Wiktionary:Requests for moves, mergers and splits

Wiktionary Request pages (edit) see also: discussions
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		Requests for moves, mergers and splits add new request | history | archives Discussion of proposed moves, mergers and splits of entries or other pages.	Category and label treatment requests add new request | history Requests for changes to Wiktionary's categories or labels, including additions, deletions, renames, mergers and splits.
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{{attention}} • {{rfap}} • {{rfdate}} • {{rfquote}} • {{rfdef}} • {{rfe}} • {{rfeq}} • {{rfex}} • {{rfi}} • {{rfp}} • {{rfref}} • {{rfscript}} • {{rftranslit}} • {{t-needed}}

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

This page is designed to discuss moves (renaming pages), mergers and splits. Its aim is to take the burden away from the Beer Parlour and Requests for Deletion where these issues were previously listed. Please note that uncontroversial page moves to correct typos, missing characters etc. should not be listed here, but moved directly using the move function.

• Appropriate: Renaming categories, templates, Wiktionary pages, appendices, rhymes and occasionally entries. Merging or splitting temp categories, templates, Wiktionary pages, appendices, rhymes.
• Out of scope: Merging entries which are alternative forms or spellings or synonyms such as color/colour or traveled/travelled. Unlike Wikipedia, we don’t redirect in these sort of situations. Each spelling gets its own page, often employing the templates {{alternative spelling of}} or {{alternative form of}}.
• Tagging pages: To tag a page, you can use the general template {{rfm}}, as well as one of the more specific templates {{move}}, {{merge}} and {{split}}.

Note that discussions for splitting, merging, and renaming languages, once held here, are now held at WT:Language treatment requests.

2017

Move entries in CAT:Khitan lemmas to a Khitan script

The Khitan wrote using a Siniform script. Are these Chinese transcriptions of Khitan? —suzukaze (t・c) 02:22, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

I'm a little confused about what's going on here. Are you RFV-ing every entry in this category? Or are you just looking for evidence that Khitan was written using this script? —Mr. Granger (talk • contribs) 12:45, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

The Khitans had their own script. These entries use the Chinese script. —suzukaze (t・c) 17:30, 13 September 2016 (UTC)

I understand that, but I don't understand what your goal is with this discussion. If you want to RFV every entry in the category, then I'd like to add {{rfv}} tags to alert anyone watching the entries. If you want to discuss what writing systems Khitan used, maybe with the goal of moving all of these entries to different titles, then I'm not sure RFV is the right place for the discussion. (Likewise with the Buyeo section below.) —Mr. Granger (talk • contribs) 17:55, 13 September 2016 (UTC)

Moved to RFM. - -sche (discuss) 21:04, 30 April 2017 (UTC)

Arbi

Discussion moved from Wiktionary:Requests for cleanup#Arbi.

Albanian. Should the common noun sense be lowercase? Compare Arbër, arbër? (Also, will whatever bot adds {{also}} reach these at some point?) - -sche (discuss) 19:29, 11 May 2017 (UTC)

• @-sche I've moved this discussion to RFM. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 17:42, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

Template:jiajie

This should be handled with {{liushu}}, since jiajie is one of the six categories (liushu). — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 18:36, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

Can both of these templates be renamed to include a language code? —CodeCat 19:01, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

{{jiajie}} should be merged with {{liushu}}, which could be renamed as {{Han liushu}}, following {{Han compound}} and {{Han etym}}. It might not be a good idea to use a particular language code because these templates are intended for use in multiple languages now. They used to be used under Translingual, but we have decided to move the glyph origin to their respective languages. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 20:22, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

You can use script codes as prefixes too. We have Template:Latn-def, Module:Cans-translit and such. —CodeCat 20:26, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

Support merging {{jiajie}} with {{liushu}}, this template only has a few uses and would be trivial to replace, I'm not sure why this discussion died out. The jiajie template does have functionality liushu is missing (e.g. at 云, where all the extra text produced by jiajie there is absent in liushu) though, but that also shouldn't be hard to add. - saph ^_^^⠀talk⠀ 14:42, 3 February 2025 (UTC)

2018

Entries for Japanese prefecture names that end in 県 (ken, “prefecture”)

I would like to request the move of the content of entries like 茨城県 (Ibaraki-ken, literally “Ibaraki prefecture”) to simply 茨城 (Ibaraki, “Ibaraki”), cf. Daijisen. 県 is not an essential part of the name.

(Notifying workgroup: Eirikr, Wyang, TAKASUGI Shinji, Nibiko, Atitarev, Dine2016, Poketalker, Cnilep, Britannic124, Fumiko Take, Dine2016): —Suzukaze-c◆◆ 03:19, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

As a counterargument, Shogakukan's 国語大辞典 entry for 茨城 (Ibaraki) has one sense listed as 「いばらきけん（茨城県）」の略 ("Ibaraki-ken" no ryaku, "short for Ibaraki-ken"), and the 茨城 page on the JA Wikipedia is a disambig pointing to 茨城県 as one possible more-specific entry. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 03:52, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) It seems like a two-word phrase to me. I am not a native speaker, but I think that if someone asked "水戸市は何県？" ((in) What prefecture is Mito?) then "茨城です。" (It's Ibaraki) would be a correct answer. Entries such as 奈良 and 広島 should have both the city and the prefecture. (I see that 奈良 currently does.) Cnilep (talk) 04:01, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

茨城県です would also be correct and probably more common. At least 東京 and 東京都 are clearly distinguished. No one in Izu Ōshima would say he/she is from 東京. — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 04:04, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes, 茨城県 is also correct. And if someone asked どこの出身？ (Where are you from?) the answer would probably be 奈良県 rather than 奈良, or else expect a follow-up question. But I don't think that is necessarily a matter of word boundaries. Compare Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Pittsburgh, Kansas; the fact that it is usually necessary, and always acceptable to specify the latter doesn't mean that Pittsburgh on its own is not a proper noun. By same token, I think that 茨城 (et alia) is a word. That's the point I had in mind. I will say nothing about what is more common. I don't even have good intuitions about frequency in my native language. Cnilep (talk) 04:54, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

I fully agree that 茨城 is a term worthy of inclusion. I also think that 茨城県 is a term worthy of inclusion. We have entries for both New York and New York City, and even New York State. Similarly, I think we should have entries for [PREFECTURE NAME], and also for [PREFECTURE NAME]県 and [PREFECTURE NAME]市 and [PREFECTURE NAME]郡, etc., as appropriate. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 05:03, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

I believe New York is a special case because there is both the state and the city. We have Washington State, but we don't have City of Chicago or State of Oregon. —Suzukaze-c◆◆ 18:40, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

A lot (maybe all?) of the prefecture names minus the 県 (-ken) suffix are polysemous. Listing a few from the north to the south, limiting just to geographical senses, and just in the same regions at that:

• 青森 (Aomori): a prefecture and a city
• 岩手 (Iwate): a prefecture, a city, and a township
• 秋田 (Akita): a prefecture and a city
• 山形 (Yamagata): a prefecture, a city, and a village
• 宮城 (Miyagi): a prefecture, a county, a township, a rural area (ancient Japan), a village, an island, and a mountain
• 福島 (Fukushima): a prefecture, a city, and a township
• 新潟 (Nīgata): a prefecture, a city, a park, and a village
• 栃木 (Tochigi): a prefecture and a city
• 茨城 (Ibaraki): a prefecture, a county, and a township

