z

I agree, sense#2 and #3 should be merged, but the challenge is to sense#4. SpinningSpark 22:16, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

overflow

Rfv-sense - defn reads "To fill a container or system beyond its limits."
This will usually be the definition for "overfill" - the usual sense will be what happens after overfilling. I was reluctant to change wording becasue of the sense's related translations. — Saltmarsh^{απάντηση} 06:31, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

Clearly widespread use IMO. Try this Google Search for "the water overflowed the..." [57] Equinox ◑ 17:44, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

Indeed, why did you tag this? Mglovesfun (talk) 18:14, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

Widespread use, both transitive and intransitive. DCDuring TALK 20:12, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

I tagged it because it could read as: #1 I overflowed the cup (by overfilling), whereas to me it means both #2 the cup overflowed and #3 the liquid overflowed. Either way I hope the new definition meets all meanings. — Saltmarsh^{απάντηση} 05:46, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

I have added definitions and usexes to try to cover the syntactic and semantic range of usage. We need a forum other than RfV or RfC for entries that are just deficient. {{rfdef}} could feed such a page, rather than just a category, so there could be some discussion of the deficiencies and how to resolve them – obvious ways not always being the best ways. DCDuring TALK 13:26, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

snuffle

Two strange senses here. "To make something or someone quiet" (was marked intransitive but should presumably be transitive, so I've changed it); and "to travel in a car at the pace of a snail". Equinox ◑ 17:43, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

The last seems to be a figurative use of sense no. 1 (“to sniff”) – imagine an animal slowly snuffling along while searching for the scent of a truffle. —Michael Z. 2013-09-17 15:18 z

technical

"(slang) A secretarial way of saying "specific"." Equinox ◑ 19:10, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

Doesn't make any sense to me. I am struggling to see how this could be used;

"Bring me the file on Jones please."

"Which technical Jones do you want?"

"Shall I arrange the meeting for a technical time?"

Don't really seem to work. SpinningSpark 15:57, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Our whole set of words revolving around technical needs reworking. It looks to me like they're trying, in a lame sort of way, to deal with examples like "don't be so technical", that deal with the idea of technicalities as the kind of things nitpickers seize on. Only technically has a sense for it, while technical loads too much into the first definition and the other entries just keep leading back to it without explaining anything. Chuck Entz (talk) 21:52, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Other common phases: "to be a little more technical," "technically speaking," "if you want to get technical about it," ... BB12 (talk) 22:03, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

None of them usually mean "specific" though, and they are not particularly limited to secretaries. SpinningSpark 17:38, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

MWOnline has six senses, a total of ten definitions for technical. RHU has eleven. Even Collins and WNW have six. So we should look to add at least one sense that covers what might have been intended, however badly worded and erroneously restricted it may be.

Perhaps something like: "Marked by or derived from a strict, especially overly strict, interpretation of rules or of wording." Is that close to what BB and Chuck's examples need?

Another sense more related "specific" might be: "marked by or related to specialization", as in technical language. DCDuring TALK 19:23, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Also: our first definition is the same as that from Webster 1913. DCDuring TALK 19:26, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

back wheels

Together with:

• boys in the basement
• movaries

They are listed in WS:testicles as terms referring to, you guessed it, testicles. If they fail this RFV, please remove them from WS:testicles; I did not create mainspace entries for them. --Dan Polansky (talk) 19:55, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

Not entries => no RfV? Do we need separate standards for WS, ie, accepting non-durable sources? DCDuring TALK 23:52, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

I would hope not, lest our WS pages become Wikimedia's Urban Dictionary. bd2412 T 02:11, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

These are redlinks: an invitation to contributors to click the links and create the entries. Anything that redlinks to mainspace should be subjected to the same scrutiny as the entry it could become. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:32, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Make 'em black or have the link go the citations page. DCDuring TALK 04:00, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Items present in Wikisaurus pages have to attested in terms WT:ATTEST. If several editors prefer that I create a mainspace entry in order to use RFV to ask for attestation, I will probably end up doing so. In the meantime, I do not see the added value of doing so.

For convenience, here are links to the citation pages of the entries: Citations:back wheels, Citations:boys in the basement, Citations:movaries. --Dan Polansky (talk) 05:26, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

I think it's definitely within the spirit of the page, if not the letter of what Wiktionary:Requests for verification/Header says. Mglovesfun (talk) 09:00, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

I think it's fine to RFV things that are listed in Wikisaurus without creating entries for them. I think it would also be fine to just delete dubious redlinks from Wikisaurus entries without RFVing them unless the deletion proves contentious. - -sche (discuss) 08:49, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

I thought one of the useful functions of WS was to allow us to include terms that are plausible, not necessarily citable, even SoP. Some of that was certainly discussed in the early days of WS. DCDuring TALK 16:43, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

It was my practice to remove unattested terms from Wikisaurus. I have sent the current three to RFV only to give them a chance; in a different mood I would have shot them on sight. But it cannot harm to confirm this practice in a vote: Wiktionary:Votes/pl-2013-09/Wikisaurus and attestation. As for sum of parts, I can imagine some such terms in Wikisaurus.--Dan Polansky (talk) 17:19, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

jaden

"Made of, or relating to jade. She wore a jaden crown." Plausible (cf. golden, wooden, oaken) but I can find no evidence in dictionaries or elsewhere. (Minor point: it would probably only mean "made of jade", and not "relating to jade"; but I can't find the evidence for either.) Equinox ◑ 05:02, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Cited. This was a hard one, mostly because the vast majority of Google hits are for the name Jaden. -Cloudcuckoolander (talk) 22:05, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