Jumping south a bit to touch on Anatoli's example further below:

• 奈良 (Nara): a prefecture, a city, a township, and a village

I am consequently in support of including both the bare name, and the qualified name(s), much as we already do for similar situations with English terms. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 21:35, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

They are polysemic because most prefectures were named after their capital city during the abolition of the han system. Exceptions include 埼玉 and 沖縄, where cities are named after their prefecture. — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 12:23, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Generally support. Less duplication is good, and it is not much different from Chinese etc. for which we generally delemmatise, if not completely hard-redirect, these forms. Wyang (talk) 04:49, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Support. For a dictionary, I think we don't need to keep entries with both prefecture name and prefecture, despite the usage but it's always helpful to provide usage notes (e.g. normally used with 県: ~県) and usage examples, e.g. 奈良県(ならけん) (Nara ken, “Nara (prefecture)”). --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 05:45, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Mecayapan Nahuatl saltillos

A number of Mecayapan Nahuatl words are currently written with U+0027 APOSTROPHE, which is a punctuation mark and not a letter. And a couple are using U+02BC MODIFIER LETTER APOSTROPHE, which is the wrong shape for this language. They should all be written with U+A78C LATIN SMALL LETTER SALTILLO instead.

• a̱'ti → a̱ꞌti
• babasoti' → babasotiꞌ
• cacahua' → cacahuaꞌ
• ca̱la̱' → ca̱la̱ꞌ
• coyo̱' → coyo̱ꞌ
• epaso̱' → epaso̱ꞌ
• hui̱lo̱' → hui̱lo̱ꞌ
• ichca' → ichcaꞌ
• ilhui' → ilhuiꞌ
• ocoʼ → ocoꞌ
• po̱cho̱' → po̱cho̱ꞌ
• sihua̱' → sihua̱ꞌ
• soqui' → soquiꞌ
• ta̱ga' → ta̱gaꞌ
• tepe̱' → tepe̱ꞌ
• ti̱lti' → ti̱ltiꞌ
• toca' → tocaꞌ
• tomaʼ → tomaꞌ
• to̱ca̱' → to̱ca̱ꞌ
• to̱to̱' → to̱to̱ꞌ
• tzi̱ca' → tzi̱caꞌ
• xo̱chi' → xo̱chiꞌ

--Lvovmauro (talk) 09:48, 31 August 2018 (UTC)

Or perhaps they should just be moved to use the Modifier Letter Apostrophe, cf WT:RFM#Entries_in_CAT:Taos_lemmas_with_curly_apostrophes, to avoid over-proliferation of different apostrophe-ish letters. I think we should try to be consistent within the Nahuatl languages, at least, in which codepoint we use. - -sche (discuss) 20:26, 31 August 2018 (UTC)

Most Nahuan languages don't use any sort of apostrophe. Mecayapan is unusual. --Lvovmauro (talk) 01:54, 1 September 2018 (UTC)

• @-sche I can do this using the same scripts I wrote for Taos terms if we can come to a consensus on what best character is. (I have no knowledge of the language myself.) — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 19:49, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

2019

toponyms

See also: Requests for moves, mergers and splits

I think the categories for toponyms (e.g. English terms derived from toponyms) should be moved to a category just called [language] toponyms (e.g. English toponyms). It feels inconsistent to have English terms derived from toponyms while also having English eponyms. —Globins (yo) 01:14, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

A term derived from a toponym is an eponym, but is not a toponym itself. So the current names make sense. —Rua (mew) 11:45, 9 May 2019 (UTC)

Sense 2 for toponym is "a word derived from the name of a place," and the entry mentions eponym as a coordinate term. —Globins (yo) 00:04, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

@Globins Wiktionary's category structure only follows the first definition, which is the more common meaning. We shouldn't mix up the two definitions. —Rua (mew) 17:52, 13 May 2019 (UTC)

@Rua: In that case, English eponyms should be moved to English terms derived from eponyms since our current category name follows the less common definition of eponym. —Globins (yo) 21:16, 14 May 2019 (UTC)

Not really. An eponym is derived from a name. A toponym is a name. So a term derived from a toponym is derived from a name, but a term derived from an eponym is derived from another word that is then derived from a name. They're not equivalent. —Rua (mew) 21:18, 14 May 2019 (UTC)

I think "eponymic terms" would be better if you want to preserve the "name that a term is derived from" sense of eponym (as opposed to the "term derived from a name" sense). "Terms derived from eponyms" seems odd, maybe tautological, to me because a name is not inherently an eponym, but only when we are discussing the fact that a term is derived from it. — Eru·tuon 21:35, 14 May 2019 (UTC)

@Globins Do you have any response to Rua or Erutuon? It would be nice to mark this discussion as resolved if it isn't going to go anywhere. - excarnateSojourner (talk | contrib) 03:58, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

@ExcarnateSojourner I think I agree with Erutuon's category name suggestion then. —Globins (yo) 17:56, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

have one's hands tied

As has been pointed out here, "have" isn't part of the term. Chuck Entz (talk) 12:24, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

As I see it, have isn't part of the metaphor, but it is part of an expression that is not in turn a form of tie someone's hands. The passive (one's) hands are/were/being/been tied are such forms, though none make for a good lemma entry or likely searches. DCDuring (talk) 13:38, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

@DCDuring: Thanks. Also the second meaning of tied: restricted (which even offers the quotation: but the county claims its hands are too tied) --Backinstadiums (talk) 14:25, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

It's still a metaphor: a county doesn't have directly have hands. DCDuring (talk) 17:39, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

For an example of tie someone’s hands being used in the active voice: “It will tie our hands for another nine years with respect to a labor contact [sic] with no layoff clauses and raises that are built in.”

In general, for any expression of form “⟨VERB⟩ someone’s ⟨NOUN⟩”, there is a corresponding expression “ have/get one’s ⟨NOUN⟩ ⟨VERBed⟩”. For example, cut someone’s hair → have one’s hair cut. Or knock someone’s socks off → get one’s socks knocked off. Or lower someone’s ears → have one’s ears lowered. If the expression is idiom, sometimes we have one, sometimes the other, and sometimes both.  --Lambiam 21:24, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Indeed. Unless the active form is very uncommon, I'd prefer it as the lemma. I don't think that we would be wrong have both the active-voice expression and the have and/or get expressions, even though we could argue that it is a matter of grammar that one can transform certain expressions in the way Lambian describes. DCDuring (talk) 22:31, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

I was going to redirect this to the active form per the discussion above, but I notice it has interesting translations, and so perhaps a case for existing as a THUB. - -sche (discuss) 22:32, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

January 2020

'Cities in Foo' and 'Towns in Foo'

@Donnanz, Fay Freak, Rua I'm not sure what the real difference is between a city and a town, and I suspect most people don't know either. For this reason I think we should maybe merge the two into a single 'Cities and towns in Foo' category. Benwing2 (talk) 03:54, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

I oppose this merger. I would not think to look for a category with such an unintuitive name, and I do not know of any examples where this is problematic. Wikipedia seems to be able to choose which word to use without trouble, so why can't we? —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 05:36, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

Eliminating one of them is a good idea where there is no meaningful distinction between cities and towns. But that's going to be a country-specific decision: England makes the decision, the Netherlands does not. I think in cases without a distinction, we should keep "cities" and eliminate "towns". —Rua (mew) 10:15, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

I wouldn't recommend merging them. It's a complex subject though, and the rules defining cities and towns can differ from country to country, and from state to state in the USA; I have come across "cities" with a population of less than 1,000 in the USA, sometimes around 50, but apparently they have that status. Cities in the UK have that status as granted by a monarch, towns can be harder to define in metropolitan areas, and villages can call themselves towns if they have a town council. Some villages large enough to be towns prefer to keep the village title. DonnanZ (talk) 10:34, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

The odds that editors will accurately/consistently distinguish these categories when adding (the template that generate) them ... seems low. However, even if the categories are merged, that problem will remain on the level of the displayed definitions. And, apparently some users above want to keep them distinct. So, meh. - -sche (discuss) 05:36, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

I can see arguments for both sides, actually. The idea needs a lot more thought, as you would probably have to drag in villages etc. as well. DonnanZ (talk) 14:15, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Could merge them into Municipalities in Foo and have the various alternatives point to that category. Of course there are some "cities" which contain several municipalities, but I don't think there is a word which comprises every form of village/town/hamlet/city/urban area. - TheDaveRoss 12:47, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

In New York State alone, we have cities, towns, villages (which are subdivisions of towns), and unincorporated places, all of which exist within counties, except NY City, which is coextensive with 5 counties, each of which is coextensive with a borough of the City. The identities and borders of these places in NYS are generally fairly stable, though subject to occasional revision. Legislative and judicial districts are separate, with legislative districts changing after each decennial census. Census-designated places form a parallel structure with relationships to the state systems. The census system has the virtue of being uniform for the entire US, but the borders of many census places do not necessarily correspond to the borders of larger governmental units such as states and counties. Within New York State there are lists of each type of jurisdiction. In principle each US state has its own names for classes of jurisdictions. Finally, in popular practice, place names for inhabited place can differ from the names of governmental units and tend to have different boundaries even when the names are the same.

In light of the lack of homogeneity even within the US, let alone between countries, I think we need to respect national and state and provincial naming systems. If there is a worldwide system for categorizing places, we could also follow that, but I have not heard of such a system. Does the EU have some uniform system?

In the absence of any generally accepted uniform universal or near-universal system for categorizing places, I think we need to accept the fact that nations and semi-sovereign parts of nations (eg, US states, Canadian provinces) each have their own naming systems, which are accepted within their boundaries. I think it would be foolish for us to attempt to have our own system for categorizing places and derelict for us to fail to use the various national and subnational categories.

If the categories then don't lend themselves to a uniform universal categorization system, too bad. DCDuring (talk) 17:55, 20 September 2020 (UTC)

February 2020

go out on a limb

Merge with out on a limb. Canonicalization (talk) 11:25, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support DCDuring (talk) 13:57, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

• Nah not merged. GreyishWorm (talk) 23:56, 9 November 2022 (UTC)
  • GreyishWorm (Wonderfool, now blocked) closed this without consensus or an explanation, so I've reopened it. — excarnateSojourner (talk · contrib) 07:27, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
•  Oppose: Even though "out on a limb" can be used without "go", I think "go out on a limb" =/= "go" + "out on a limb", so I think we should keep them separate after all. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 02:14, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

March 2020

centrifugal force

We have four definitions here and probably ought to have one; compare centripetal force, with its one, simple def. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 15:36, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

See w:History of centrifugal and centripetal forces. The article just lacks cites, dates, etc to support the historical definitions. I suppose that we should just give up on trying to cover the historical definitions and leave that to our betters at WP. DCDuring (talk) 17:55, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

April 2020

until one is blue in the face

to blue in the face (now a redirect to until one is blue in the face).

In addition of all the tense, person, and number variants (also contractions) of the current entry one can find variants omitting the pronoun, adding adverbs, using till or 'til instead of until; [VERB] oneself blue in the face; go|become|turn blue in the face; and blue-in-the-face and blue in the face as adjectives outside any of these expressions. The unchanging core of these is the set phrase blue in the face. It also has medical use (synonym cyanotic), which renders the figurative sense evolution and meaning obvious. DCDuring (talk) 17:39, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

•  Support. I might do it myself if I can think of a good way to phrase the definition. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 04:38, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

  Maybe until blue in the face would be better for wording a definition. Usage examples could include the most frequent 2-4 tense and person forms. DCDuring (talk) 14:01, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

  A possible definition of blue in the face "exasperated". DCDuring (talk) 14:04, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

imek

The reconstructed infinitive form is useful to understand what the underlying verb is but it is never used in a sentence to convey meaning, like Azerbaijani *imək, Uzbek *emoq. —92.184.116.176 23:50, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

@Allahverdi Verdizade: Seems to me like reconstructions are not meant for this purpose. Is there a better way to lemmatise this verb? —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 23:38, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

@Metaknowledge: I agree, and I don't think it's needed for any purpose, at least not for Azerbaijani. There was a user (or anon?) who insisted on adding those "underlying" verbs and creating templates for them, but I never understood the linguistics behind this reasoning. Allahverdi Verdizade (talk) 23:42, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

@Allahverdi Verdizade: So can we just delete them? How should they be lemmatised? —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:27, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

You could lemmatize imiş as a free morpheme-form of -miş, i.e. Allahverdi Verdizade (talk) 01:36, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

May 2020

state's evidence

to turn state's evidence.

Most use of state's evidence is clearly of state + 's + evidence. I haven't found any use that is suggestive of a restriction to a witness's testimony, except with the use of turn. Also compare “turn state's evidence”, in OneLook Dictionary Search. with “state's evidence”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. DCDuring (talk) 14:16, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

They can't be state + 's + evidence when the phrase encompasses proceedings where the prosecutor is not a state (e.g., a municipality, county, or country). bd2412 T 05:32, 6 August 2020 (UTC)

Sense 3 of state should cover it. I think if 3(a) doesn't cover it, then "Never do anything against conscience even if the state demands it." is not an appropriate citation thereof; I think Einstein would consider national, state, and city governments all part of "the state".--Prosfilaes (talk) 07:04, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

play the victim card, play the race card, play the gender card

I wonder if these all ought to be merged into some entry akin to "play the ____ card" or something. There appear to be other words substituted aside from victim, race, and gender. Tharthan (talk) 22:09, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

I lament that our way of handling snowclones is not optimal, banishing them to appendix-space, such that the choices here amount to 'have these multiple similar entries in the mainspace where users find them' or 'banish them to a tidy but less-findable appendix'. However, I see that we have a sense at card for this (although the definition could use some work), and between putting a link there and redirects from these entries, I suppose we could get by with migrating these to the snowclone appendix. Centralizing them does seem sensible since there are so many. ("Play the religion card" also exists.) - -sche (discuss) 23:56, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

Maybe a title like play the prejudice card. — This unsigned comment was added by 2600:387:9:9::bf (talk) at 14:37, 2022 September 4.