The second one is describing jaden as a hypothetical form that would be wrong if it were used. It's a bit like a sentence saying one would get "aplle" marked wrong on a spelling test- which wouldn't be a valid cite for "aplle". Chuck Entz (talk) 23:25, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

I don't read it as describing it as a form that's wrong; merely that describing a green computer as "jade" would be legal, as that would be a reference to the color, but they couldn't describe it as "jaden", because that would mean it was actually made out of jade. In any case, Citations:jaden has five citations in all, and taken as a whole, I think they make the case.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:49, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

I'm in agreement with Prosfilaes. I read the Usenet post as stating that to describe a green computer as "jaden" would be wrong because it would represent false advertising, since "jaden" would indicate an object actually made of jade (although presumably it would be fine to apply the word to a computer that actually was made of jade). Cloudcuckoolander (talk) 00:31, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Equinox. “If they described the computer as 'jaden'” is the same as “If they [Foo] used the word “jaden” to describe the computer”. It’s talking about the word jaden as one Foo might use. If the poster’s prediction comes true and Foo does indeed describe the computer as jaden, then Foo’s use would be an actual use.

In any case, the word is cited, as it now has five cites other than the controversial one. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 00:46, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

I think Chuck Entz was wrong in comparing it to "aplle"; the author clearly thought it was the right word to use for "made of jade". I think it's on the edge at least; he was clearly using it in a sentence to mean "made of jade" believing that his audience would understand it.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:05, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Okay. I'm adding a "nonstandard" gloss. Equinox ◑ 19:11, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Passed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:09, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

paade

Discussion moved from Wiktionary:Requests for deletion. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:51, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

The native Mopan Maya term for priest is "ki-yum" (roughly "good father"). While it is possible that Mopan has a Spanish loan word for priest as well, this is not documented anywhere I could find and it would not be spelled "paade" anyway (there is no ⟨d⟩ in Mopan Maya). There are a few Mayan languages that use "paale/pale/palé" as a loan word for priest, but again, there is no documentation of this in Mopan (as far as I could tell), so the spelling, usage, and pronunciation of any such word in Mopan is unknown. Kaldari (talk) 22:48, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Isn't this an RFV issue, not RFD?--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:32, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Yes. Moved. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:35, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

kostuumbre

Discussion moved from Wiktionary:Requests for deletion. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:51, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Another dubious Mopan Maya Spanish loan word. While this word's use in Mopan Maya seems plausible, the given spelling is not. Mopan Maya does not use the consonant ⟨b⟩, and the similar ⟨b'⟩ is never blended with r. Since I couldn't find any documentation of this word's use in Mopan Maya, I would rather delete it than move it to a speculative (but plausable) spelling. Kaldari (talk) 23:11, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Isn't this an RFV issue, not RFD?--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:32, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Also moved. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:37, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

alkaalde

Discussion moved from Wiktionary:Requests for deletion. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:51, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Another dubious Mopan Maya Spanish loan word. The native Mopan Maya term for mayor is "polil kaj" (roughly "town chief"). While it is possible that Mopan has a Spanish loan word for mayor as well, this is not documented anywhere I could find and it would not be spelled "alkaalde" anyway (there is no ⟨d⟩ in Mopan Maya). Kaldari (talk) 23:24, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Isn't this an RFV issue, not RFD?--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:32, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

And also moved Chuck Entz (talk) 23:38, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

cinco minutos sem perder a amizade

— Ungoliant ^(Falai) 10:02, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

você se machucou quando caiu do céu

— Ungoliant ^(Falai) 10:25, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

sussa na montanha-russa

— Ungoliant ^(Falai) 10:25, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Seems to be not a 'pun' as it claims, it just rhymes. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:02, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

os homens só pensam naquilo

Two hits. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 10:25, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Not strictly relevant, but only after one thing might be a valid English entry. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:00, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

nos quarenta e quatro minutos do segundo tempo

— Ungoliant ^(Falai) 10:25, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

de boa na lagoa

The most popular of several informal rhyming greetings used in Brazil. Unfortunately it’s uncitable. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 10:25, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

As above, not a 'pun', just it rhymes. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:07, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

dá a mão, quer o braço

One hit. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 10:25, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

zamar

There is some evidence for the word being used in the names of choirs. Any evidence for the verb? SemperBlotto (talk) 09:46, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

rectitudinity

Quick look didn't generate anything at news or books. Been there since 2006. DCDuring TALK 11:03, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Bl. Com.

Nothing obvious on a Google book search. (needs a cleanup if OK) SemperBlotto (talk) 17:03, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

• 1787, Charles Durnford, Reports of Cases Argued and Determined in the Court of Kings' Bench, Parts 5-7, page 469:

  As well the existence of private customs must be shewn, as that the thing in dispute is within the custom alledged. 1 Bl. Com. 76.

• 1838, Thomas Sergeant, View of Land Laws of Pennsylvania, page 195:

  A manor could not legally exist without a court baron.^{(1)
  (1)} 2 Bl. Com. 90. 3 Bl. Com. 33. 4 Bl. Com. 273.

• 1877, John Barbee Minor, Institutes of Common and Statute Law, Volume 2, page 70:

  Fealty. Belongs to copyhold, as to all feudal tenures, except estates at will. (1 Th. Co. Lit. 675 ; 2 Bl. Com. 97.) 2e.

• 1987, Alexander M. Burrill, A Law Dictionary and Glossary, page 620:

  Feudum antiquum ; an ancient feud or fief ; a fief descended to the vassal from his ancestors. 2 Bl. Com. 212, 221.

• 2011, Eimear Spain, The Role of Emotions in Criminal Law Defences, page 117:

  He saw necessity as amounting to a 'defect of the will' which renders one incapable of committing a crime, 4 Bl. Com. 27.

• Cleaned up, also. Cheers! bd2412 T 17:25, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

It's the name of a book, albeit abbreviated. Seems includable to me because it's far from obvious what it means. Worth considering though. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:13, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Includability is really not at issue here, since this is an RfV. I would say that the term is now verified. If this were an RfD, I would argue for keeping on the basis that only a very small number of books tend to have a standardized abbreviation used without further explanation in formal documents like judicial opinions. Books of the Bible come to mind. bd2412 T 19:13, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

Isn't this just an example of the common scholarly practice of having standard abbreviations for journals in their reference lists? Does allowing this entry mean we should allow all journal abbreviations? Some are very well known, Phil. Trans. R. Soc. (Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society), and some are completely obscure to all but researchers in that field, J. Cyclic Nucleotide Protein Phosphor. Res. (Journal of cyclic nucleotide and protein phosphorylation research). SpinningSpark 09:03, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

For the most part, these abbreviations are basically SoP. Of course, if "Phil." and "Trans." are the usual abbreviations for "Philosophical" and "Transactions", then we should have these defined at Phil. and Trans.; however, so far as I know, Bl. is not used as an abbreviation for "Blackstone" outside of the context of "Bl. Com." Unless we want to have a definition of Bl. that is limited to its use in Bl. Com., this term will not be discernible from the sum of its parts. bd2412 T 00:59, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

There are, of course, numerous journals that are "transactions" of something or other using the abbreviation "Trans." However, it would be quite challenging to find another example of "Phosphor." used as an abbreviation for "phosphorylation" in a journal title which, by your argument, allows "J. Cyclic Nucleotide Protein Phosphor. Res." as an entry. SpinningSpark 13:09, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

It seems to me that it is much easier to discern that "J. Cyclic Nucleotide Protein Phosphor. Res." is the abbreviated title of a work than it is to discern such meaning for a much shorter phrase with no unabbreviated components. bd2412 T 16:36, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

This is an RfV, but, were it an RfD, I'd say Keep. DCDuring TALK 16:51, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

Since this is, indeed, not an RfD, and since I have provided citations, would anyone object to closing this as verified? bd2412 T 21:00, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

I was discussing rather than objecting, clear pass IMO. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:37, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Striking as closed, then. Cheers! bd2412 T 15:21, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

葹

Rfv-sense: Translingual Han character: "kind of chrysanthemum, Xanthium"

A chrysanthemum is a well-known flowering plant; w:Xanthium is a cocklebur. Are both correct, but wrongly on the same line? Is one a misunderstanding? Or […] . DCDuring TALK 21:58, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

The Unihan database where the definition was imported from separates definitions with "," (sometimes), and ";" (sometimes). Different parts of the database use different conventions that weren't always treated correctly by the original bot. DTLHS (talk) 22:02, 11 September 2013 (UTC)

I was able to find the following definitions 1. Siberian cocklebur (Xanthium sibiricum). 2. Xanthium strumarium. I'm not a plant expert, not sure if these two are completely separate. "kind of chrysanthemum" could be crossed out. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 02:40, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. I will split the definitions and confine the rfv to the "chrysanthemum" part. DCDuring TALK 04:35, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

Wikispecies has the subspecies Xanthium strumarium subsp. sibiricum as the Siberian cocklebur, but the Plant List agrees with Anatoli's findings and doesn't have the Wikispecies name as accepted or a synonym. DCDuring TALK 04:44, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

This "kind of chrysanthemum" part was mass-copied from a character definition in CCDICT ditionary, made by volunteers. It's very useful but there are errors. I've checked reliable dictionaries. None of them mentions "chrysanthemum". Added translations at "cocklebur". --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 04:52, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

It should probably be given its 30 days on this page anyway. DCDuring TALK 13:32, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

Cockleburs are a nightmare for taxonomists because they've been hitchhiking on animals and people all over the world since long before anyone paid them any scientific attention. The current consensus seems to be to treat them as maybe two or three highly variable species. I would just leave out the "sibiricum" part: if there ever were regional subspecies, they've all been randomly mixed together over the centuries (and they seem to be native to the Americas, anyway).

As for "chrysanthemums", the genus Chrysanthemum has been a battleground between the taxonomic splitters and lumpers for centuries- it used to contain things like tansy and chamomile, but now doesn't even include the garden chrysanthemum. The resulting confusion in what the common name refers to makes it pretty much meaningless without context. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:24, 14 September 2013 (UTC)

¤

This symbol was invented as a placeholder for the dollar sign in text encodings that had to be acceptable in non-dollar-using countries. It’s very nature means that it is unuseful. Has it ever been used (as opposed to merely being defined in glossaries and references)? —Michael Z. 2013-09-12 21:59 z

I have a vague feeling that it was used in RISC OS (i.e. as something that would be presented to the user in some situations — perhaps currency-related), but can't remember any details... Or maybe not: all I can find by searching is that that slot was sometimes used for the (then new and unassigned) euro sign. Equinox ◑ 01:18, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

Google and Bing refuse to search for it at all. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/michkap/archive/2007/03/15/1885864.aspx offers some hints about places where it's been used; maybe a 80s-era book on BASIC from Sweden or Russia might have it.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:45, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

We can leave this on RfV for two months, since it resists searching.