Interesting idea. Perhaps there would be an extensive entry for play the (something) card, but with full entries for the main attestable instances (eg, race/gender and perhaps victim, derived terms, and a usage note about "(something)". Play the X card seems to be something that would be highly productive, unless its use in too many cases would be deemed a microaggression. Attestation for play the (something) card would have to be limited to "somethings" other than the forms that have their own attestation. Other instances that I can readily find are disability, oppression, and queer. The uses of feminist and bully don't fit the "victim" semantics, which might warrant a second figurative definition for play the (something) card in addition to a {{&lit}} "definition". DCDuring (talk) 15:10, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

BTW, we are not alone in having an entry for these, but MWOnline only has one for use/play the race/gender card. Collins and Cambridge Advance Learner's have only play the race card. DCDuring (talk) 15:21, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

Besides those, there's "play the poverty card", "play the gay card", "play the abuse card", "play the disabled card", "play the rape card", etc., as well as ones which, as you say, seem like they may have different semantics (e.g. some uses of "play the Muslim card" in reference to legislation ?to get Muslim support?, and some uses of "play the Holocaust card"?) ... it seems too productive to have entries for every attested X (it becomes SOP). Should this be in the mainspace as play the something card, or at Appendix:Snowclones/play the X card like Appendix:Snowclones/X is the new Y? For snowclones like this that require placeholders other than "someone"/"one" in the title, we seem to in recent years prefer to put them in Appendix:Snowclones/ rather than in mainspace, but I do see a handful of mainspace titles where "something" is a placeholder, like give something a go. If we redirect all the variations people might search for, add usexes to the relevant sense we list at card, and maybe add a usex to whichever sense of play is relevant, it should be sufficiently findable. - -sche (discuss) 16:48, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

I'd favor having a full entry for any term (presumably they would be attestable) that another dictionary had. It is unfortunate that our basic search engine searching for "play the disabled card" (with or without quotes) does not take a user to any of our existing play the X card entries. (I have added test entries for play the card and play the something card.) That would imply that we could use hard redirects for as many attestable instances of the snow clone as seem likely to help users. It may well be that the hard redirects should go to the snowclone appendix subpages, but there is no particular reason to do so in preference to a mainspace entry. Concern about the aesthetics of headwords with a placeholders seem misplaced. And (who knows?) someone might actually search for the expression using a placeholder and find it if it were in principal namespace. DCDuring (talk) 20:27, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

Also, as the MWOnline entry shows play is not strictly essential; it can be replaced by use, among other verbs, such as deploy. So, perhaps a sense of card is an appropriate target for redirects. But I doubt that the entry for card is the right place for an intelligible presentation. For one thing, any etymology (sense derivation), usage notes, and derived terms or collocations (eg, race card) would necessarily be separated from the relevant definition for the polysemous noun, so as not to appear on the same screen. And, even if they did, that they belonged together would not be at all obvious. I realize that this kind of argument, if applied, might make for some inconsistency in our presentation of snowclones and might violate a strict reading of idiomaticity, but cases like this may merit exceptional treatment. DCDuring (talk) 21:05, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

Onelook finds "play the race card" and "play the gender card" in various dictionaries, but "play the victim card" only in us, and it seems unlike the others in other ways, too: card seems unnecessary, as the same meaning is expressed by play the victim. As you note, all of these can also be found with other verbs, like "use". I am inclined to redirect play the victim card to either card's relevant sense or play the something card. It has a Swedish translation; if there are others, I would think play the victim would be the better THUB location. I'm not sure what to do about play the gender card and play the race card; on one hand, each is in other Onelook dictionaries; OTOH, you can swap out "play" for "use", "gender" for other things ("sexism", "sex", "woman", and with different meaning other things like "religion", etc), it's not a set phrase and the kernel of idiomaticity is obviously some smaller part, maybe just card, not the whole phrase. - -sche (discuss) 17:03, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

But the current definitions of both card and play the something card need improvement before anything can be sensibly merged there. - -sche (discuss) 17:05, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

Is the entry for race card good enough? DCDuring (talk) 07:50, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

As to card, we may need two additional definitions, one for the general metaphorical sense, another (subsense?) for the more specific sociopolitical use. As Equinox observed elsewhere, the metaphor of a competitive card game must be understood for the expression to make any sense at all.

(figuratively) A ploy of potentially advantageous use in a situation viewed as analogous to a card game.

The only card left for him to play was playing dumb.

An invocation of an emotionally or politically charged issue or symbol, as in a political competition.

race card, gender card

HTH. DCDuring (talk) 08:28, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

FWIW I've also seen "play the gaijin card". MedK1 (talk) 15:32, 15 February 2025 (UTC)

Snowclone? TooSimilarT0DaFollowingUsername (talk) 01:22, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

July 2020

Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/vьlkolakъ

I suggest that this entry be moved to Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/vьlkodlakъ, since the -dl- cluster in the Czech descendant vlkodlak indicates that the cluster was still present in the Proto-Slavic form and was reduced to -l- in the other descendants. --108.20.184.19 00:44, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

User:Bezimenen, seems sensible? PUC – 12:02, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

@PUC: I have no objections to the move, however, I'm not entirely sure that *vьlkodlakъ was the primary form. Semantically, it makes sense to analyze the lemma as Proto-Slavic *vьlkodolkъ = *vьlkъ (“wolf”) +‎ *dolka (“skin”) +‎ *-ъ with -ol- > -la- metathesis or possible *vьlkodьlakъ (less likely in view of East Slavic forms with *-olo-, e.g. Russian вурдала́к (vurdalák, “vampire”) /first recorded in written form in 18-19 cent./). You should consult with User:Rua in regard to which form should be created - *vьlkodlakъ or *vьlkodolkъ. I'm not so familiar with the style that Wiktionary likes to follows. Безименен (talk) 12:25, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

If the original form had -dl-, why do we not see it in the other languages that preserve it, such as Polish? —Rua (mew) 13:25, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Not sure, but looking again at the entry, it seems not only Czech but also Serbo-Croatian and Slovene preserve the -dl- as well. --108.20.184.19 16:51, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Serbo-Croatian (and, I believe, Slovene) never preserves Proto-Slavic -dl- clusters, so the Serbo-Croat form indicates either some such form as Proto-Slavic *vьlkodolkъ or a later epenthesis of -d- by analogy with dlaka. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 16:20, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

September 2020

ungjetë to a new ungjet

Ungjetë is actually just a variant of ungjet, which is the standard form. ArbDardh (talk) 19:13, 12 September 2020 (UTC)ArbDardh

be up to

Tagged but not posted here: Merge with up to something.

Be is not essential to the idiom. Some other copulas work, eg. seem, appear, look. DCDuring (talk) 05:13, 20 September 2020 (UTC)

November 2020

bainin, bawneen

One should almost certainly be an alt-form of the other. I’m not sure which is best as lemma or whether the pronunciations should be identical. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 05:16, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

de kat sturen

It looks like this is only citable with a pronoun, so the lemma should be zijn kat sturen. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 17:40, 26 November 2020 (UTC)

December 2020

take advantage of, take advantage

Tagged by Adam78 in July 2019, but apparently never listed. The specific diffs for the taggings are Special:Diff/53620744 and Special:Diff/53620742. The entries seem to have some distinct definitions listed, with take advantage of having "To exploit, for example sexually." and take advantage having "To profit from a situation deliberately." They also seem to share the definition "To use or make use of."/"To make use of something." Of final note, take advantage has a quotation with a usage that is not followed by of. Feel free to move this entry into the 2019 section if appropriate. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 19:58, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

January 2021

all out, all-out

Two assorted groups of adjective and adverb senses. Merge? Equinox ◑ 14:48, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

I'd bet that you couldn't come up with definitions on the merged entry that were both complete and subsitutable as both adjective and adverb in such definitions. Also I'd expect that synonyms might need to be distinguished by PoS. DCDuring (talk) 16:22, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

I don't mean that Adj and Adv should be merged, but rather that the two named entries should be merged. Equinox ◑ 21:48, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

Support for the sake of deduplication. - excarnateSojourner (talk|contrib) 06:52, 29 October 2021 (UTC)

Hmm. I think the adjective is normally all-out. The adverb seems to mostly be "all out". So it seems like each POS is best situated where it is, on its own page...? - -sche (discuss) 05:14, 31 March 2024 (UTC)

February 2021

one-on-one, one-to-one

Significant overlap. Equinox ◑ 18:43, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

reconnoiter, reconnoitre

Merge (note that both have additional translations and reconnoiter was WOTD). J3133 (talk) 09:08, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

I've merged the verb translations for reconnoiter and reconnoitre. They are all now on reconnoiter#Translations, and reconnoitre#Translations points to this with {{trans-see}}.Voltaigne (talk) 12:38, 20 March 2021 (UTC)

classic, classical

Not synonyms, of course, but certain senses overlap almost entirely (except people have edited one and not the other without realising). Equinox ◑ 04:12, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

An approach would be to put all and only the true definitions that are most commonly use a given spelling in that spelling and also have a definition in each saying that it is a synonym of the other spelling. That might not be exactly true, but would be close. To rely on the other term appearing in related terms seems a bit weak. DCDuring (talk) 04:19, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, I think that's what we may have to do, with glosses in the {{synonym of}}s to make clear that each entry being a {{synonym of}} the other is not (just) circular. Like egoist vs egotist (we are not the only dictionary to have a sense line defining each of those terms as the other, in addition to other definitions). - -sche (discuss) 19:45, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

If possible and if properly executed, the approach I advocate gets you out of circularity for each individual definition. DCDuring (talk) 23:00, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

banane Gros Michel to Gros Michel (French)

I would do this myself (it's SOP), but I don't know gender and other grammatical details. Chuck Entz (talk) 07:12, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

March 2021

een sprong in het duister maken

I think this should be moved to sprong in het duister and converted to a noun. The forms with maken are not overwhelmingly common compared to other uses. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 14:56, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

April 2021

slue, slew

There are several "rotation" senses that are patchily duplicated between these entries. Equinox ◑ 19:39, 9 April 2021 (UTC)

May 2021

spit in someone's face

Should be moved to spit in the face of, since one can spit in the face of, e.g., the law, the government, hip-hop culture, and other non-people nouns. Imetsia (talk) 23:48, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

Actually it should be spit in one's face, as there are already many such set phrases involving a genitive construction where the variable object is represented as one's. For example: change one's mind—though there is also change someone's mind, which is redundant and should probably be deleted. — 69.120.64.15 02:31, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

In this case (spitting) it should be "someone's", because "one" spits in "someone" else's face. We use "one" where the phrase is constructed so that it happens to oneself. Equinox ◑ 20:27, 23 May 2021 (UTC)

On the other hand, it's conceivable that someone says, "How dare you spit in my face?", meaning that the person addressed has treated the speaker disrespectfully. — SGconlaw (talk) 17:44, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

Spit in quoting is "TFFFF" or "PTFFFU". 155.137.27.93 15:05, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Ah I see now, the distinction is that one's constructions are supposed to be reflexive. The distinction in titling however is not obvious and I wish it were made clear somewhere. — 69.120.64.15 03:57, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

swaddler, Swaddler

Can/should the Irish religion senses at these two entries be merged somehow? Equinox ◑ 20:26, 23 May 2021 (UTC)

June 2021

Reconstruction:Proto-Tocharian/jä- → Reconstruction:Proto-Tocharian/yä-

All of the other Proto-Tocharian entries so far use ⟨y⟩ for this phoneme */j/, equivalent to Adams' ⟨i̯⟩. This is also the letter used on the Wikipedia article for Proto-Tocharian and in the standard romanization of Tocharian languages, which we use, not to mention for the corresponding phoneme in PIE, *y. It would be nonsensical and confusing to use ⟨j⟩ instead for the Proto-Tocharian stage only. The page was created recently (April), so presumably its creator just forgot to check the existing entries. — 69.120.64.15 03:37, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

Wait, apparently there is a distinction in how Adams uses ⟨i̯⟩ versus ⟨y⟩ for Proto-Tocharian, but I have no clue what it is. (It has nothing to do with PIE *d versus *y, for instance, and nothing to do with laryngeals.) — 69.120.64.15 04:18, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

Ok, it seems to be non-phonemic and have to do with the following vowel. */jä/ (⟨ä⟩ ≈ IPA /ɨ/) and */jē/ are written ⟨i̯ä⟩ and ⟨i̯ē⟩ respectively, but /jV/ for all other vowels seem to use ⟨y⟩. I doubt this is a necessary distinction for Wiktionary to make, since it seems entirely predictable from environment, but I'm still unsure what purpose it is meant to serve. @GabeMoore, might you be able to weigh in? — 69.120.64.15 04:34, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail versus if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail

Suggest making when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail the primary and if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail the alt form. Rationale: sounds better and more hits on Google in a 4:3 ratio. Cheers, Facts707 (talk) 17:19, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

Support for the sake of deduplication. - excarnateSojourner (talk|contrib) 07:14, 29 October 2021 (UTC)

July 2021

rubber-band, rubberbanding

A bit fiddly: one entry is a verb and the other a noun, and they both have multiple senses with slight distinctions that should be ironed out. Equinox ◑ 13:13, 25 July 2021 (UTC)

August 2021

armenishte

Overlap with armenisht. Also, it may be an adjective not a noun Wubble You (talk) 19:01, 27 August 2021 (UTC)

September 2021

checked tone#English, entering tone#English

Merge into checked and entering? —Suzukaze-c (talk) 06:11, 3 September 2021 (UTC)

Saltillo in Rapa Nui

Previous discussion: User talk:Kwamikagami#Saltillo
Pinging @Kwamikagami, Metaknowledge as users that were already part of the discussion. For others, the following TLDR:

• User:Kwamikagami has moved a few Rapa Nui pages en masse from a straight apostrophe (U+0027) to a saltillo (U+A78C)
• The reason they give for this is that, since unicode classifies the apostrophe as a punctuation mark, rather than a letter, it shouldn't be used as a letter, and thus the visually similar saltillo should be used.
• The counter-reason given is that Unicode's classification is arbitrary and has little to do with actual usage in the language, which we as Wiktionary want to follow.
• There is one mention of the saltillo being open to usage, in Kieviet (2007).
• There is yet to be found at least one usage of the saltillo for Rapa Nui in the wild. since both Kieviet (2007) and schoolbooks published by the Chilean government use either a straight apostrophe (U+0027) [This one is most common], or a curly apostrophe (U+2018) provided with a font that renders it similar to a prime (U+2032). Other grammar books and dictionaries use any of the three characters.