The challenge is finding uses of this term (symbol), rather than merely mentions or definitions of it, since it is merely a placeholder. It might be used as a placeholder character for a different currency symbol in unpublished text, which would be difficult enough to cite, but I think it might be only a placeholder in the encoding tables, in which case it is probably not a term at all. Note that the cited terms lorem ipsum and etaoin shrdlu are names of placeholders – the names for this symbol are louse and sputnik, not ¤.

Don’t mistake text encoding or rendering errors for uses. If a writer was using a font that displayed a rouble, or yuan, or euro symbol, and expected his audience to see the same, that is the use of a particular code point, but not of this symbol. Also, uses in programming languages are not in any wt:CFI#Natural languages, and so do not count for inclusion in Wiktionary. —Michael Z. 2013-09-17 15:14 z

If you have any citations that a writer used this, please show us. Otherwise, let's not speculate that a writer accidentally used this in absence of evidence.--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:21, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Does the symbol have a name? DCDuring TALK 13:05, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

It is the old IBM international currency sign. It is used in Java as a placeholder for the current currency symbol when formatting a number: —Stephen ^(Talk) 13:29, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

cachet

The usage note seems completely wrong for cachet. "X has a certain cachet" seems more common than the negative sense to me. I wasn't sure about the template. I used rfv-sense even though this is a usage note. Is there something better? BB12 (talk) 04:31, 14 September 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps {{rft-sense}}, because it is not obvious that any citation effort is appropriate. RfV's in principle have some formal requirements, too. The Tea Room always seems to me to be more relaxed. DCDuring TALK 12:18, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Thank you. ‎Mglovesfun has suggested that as well, so I will take it there. --BB12 (talk) 02:48, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

skintern

Appears unattested: google books:"skintern", google groups:"skintern", “skintern”, in OneLook Dictionary Search., via {{{attest-search}}. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:04, 14 September 2013 (UTC)

Cited. Cloudcuckoolander (talk) 05:23, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Funny, I was thinking it would be an intern that's also skint. Mglovesfun (talk) 12:25, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Only one of the cites looks durably archived. DCDuring TALK 12:57, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Out of four newspapers notable enough to have Wikipedia articles and a book? -Cloudcuckoolander (talk) 16:37, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

The citations now consists of a book, two college newspapers, a non-college newspaper, the title of a Usenet thread and a blog. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 16:47, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

It's hard to tell what actually reaches print and what doesn't. The book and Usenet certainly meet our requirements. The Washington Times and the Memphis Flyer seem to have print editions, but I can't tell for certain whether the articles in question actually reached print. The others seem less likely to be in print, but may be. What are we going to do when even fewer news publishers have paper editions? DCDuring TALK 18:21, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

palm

"A handheld computing device used to store personal data such as calendars and phone numbers." There's palmtop, and there's the capitalised trademark Palm (WT:BRAND) for such a device, but is this really a generic lower-case term? Equinox ◑ 02:58, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Phones've made this mostly obsolete, but I've heard it. That said even in their heyday the more common term was PDA. Soap (talk) 01:22, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

アィヌ - adjective

I don't find アィヌ as an adjective in the second edition of Batchelor's dictionary. It is listed as a noun and in combinations, such as ainu-kut (a man's throat) and ainu-kuwa (a man's grave mark). I do not see this as an adjective in the Talking Dictionary or in Tommy's Aynu Online Dictionary. Moreover, in the Japanese Wiktionary, ja:aynu is listed only as a noun, not an adjective or verb. Britannic124 cites the third edition when creating the entry with the adjective; I wonder whether this was inferred from the combination forms. BB12 (talk) 08:24, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Deleted. It’s not an adjective. — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 01:29, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

parbuckling

sense n. A salvaging operation in which a sunken vessel is rotated by the application of leverage. I know the w:Costa Concordia is being raised by parbuckling, but I don't see any usage of parbuckling as a noun. This is just an example of the use of a parbuckle, admittedly an exceptionally large one, and all the cites I can see on gbooks are parbuckle being used either attributively or adjectively. SpinningSpark 18:23, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

I didn't find any cites for the plural parbucklings, nor for more|less|much|little parbuckling at Google Books, News, Scholar, or Groups. Other non-count determiners might work. DCDuring TALK 18:49, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Kaczism

—Ruakh_TALK 06:31, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

You can add Kaczist too. (See also #duckism above.) Keφr 19:04, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

I have added "Kaczist" as a separate RFV, currently available at #Kaczist. --Dan Polansky (talk) 16:42, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

spoon

Rfv-sense - I was inclined to delete this definition which contradicts the Pepys quotation, now to be found under spoom. All the definitions I have found give a stern wind, not a headwind. — Saltmarsh^{απάντηση} 09:17, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

Restored the Pepys quotation, since it is spelled spoon, not spoom, thus belongs there. But if it's under the wrong sense, by all means move it. This came from Webster 1913. Equinox ◑ 09:19, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

Webster(1913)'s definition for spoon is "see spoom", but it does give the quote. — Saltmarsh^{απάντηση} 14:51, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

unsupported defn deleted — Saltmarsh^{απάντηση} 06:42, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

Restored; this is not how rfv works. Mglovesfun (talk) 10:59, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

тѧжъкъ

Is this a spelling mistake or did this word really have ъ after ж? This combination was not normally allowed in OCS words. —CodeCat 17:53, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

We do also have тѧжькъ. Ivan created them both, in less than three weeks of each other. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 18:13, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

Ivan is in the habit of creating many entries that are copies of each other, apparently because he thinks that calling something an "alternative spelling" is POV, or something like that. —CodeCat 18:29, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

If you're referring to the Glagolitic script equivalents of Cyrillic OCS entries, yes it's a pretty big POV to have them redirected to Cyrillic. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 03:04, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