I believe we should move these pages back to a straight apostrophe, and set the use of the straight apostrophe in stone at WT:ARAP. What do others think? Thadh (talk) 10:53, 3 September 2021 (UTC)

We have four sources:

We have Du Feu, who used a special font because the usual fonts available to her were inadequate for Rapa Nui, which required two special letters (the glottal stop and the engma). If the ASCII apostrophe were adequate for glottal stop, there would've been no need for a special letter.

We have Kieviet, who states that, now that Unicode provides for the saltillo, there is no longer a need for a special font.

We have the ministry dictionary, which uses an apostrophe letter -- not ASCII input with smart quotes, because it has the '9' shape at the beginning of a word.

We have the ministry educational material, which uses a hodgepodge of ASCII apostrophes, curly apostrophes and curly quotation marks -- that is, sometimes '1' shaped, sometimes '9' shaped and sometimes '6' shaped, with little consistency. Presumably we wish to aim for better than that, even if it is common.

In most languages that use an apostrophe-like letter for glottal stop, it's common to substitute a keyboard <'>, but that doesn't mean we should do the same. When writing Chechen, it's common to use a digit <1> for palochka, but again that doesn't mean we should do the same. When writing Ossetian, it's common to use a Latin rather than Cyrillic æ, but if you did that in a domain name, it would likely be tagged as phishing. The shortcuts people take with typography may be common, but a dictionary is expected to be more professional. kwami (talk) 15:10, 3 September 2021 (UTC)

To briefly summarise the important points of what I said on Thadh's Kwamikagami's talk page: This move should have been raised here first, so the weight of the evidence should have to point to the saltillo for us not to move it back. Kwami is from Wikipedia, and believes that we should be "more professional", even at the cost of ignoring all actual usage in a language community. (He has not, to the best of my knowledge, taken me up on my suggestion that he should go to the Wikipedias of languages like Rapa Nui and Hausa that use the apostrophe, and tell them that they're doing it wrong — just us.) I was open to the possibility that the saltillo might see actual use, but the fact that it doesn't makes this seem to be all about the Unicode specifications, which are not relevant to a descriptive dictionary. As I result, I support moving back to the apostrophe. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 16:15, 3 September 2021 (UTC)

There are several recent cases where @Mahagaja has advocated a particular Unicode character instead of a the straight apostrophe in such cases, but I don't remember the specifics off the top of my head. Chuck Entz (talk) 16:18, 3 September 2021 (UTC)

We do need to use Unicode correctly. The straight apostrophe (U+0027) and curly apostrophe (U+2018) are punctuation marks and should not be used as letters. That's what the saltillo (U+A78C) and modifier letter apostrophe (U+02BC) are for. If using punctuation marks as letters were acceptable, Unicode wouldn't have bothered creating those characters. Using punctuation marks for letters is as bad as mixing Latin and Cyrillic (which is something we used to do for Montenegrin Serbo-Croatian, but don't anymore), as Kwami points out, and just because other sources do it doesn't mean we should. We can, of course, have hard redirects from spellings with the more easily typable straight apostrophe, or put the correct page name in {{also}} if the spelling with the straight apostrophe exists (as a punctuation mark) in another language. But Kwami was quite right to move these Rapa Nui pages to the spelling using the correct character, and they should not be moved back. —Mahāgaja · talk 16:39, 3 September 2021 (UTC)

@Mahagaja: So if nearly everyone writing text in a given language (say, tens of millions of people) use a character that you consider "wrong", we should still avoid it because it doesn't respect Unicode? Whatever happened to descriptivism? (And if you think this is a silly hypothetical, it's not — I just described the situation with the apostrophe in Hausa.) —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 21:56, 3 September 2021 (UTC)

It reminds me of when I started adding entries in the Cupeño language and had to figure out how to deal with a letter that the (pre-Unicode) main source defends as being very easy to replicate by filing bits off the $ key on a typewriter. People work with what they have available, and it doesn't always fit neatly into the right categories. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:00, 3 September 2021 (UTC)

@Metaknowledge: If tens of millions of people used Rapa Nui, it would have its own keyboard layout and the saltillo would be easy to type for them. Descriptivism applies to language, not orthography. It's not anti-descriptivist to say that recieve is a misspelling, and using an apostrophe as a letter is also a misspelling. The only difference is that using an apostrophe instead of a saltillo isn't a mistake that can be made when writing by hand or by typewriter or that can be detected in a photocopy or a scan, so it's more subtle (like mixing Latin and Cyrillic), but it's still a mistake. —Mahāgaja · talk 06:49, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

@Mahagaja: As I said, my example wasn't a hypothetical. There are somewhere around 60 million native speakers of Hausa per WP. Mac offers lots of keyboards for lots of languages, including one for Hawaiian complete with ʻokina, but it doesn't provide a Hausa one. When I search for Hausa keyboards on Google, they provide the apostrophe and quotation marks, but no character designated by Unicode as a letter. So are you really maintaining that nearly all typed material in Hausa is misspelt? —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 07:11, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

Yes, though of course that's not the Hausa users' fault, it's the fault of the software companies that care more about providing support for a minority language spoken by 24,000 people in the United States than about providing support for a language spoken by tens of millions of people in Africa (i.e. systemic racism). I don't blame Hausa users for doing the best they can with the materials available to them, and I know it's unrealistic to expect them all to type ʼ instead of just hitting the apostrophe key, but as a dictionary it's our responsibility to do things the right way rather than the easy way. —Mahāgaja · talk 07:29, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

@Mahagaja: Systemic racism is the root cause of lots of annoying things, but some of those things are set in stone. At this point, Hausa users have no reason to follow Unicode rules even when they can. I'm sure the editors at Hausa Wikipedia can figure out how to get the "correct" character if they wanted to, but I see that you too have no interest in going over there and telling them they're doing it wrong. I have a radical idea: let's respect their choices. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 17:57, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

I have a better idea. We'll let Hausa Wikipedia worry about Hausa Wikipedia, and we'll worry about Wiktionary, which, as I said, has a responsibility to use Unicode correctly, even when other Wikimedia projects use it wrong. —Mahāgaja · talk 18:11, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

I thought we had a responsibility to document languages, not be Unicode purists. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 18:33, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

If Wikitionary or our browsers represent the languages incorrectly, because they follow the Unicode definition that punctuation marks are punctuation marks, then we are not documenting the languages correctly. If a language commission chooses a specific Unicode point that is one thing, but that's seldom the case. Since we by necessity choose a Unicode point for each letter regardless, we might as well choose one that represents the language well. kwami (talk) 01:17, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

Just to jump in quickly, as someone who is Nigerian and has had to go through the process of creating my own keyboards to be able to type properly in Yorùbá and as someone who is learning Hawaiian, while there definitely is systemic racism when it comes to African languages, I really would not pit them against Hawaiian. Hawaiian still lacks a ton of support, sometimes even less than Hausa, Igbo, & Yorùbá (see: spellcheck on PC Microsoft Word or language packs for Windows), and people are still trying to get more support for it. At the same time, Hawaiian is more than just "a minority language spoken by 24,000 people in the United States", it is an indigenous language that currently is the product of tons of effort gone towards revitalizing it and making sure that it's well-supported. And so, please do not pit them against each other saying that Hawaiian having more support (even though it doesn't) is systemic racism. The communities are aiming for very similar goals and are all dealing with racism in our own ways, not from each other.