• Yes it's a spelling mistake, but not by me, but the scribe who copied Codex Marianus. Quote added and tag removed. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 03:04, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

flap

The vagina. I've heard of "flaps" (plural) for the labia minora, but not this. Equinox ◑ 11:00, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

• I think people get confused between the external and internal feminine genitalia. I blame the very limited amount of pornography available on the web. SemperBlotto (talk) 11:07, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

We're talking about the singular here referring to the vagina. I suppose it might be citable, if so it's a citable error due to misunderstanding. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:41, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

• 27 Aug 1999 alt.fan.metal.burzum

  "Madonga is not blonde. Her flap-hairs are sooty." [sic]

• 2008 Step Johnson: A Novel of Deep-South Civil Rights and Wrongs in 1936

  "The swell of her hips sent electric shocks through his fingers, like when he licked her flap only a million times more."

• 2010 Slave Mines of Tormunil

  "He lifted her leg and opened her flap on the side that was lifted and again made her squeeze."

Such literature we are exposed to in the search for citations. ~sigh~

-- Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 12:59, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

The definition should be changed to "the vulva." This isn't an isolated case, either. I've had to correct entries in which someone conflated vagina with vulva before (for example, vajazzle).

Also, I hear you, Catsidhe. -Cloudcuckoolander (talk) 14:13, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Now, I know my way around female genitalia about as well as I know my way around the surface of Mars, but from the cites it sounds more like the vulva than the vagina to me. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 14:42, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Frankly, I don't think most slang terms are that anatomically precise. I'd suggest going the road of prat (Etym 2, Noun Def 3.), and define it as "the female genitals". (Which is probably the intended less specific meaning of "vagina" used there anyway.)

I would say labia or female genitals since vagina is technically wrong and vulva isn't a very precise word either. Soap (talk) 01:20, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

Can someone please now ask for verification of some high minded word which I could google for while at work? --Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 00:39, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

These don't seem to support the challenged definition. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:05, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

How so? --Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 11:48, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

baize

Rfv-sense: coarse woollen stuff. Other dictionaries seem to use the word frieze for coarse woollen cloth, wheras baize is supposedly a finer material resembling felt, and mainly used for billiard tables (current sense #2 of baize). Anyone who knows? --Hekaheka (talk) 12:29, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

mirror polishing

I ask for attestation. The one quotation placed in the entry is not really a quotation but a link to a quotation; when I follow the link, I get what looks like mention rather than use. Searches: google books:"mirror polishing", google groups:"mirror polishing", “mirror polishing”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.; “mirror polishing”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:05, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

It seems to be a literal gloss of the Mandarin term, rather than an English term. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:49, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

suck my cock

Any attestation? The only current definition: "An expression of discontent or aggravation to another party." google books:"suck my cock", google groups:"suck my cock", “suck my cock”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.; “suck my cock”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. --Dan Polansky (talk) 14:10, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Widespread use. DCDuring TALK 14:14, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

• Agreed, widespread use, though "suck my dick" is probably more common in this nonliteral sense. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 14:51, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Yeah it's real. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:47, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Or just plain "suck it" if you want to be less direct. Soap (talk) 15:20, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

There are lots of synonyms in widespread use. DCDuring TALK 16:01, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

• RFV passed as widespread use per three native speakers. --Dan Polansky (talk) 19:14, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

bydraag

(moved from RFD)

Not a real Afrikaans word, proper singular is bydrae with plural bydraes. CeNobiteElf (talk) 12:39, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Sounds like a case for RFV. Maybe it's attested in nonstandard usage or older texts. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 14:37, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

What about as a verb, descended from Dutch Template:term/t? —CodeCat 16:02, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Of course it's a real word. CeNobiteElf, the requirement is just that people use it, not that it be considered 'correct'. I'll go cite the entry. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 17:22, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

CodeCat the verb is is bydra, bydraende, bygedra. Metaknowledge, I checked your quotations, you noticed all of them are quite old, right? I've personally never heard bydraag, I have only rarely heard bydrag (note the short a) in speech before, so it could be a potential case of colloquial vowel shortening which is common in common words such as ook, gaan, aan, etc. though how often does one use brydraag daily?

I just checked the WAT (Woordeboek van die Afrikaanse Taal) though, bydraag is in there, but it's omitted in both the Pharos Afrikaans dictionary and the AWS (Afrikaanse Woordelys en Spelreëls) 2009 edition. Assuming you don't have acces to the WAT, here is the full entry of bydraag "bydraag s.nw., bydrae. Sien BYDRAE: Ons het nog nie jou bydraag ontvang nie. 'n Groter bydraag vir die vloot gee. 'n Bydragie vir 'n blad skrywe."

--CeNobiteElf (talk) 18:17, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

I wouldn't call the 1980s "quite old", but yes, I could find nothing from this century. We can mark it as "dated". And no, I don't have access to die WAT (wish I did!) so thanks; that does confirm the validity of the entry, although per WT:ATTEST we rely on quotations, not other dictionaries. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 20:15, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Languages are big things, it's not a good idea to nominate entries for verification on the grounds 'you haven't heard of it'. Just in English I could nominate thousands of entries a day if I did that. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:19, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

immolate

Rfv-sense: To disembowel a person. I checked some Onelook dictionaries and none had it. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:04, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

I think this is possibly a confusion arising from the Japanese practise of hara-kiri (self-disembowelling) sometimes being described as self-immolation.[58][59] Of course one can sacrifice by disembowelling but that does not make disembowelling synonymous with sacrifice. It is no more correct than giving crucifixion as a definition of execution. SpinningSpark 11:38, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

doolally tap

Rfv-sense. Either noun sense:

1. Camp fever.
2. Madness, eccentricity.

Usage seems to be adjectival, though there are mentions defining it as a noun. — Pingku^dimmi 14:57, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

• I only know it as a noun (but haven't heard the term in many years) - always preceded by "the". SemperBlotto (talk) 06:57, 24 September 2013 (UTC)
  • Thanks!— Pingku^dimmi 08:00, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

pugofrapadi

And its variant, pugfrapadi (currently a redirect). I can't find it on Google Books, Tekstaro, or soc.culture.esperanto. Mr. Granger (talk) 19:09, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

sēsquidiēs’s genitive, dative, and ablative plural forms

sēsquidiērum and sēsquidiēbus

These inflections of (deprecated template usage) sēsquidiēs are not attestable. — I.S.M.E.T.A. 11:46, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Is there a semantic reason (i.e. no plural entry if the word uncountable) to assume this word doesn’t have genitive, dative and ablative plurals? — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 20:17, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Yes, there is a semantic reason, the plurals of "one and a half day" start with "three days". — This comment was unsigned.

Why only the genitive, dative and ablative? — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 19:19, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

The nominative, vocative, and accusative are isomorphic with the lemma form, so obviously they can't be deleted. This is apparently purely a New Latin word; it certainly isn't Classical Latin, and I strongly doubt it's ever attested in the plural (in any Case). —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 20:48, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

cacodemonical

Can't attest: google books:"cacodemonical", google groups:"cacodemonical", “cacodemonical”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. What does seem fairly easy to attest is cacodemonic: google books:"cacodemonic", google groups:"cacodemonic", “cacodemonic”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:36, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

However, cacodemoniacal is attested [60]. SpinningSpark 00:18, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Barely; I count three independent cites there at best; one from Clark Ashton Smith (though you have a choice of sentences to cite), and two different book titles mentioned repeatedly.--Prosfilaes (talk) 00:27, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

cóiréagrafaíocht

Irish. --Dan Polansky (talk) 17:20, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

• I've added a cite from the online edition of a print newspaper and a reference to a print dictionary that includes the term. Irish is an LDL, so that should suffice. In addition, this page (from the same print newspaper) uses the word in isolation in a way not really amenable to inclusion in a quotation, and this page and this page show the word (in its lenited form chóiréagrafíocht) being used in the wild, though I guess they don't qualify as durably archived. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 21:08, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

guidliheid

Scots. --Dan Polansky (talk) 17:22, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

wanweirdit

Scots. --Dan Polansky (talk) 17:24, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Kaczist

Any attestation? google books:"Kaczist", google groups:"Kaczist", “Kaczist”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. --Dan Polansky (talk) 10:58, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

This may be of interest. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:44, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

Only one possible Google Groups hit. Nothing on Google Books. Given that the only definition is a redlink to the nonexistent term duckist, it's tempting to consider speedying it as "No useful content given", though a halfway-decent definition could be cobbled together from the entry at Kaczism. At any rate, the term apparently relies for its humor on kaczka, a Polish word for duck, and would seem to be meaningless to anyone outside of Poland. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:08, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

Kaczism claims the following etymology: from Kaczyńsci + ism, after Lech Kaczyński and Jarosław Kaczyński. There may still be the pun to kaczka ("duck"). See also google:Kaczismus (German?) and google:kaczyzm (Polish?). kaczyzm could be attested as a Polish word in google books:kaczyzm, although some of the hits are mentions rather than uses. --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:15, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

lina

The Spanish wikipedia page was deleted (but for unrelated reasons)- nothing in a cursory google books search and the RAE only has lino. Can anyone find citations for this? DTLHS (talk) 23:54, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

It's hard to sift through all the false positives from names of people and line-wrap artifacts of words ending in -lina. Given that the user who added it (Luciferwildcat (talk • contribs)) is notorious for guessing/making stuff up, I'm skeptical. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:36, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

I have not tried to go through the hits on google books, but ... I only know of the word linaza for flaxseed, lino for flax. In Chile, they use the word lina to mean coarse wool, and that is the only case that I know of where lina is a proper word in Spanish. However, I would expect lina to occasionally be used for flaxseed/linseed (even though not standard usage), because changing the gender like this (lino/lina) is a common way to name the product or fruit of a plant: manzano/manzana (apple tree vs. an apple), fruto/fruta (fruit on the tree vs. fruit picked for eating), banano/banana (banana tree vs. banana), naranjo/naranja (orange tree vs. an orange), castaño/castaña, cerezo/cereza, olivo/oliva, and so on. But there are exceptions, such as peral/pera (pear tree vs. pear), higuera/higo (fig tree vs. fig). Changing lino (flax) to lina to make the word for flaxseed is logical even if it is improper, and it would not surprise me if it happens occasionally in some places. —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:05, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

Appendix:Proto-Balto-Slavic/ēstei

No reference was given. Can anyone supply one? --Pereru (talk) 15:12, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

The presence of both the long vowel ē and the change dt > st are clearly attested in the descendants. And there are sources for the infinitive ending -tei too. —CodeCat 16:20, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

Sure. All we have to do is add sources that make these claims explicitly. Or else, per BP discussion, the page would have to be deleted (at least if I understand well the result of the discussion). --Pereru (talk) 00:13, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure if it would be possible to find any for the first, as it's just straightforward PIE ē > PBSl ē > Baltic / Slavic ē. Linguistic sources usually focus on changes, not retentions; it's assumed that anything that isn't changed is retained. However, it might be that the ē arose by Winter's law. w:Winter's law mentions both the lengthening and the dissimilation: -edt- > -ēst-. It also mentions the ending (spelled as -tej) but for a source see {{R:Kim PBS}}. The article mentions that Winter's law gave a rising accent, whereas original PIE ē gave a falling accent, so the accent that is actually found in Balto-Slavic would tell us how the ē arose. —CodeCat 00:31, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