Re: the main issue at hand. I would go with what the speakers of the language use. It's similar to what we do for Hausa, Igbo, & Yorùbá tones. No matter how annoying it can be, since the majority of speakers don't write tones out, we don't put them in page titles and only in headword lines, since we want people to be able to find words that they see "in the wild", which will often not be tone-marked. So it's a similar issue here, if the majority of speakers and majority of texts don't use the special character and it's not hard prescribed, then the page title shouldn't change, and the special character can be put in the headword line. That's my personal take on that issue. AG202 (talk) 13:48, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ This isn't a case of leaving out elements like tone marks. All RS's for Rapa Nui use the glottal stop. It's a matter of deciding which Unicode point to use for it, not whether to include it.

Re. the poor support for W. African languages, that's not racism so much as bias in the interests of the people developing Unicode. When Unicode decided they would no longer accept precomposed Latin, there was a call for people to get what they needed in before the deadline. But the respondents were all working on European languages. After West Africans started complaining that Unicode didn't adequately support their languages, the Unicode people realized they'd fucked up. At least, the ones I've talked to say they wished they'd realized what was going to happen, and spent more time on major African languages than on minor European languages.

Now that there are supplemental planes, there's room for more precomposed Latin. But as computers improve, there's less and less need for it, so I doubt they'll start accepting precomposed letters again.

I find it amazing that you could write Yoruba without tone. I mean, you can write it without vowels as long as you include the tone! kwami (talk) 23:06, 18 October 2021 (UTC)

There are many reasons that folks don't write Yoruba with tones, partly because of a lack of solid education, partly because of a lack of technological support, partly because you can (usually) tell what you mean from context, and a ton more. There was a solid seminar done last year at the British Library about it actually, but yea it's complicated. I wish that precomposed characters could be brought back, but that's a pipe dream. I don't think that you can write it without vowels as long as you include the tone though, as Yoruba is very vowel-heavy, and it'd get confusing quickly.

In terms of the question at hand though, I brought up the comparison more of a way to show how proscribed writing & everyday writing can interact on Wiktionary. If the majority of speakers type/write one way in informal & formal registers, that way should be the way that should be primarily reflected on Wiktionary, while the proscribed way can be shown in the headword line or an alternative form or whatever. However, I don't know the specifics of the situation with Rapa Nui, so I won't comment directly on the specifics of addressing it. AG202 (talk) 23:15, 18 October 2021 (UTC)

My impression of Yoruba, from the very very little I think I know of it, is that in fluent colloquial speech the vowels tend to assimilate to each other, and even consonants sometimes drop out, so that you might be left with a long [ooooo] with a bunch of tones and just a few consonants. It's the tone that makes it comprehensible. But that's by ear; I guess it wouldn't work well in writing.

But Hausa, yeah, I can see omitting the tone without any problem, except maybe the need to dab an occasional word. You might learn to write those few words with tone, the way accent marks distinguish homonyms in Romance languages, and otherwise ignore it. And some languages mark changes in tone, rather than the tone of each syllable. But I doubt that would work for Yoruba either. kwami (talk) 23:23, 18 October 2021 (UTC)

I have a suggestion that might be able to square this circle, but it's a bit awkward to explain so bear with me:

• There are situations when it makes sense to remember the difference between the orthographic character a person intends to write, and the Unicode character which they actually use. A good example of this is the full stop "." (U+002E), which is also used in English (and Translingually) to represent the decimal point. We all agree that a full stop and decimal point are two different things, because any competent French translator would have to treat them differently, but the important thing is that that remains true regardless of which Unicode codepoints we happen to use. Indeed, it's true whether or not we're even encoding the characters at all. The same is true in French with the decimal point and the comma, too. Equally, nobody who receives "A-" on their homework is receiving "A dash" or "A hyphen".
• Conversely, ｊｕｓｔ　ｂｅｃａｕｓｅ　Ｉ　ｗｒｉｔｅ　ｉｎ　ｆｕｌｌ－ｗｉｄｔｈ doesn't mean that any of us actually think "ｊ" has a distinct identity to "j" etc. There might be technical, historical and/or stylistic reasons why we have both, but the point is that we consider them to have the same orthographic identity.
• However, none of this prevents us from having a particular manual of style when it comes to certain characters. If we want to start using the en dash "–" (U+2013) or minus sign "−" (U+2212) in places where people intended to use them (i.e. intended characters with those orthographical identities), then that's fine. It would be no more of a problem than our choice to use a clear, black, legible font on white by default, when the original might be scrawled on a barely legible manuscript. Obviously there are no codepoints to interpret in cases such as that. Hell, a lot of the time the codepoints "used" are actually just whatever the OCR software vomited up anyway. Just like with misspellings, there needs to be some genuine intention, and it needs to be considered with respect to the orthographical identity of the characters, and not the codepoints they happened to pick.
• A final point is that writers of a language don't necessarily know their own language perfectly, or they might not perceive a conscious distinction between two characters that does actually exist, because the context usually makes it so obvious (e.g. the full stop and the decimal point). It's not enough to say "yes, they intended to write an apostrophe because that's what they used". Are they really treating it as one?

I don't know enough about Rapa Nui to know whether the saltillo is the most appropriate character, but I hope that's a framework that makes it easier to determine the answer. Theknightwho (talk) 16:00, 7 July 2022 (UTC)

-u

See WT:Etymology scriptorium/2021/September#korku, -u and -i

This Turkish suffix entry is probably the same as -i, and possibly -ı, due to vowel harmony. While I don't know much about Turkish, the fact that this was created as the only Turkish edit ever by this contributor and the other two were created by a veteran contributor who is a native speaker has to count for something. Chuck Entz (talk) 05:45, 18 September 2021 (UTC)

-u is a harmonized form of -i, as are -ü and -ı. The canonical forms of suffixes are those with i and e. I disagree with the current policy of essentially providing the same definition 4 (or 2) times, see for instance the situation with -im, -ım, -um, -üm where only one contains all meanings and etymological information. I'm in favor of keeping the harmonized realizations of the suffixes as separate articles but I'm strongly in favor of converting the non-canonical forms into simple referral pages (see -dük). --Fytcha (talk) 09:59, 18 September 2021 (UTC)

post-transition metal, poor metal

Apparently the same thing. Reduce one entry to a synonym? Equinox ◑ 16:08, 19 September 2021 (UTC)

October 2021

Sieng

Sundanese by @Rankf. I'm guessing this should be lowercase. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 07:20, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

Appendix:Glossary of fighting games

Move to Wikipedia?
It's encylopaedic and not really about words, for example the etymology of footsies isn't explained (related to foot?). --Myrelia (talk) 21:09, 20 October 2021 (UTC)