If someone wants playing reconstruction, here's my translation from Vasmer: Russian "ем" (1st person singular present of "есть" (to eat)), Ukrainian ïм, ḯсти, Belarusian ем, есць, Old Church Slavonic мь, сти, Bulgarian ям, Serbo-Croatian jе̑м, jе̏сти, Slovene jė́m, jė́sti, Czech jím, jísti, Slovak jem, jest', Polish jem, jeść, Upper Sorbian, Lower Sorbian jěm, jěsć.

ORIGIN: Proto-Slavic *ědmь, invinitive *ěsti, Middle Lithuanian ė́du, ė́mi, ė́dmi 1, ė́džiau, ė́sti "eat (of animals, cattle)", Latvian ę̄du, êst, Old Prussian īst "to eat", Old Indic ádmi, átti "to eat", Armenian utem "I eat" (from Indo-European *ōd-; see Bartolome(? spelling), IF 3, 15), Greek ἔδω, ἔσθίω, ἔσθω, Latin edō, ēdī, Gothic itan, past tense at, 1st person plural ētum, Old High German еʒʒan "to eat".. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 01:05, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Long root in Latin is by Lachmann's law, in Balto-Slavic by Winter's law, further confirmed by acute accent in Slavic and Lithuanian. For Hittite, Kloekhorst dismisses the Narten theory altogether because attested forms show ablaut (zero-grade) in Old Hittite, and only in newer (Middle Hittite) texts being replaced by full-grade forms. I.e. the original PIE paradigm being a normal root-present with *e/Ø- ablaut *h₁édti / *h₁dénti. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 01:38, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

• There is also the issue of Balto-Slavic infinitive ending, because in this case we also have Old Prussian cognate (deprecated template usage) īstwei which can't really derive from Balto-Slavic *ēstei as was argued here (the Old Prussian infinitive ending -twei is problematic). Perhaps Balto-Slavic verbs should be simply formatted as roots, i.e. *ēd- (or *ḗd-). --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 02:10, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
  • On that same page I argued that while we can't be sure that -tei was used as the infinitive or even as an infinitive, we can be sure that it existed in Proto-Balto-Slavic and was used in some verbal function. So I don't see any reason to leave it out. When we cite descendants we cite whole paradigms, not only the matching lemma forms. We list Bulgarian first-person singular forms as descendants of Proto-Slavic infinitives. We list Romance infinitives as descendants of Latin first-person singular present active indicative forms. We list Afrikaans infinitives as descending from Dutch infinitives even though they descend from the first-person singular present. And we list descendants of PIE terms in the nominative case's root grade (Template:term/t) even when the descendant has the genitive's grade (Balto-Slavic Template:term/t, Germanic Template:term/t). So there really is plenty of precedent for lemmas that are not exact phonological descendants. —CodeCat 12:56, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

    We can't be sure that *-tei/*-tej/*-tey was used as an/the infinitive, and you see no reason to leave it out? I don't quite comprehend your logic. If there is no agreed lemma form for a protolanguage, we should be using the most neutrally cited form, i.e. the present stem. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 14:02, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

嗯

Rfv-sense for ân Vietnamese reading, as it's not listed either in the Unihan database nor at the Nom Foundation website. Bumm13 (talk) 03:28, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Okay, I see that whoever added the Vietnamese section assumed that 嗯 matches its phonetic component (恩) character's primary reading. This assumes that it isn't somehow irregular or that linguistic drift hasn't occurred, so a citation would be very helpful. Bumm13 (talk) 03:34, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

hoi polloi

Rfv-sense "élite". See Talk:hoi polloi for more. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 06:01, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Widespread (mis)use in speech. This is among the 100 best-documented examples of misuse of borrowed terms. I suppose we won't be able to put this to bed until there are citations and a tedious usage note. DCDuring TALK 13:11, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

No, we won't. Speaking for myself, while I have often heard/read people complain about the misuse of hoi polloi to mean "élite" rather than "rabble", I have only very rarely actually encountered it being misused that way. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 13:30, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

You need to get out among the common people more ;-}.

Cited IMHO. DCDuring TALK 14:10, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

I've never heard it misused this way either, though I have encountered a lot of people who like to jump gleefully on "the hoi polloi" as an unforgivable error. Oddly enough I've never heard anybody object to "the algebra" (see etymology). Equinox ◑ 16:38, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Nope, nor "the apricot" either. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 16:55, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

MWDEU (1985) spills only half as much ink about this definition as about use with the, but say "this sense of hoi polloi is extremely common in speech" and "testimony […] strongly suggests that this sense of hoi polloi may now be more widely known and frequently used than the older, etymologically accurate sense."

Garner's (2005) rates it an error. DCDuring TALK 18:41, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps the dead hand of classical education for the aristocracy et al has retarded language change in the UK? DCDuring TALK 18:43, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

You may be right. (It took the OED 242 years to recognise that literally is a synonym for metaphorically.) I've never heard the opposite sense, though it might have developed from old University slang meaning those who obtained only a pass degree (without honours). I don't think Noël Coward's search for a rhyme is convincing evidence of contrary usage, but I'm surprised that so many modern writers can be cited for the reversed sense. Dbfirs 22:38, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

I operate under weak influence of the dead hand, but there is no denying that it has minimal influence on spoken language in the US. For example, the classical language plurals of words borrowed from those languages don't stand a chance here against regular English plural forms in the spoken language. It seems that the least bit of similarity of a classical borrowing to a more familiar term (in this case, high and hoity-toity) can lead to reanalysis of the term. DCDuring TALK 23:46, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

re: Noel Coward cite. I generally don't like poetry, song, or excessively 'literary' works for any Englsih citations because the meaning is often ambiguous. I thought there might be some usage in the 30s because of the rising influence of socialist thought and glorification of the working class in the mainstream but his was the only one I found in books. DCDuring TALK 23:52, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Whether there's a dead hand at play or not, the term does seem to have been amply cited by DCDuring. The 1992, 2010, 2011 citations in particular look solid. - -sche (discuss) 21:06, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

knock-on effect

Rfv-sense

I have been searching, without success, for evidence that the phrase "knock-on effect" is used to refer to dieseling in a car. In the US, dieseling is commonly called "knocking," not "knock on." If the term "knock-on effect" has ever been used to mean "dieseling," can anyone please supply a citation? Otherwise, I think this definition should be removed. I cannot find any mention of this meaning for "knock-on effect" outside of this wiktionary entry. — This comment was unsigned.

I found a definition of knock-on ("a knock-off nut") in an automotive glossary, which makes it even less likely that there is current use of the term with the definition being challenged. And w:Knock-on refers to other things, including a rugby and a physics sense. DCDuring TALK 03:23, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

My understanding has been (please correct if I'm wrong) that knocking and dieseling are two different things. Knocking refers to preignition and associated abnormal sound (a.k.a. knock ) in a spark-ignited motor, or the normal running sound of a diesel motor, which was especially audible in the older engines. Dieseling is the continued running of a spark-ignited motor after the motor has been turned off from the key. If dieseling and knocking are actually synonymous, we need a new sense to "dieseling". --Hekaheka (talk) 05:40, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

To DCDuring: true about w:Knock-on; however, I don't find any other uses for "knock-on effect" other than the first definition given.

To Hekaheka: I'm sure that is true, and probably the entry for "dieseling" should be corrected. But my point here is that "knock-on effect" does not refer to any sort of car-engine noise, regardless of cause, and therefore that definition should be removed altogether from the "knock-on effect" entry. Does anyone disagree? (Also, too, how does this work? Is there a time limit, or does there need to be a vote or something? I just want to fix the danged entry and was informed I should go through this process instead of just fixing it myself like we did in the old days.)--Potosino (talk) 16:24, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Where the problem is one of meaning, the RfV tag is inserted. Someone has to come up with citations before the later of 30 days or when a veteran contributor decides to close the RfV. Closing occurs when the closer thinks the matter has gotten sufficient attention and will not be getting any more that would be likely to change the outcome. DCDuring TALK 19:50, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

lamps

Rfv-sense "obesity". Has been around since 2006. - -sche (discuss) 20:56, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

The user in question as about as many deleted edits as live edits. I'm dubious. Am trying to think of thinks to search for. Mglovesfun (talk) 13:48, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

nationalise

Rfv-sense: Adjective: "Describes something that has undergone the process of nationalisation"

Speedy or RfV? DCDuring TALK 03:44, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

• Speedied. SemperBlotto (talk) 07:10, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

poly

Rfv-sense: Adjective: "Made of polyethylene (polythene)." a poly bag

This sense doesn't look like it is used as a full adjective. Attributive use of the noun covers it. DCDuring TALK 03:50, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

scatheness

"Harm; damage; injury; hurt; misfortune."

I see only scant mentions. DCDuring TALK 04:35, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Also spelled "scathness"? Anyway still not enough hits for inclusion- maybe someone can come up with more variant spellings. DTLHS (talk) 05:06, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

This is a modern Old English-based coinage used by language purists. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 10:44, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

But apparently not used, but only mentioned in Books. I guess there might be language purists Usenet groups that use it. DCDuring TALK 11:25, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

anonymous

Rfv-sense: (comparable, figuratively) Lacking individuality.

Tagged but not listed. — Ungoliant ^(Falai) 11:58, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

I think I have come across this meaning, such as in the expression "anonymous suits". Quite hard to distinguish this meaning from "unknown" in cites but try these:

• For Osborn the bombs appeared anonymous and indiscriminate, but the raking paths of cannon shells always seemed to be aimed directly at his slit trench.
• his style of dress projected the image of a clean-cut, white-collar company man: sober, mature, and anonymous.
• he explains that "a sentimental insistence on the importance of sympathy and individual suffering" worked to counter the Civil War's increasingly mechanized and anonymous slaughter.

SpinningSpark 23:02, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

I would actually want to pass this on widespread use ("anonymous buildings" is common, and they probably do have names and/or addresses), but I suppose the line is blurry. Equinox ◑ 22:19, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

oriental

Rfv-sense: a zoögeographical region of southeast Asia.

This sense is marked as "capitalized", so this should only be at Oriental. I request attestation of the lowercase "oriental" used in this way. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:35, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

krakozyabry

Can't find much of anything in English that uses this, let alone three good cites. (This is the only relevant GBook hit.) This, that and the other (talk) 08:30, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

ratheist

Protologism? Boogle Gooks has nothing relevant. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 12:59, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps it's the act of heisting a rat. Seriously, kill with fire. Mglovesfun (talk) 13:03, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Mglovesfun's gettin' wrathy. Dumped it in LoP.  Deleted. ~ Röbin Liönheart (talk) 17:04, 6 October 2013 (UTC)