There is good stuff but it's mostly written like a long essay or book. Equinox ◑ 00:53, 4 November 2021 (UTC)

This would almost certainly not survive on Wikipedia. I have mixed feelings about the Appendix namespace here, as it seems a lot of things go there that would never be acceptable in the main dictionary, but that appendix pages are so hard to find for the casual user that it doesn't really bring us down. —Soap— 11:36, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

If we do end up deleting this, i'd hope we could try to contact the editor who wrote most of it (see User_talk:DKThel). There are other wikis that could host content like this where they wouldn't be pushed into the background like our appendix pages are. Admittedly the trade-off for that is having ads and using a site that is itself harder to find. —Soap— 11:47, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

There's definitely no point in moving it to Wikipedia, since it was originally moved here from Wikipedia, so they already decided they don't want it and foisted it on us. That's why it's written so encyclopedically. If anyone's interested in it, they should clean it up to make it more dictionarian; otherwise we should just delete it. —Mahāgaja · talk 12:34, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

A lot of these, to be honest, should just have their own entries. AG202 (talk) 19:53, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

November 2021

Francian, Frankian

These two entries link to each other rather confusingly and there may be redundancy in it. Equinox ◑ 00:52, 4 November 2021 (UTC)

Eŭkaristio > eŭkaristio

This entry seems to have been created in title case by mistake; while proper nouns are capitalized in Esperanto, "eŭkaristio" is not a proper noun and thus should be moved to eŭkaristio. --Martelkapo (talk) 19:51, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

What does actual usage look like? Eucharist is a capitalized common noun in English; maybe it is in Esperanto too. —Mahāgaja · talk 20:25, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

sfaccimma

Seems to be an alternative spelling of sfacimma, or the other way round. I don't know which should be made the main entry. --Akletos (talk) 09:03, 13 November 2021 (UTC)

Sfacimma is an alternative spelling of sfaccimma, which is how the word has been mostly written in the past years; the IPA pronunciation of the word is nowadays always /ʃfat͡ʃˈt͡ʃimmə/, with the voiceless postalveolar affricate having always the gemination, hence the spelling cc. Antomanu14 (talk) 13:59, 10 December 2022 (UTC)

guaranty

Senses 1 and 3 seem to be the same thing. Maybe this could just be reduced to "dated form of guarantee", even. Equinox ◑ 10:56, 13 November 2021 (UTC)

I think it's been an alternative form of guarantee for a couple of centuries. Only recently (this decade) has it become much less common than guarantee. DCDuring (talk) 17:39, 13 November 2021 (UTC)

OTOH, MWOnline has differing, but overlapping, definitions for the two terms. DCDuring (talk) 17:42, 13 November 2021 (UTC)

wanghee, whangee

(There's whanghee too, but that is suitably an alt-form stub entry.) Equinox ◑ 11:22, 20 November 2021 (UTC)

December 2021

dormitive virtue, dormitive principle

Equinox ◑ 05:43, 26 December 2021 (UTC)

January 2022

second lady, Second Lady; second gentleman, Second Gentleman

Equinox ◑ 10:35, 1 January 2022 (UTC)

exoreic and exorheic

probably the same thing. Br00pVain (talk) 13:19, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

ecphoria, ecphory

Seemingly synonyms. Equinox ◑ 19:00, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₁én

Tagged but not listed in August 2021 by User:Caoimhin ceallach, providing the reason:

I'm in favour of moving this page to *én. As {{R:ine:LIPP|page=221|vol=2}} shows, there is no evidence that points to an initial laryngeal and Greek and Vedic speak against it.

I've redacted the preceding quote by incorporating the reference in the superscript. Thadh (talk) 11:16, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

We reconstruct all PIE terms with an initial laryngeal on the project, per current PIE theory, so *én = *h₁én. Sidenote, {{R:ine:LIPP}} is an embarrassment in the academic community, and should never be used as a primary source. --Sokkjo (talk) 02:24, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

can you elaborate on why you think {{R:ine:LIPP}} is an embarrassment? --Ioe bidome (talk) 15:58, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

@Ioe bidome: His hypothetical system of deriving roots from particles is largely considered crackpottery. --– Sokkjō 20:42, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

@Sokkjo @Ioe bidome I don't care where we hold this conversation, as long as you reply. I'm the second person who has asked you to elaborate. If you can't, your concern will have to be dismissed. —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 08:04, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

I have elaborated to why accademics largely reject {{R:ine:LIPP}}, and referred you to this unfavorable review, DOI:10.1515/zcph-2019-0009. That's all neither here nor there, as on this project, we subscribe to larygeal theory, which also calls for word-intitial larygeals before vowels. If you wish to make an arugment for why we should do away with that standard, feel free to start a discussion in the WT:Beer parlour, but as is, your move request is unwarranted. --– Sokkjō 08:52, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@Sokkjo

• You seem to have not read that review. If you did you'd see that it is overwhelmingly positive:
  • "Ce sera un ouvrage de référence pour longtemps."
  • "Ces remarques ne retirent rien à l’importance de l’ouvrage, qui peut servir de base tant à une recherche synchronique éclairée consacrée à tel ou tel groupe de langues qu’à une étude proprement comparative."
• The other review I'm aware of is also overwhelmingly positive:
  • "In this massive, and truly monumental, two-volume work that was years in the making, author George Dunkel (henceforth D) draws on the extensive research, and the literally dozens of articles, that he has done throughout his distinguished career as an Indo-Europeanist, investigating the uninflected bits and pieces – the ἄπτωτα (áptota), the indeclinabilia¹ – of the Indo-European lexicon that are so indispensable to the phrasal and sentential syntax and to discourse and text structure in all the family’s languages." https://www.jbe-platform.com/content/journals/10.1075/dia.33.4.05jos
• Nothing about this thing takes away from laryngeal theory.
• I'm going to ask again: please elaborate on your misgivings about LIPP. —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 10:28, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Since I'm guessing you don't have academic access to the second page:

Reste une réserve. Malgré la prudence de l’auteur, les processus de formation des grammèmes qu’il étudie relèvent, par définition, de la reconstruction, et l’ouvrage n’étudie pas de manière détaillée les processus qui ont lieu à date historique. Parfois le lecteur peut avoir l’impression que le système titué est d’une complexité qui le rend typologiquement invraisemblable; ainsi, vol. 1, pp. 24–26, l’auteur pense pouvoir reconstruire pour l’indo-européen quatre thèmes pronominaux qui relèvent de l’exophore proximale, deux qui relèvent de l’exophore distale, et quatre thèmes anaphoriques (George Dunkel écrit que les thèmes liés à l’exophore proximale et distale ne sont pas en contraste sémantique les uns avec les autres, mais seulement avec l’absence de déixis; ce point est obscur aux yeux du recenseur).Une telle richesse en thèmes démonstratifs nécessiterait une explication. Au demeurant l’opposition entre exophore proximale et distale n’est pas nécessairement suffisante pour couvrir tous les thèmes de l’indo-européen, qui a pu posséder par exemple trois degrés d’exophore.
En fait il peut sembler que la reconstruction des grammèmes indo-européens est vouée au flou, faute de données permettant d’étudier, notamment, la sémantique exacte des éléments concernés aux différents stades chronologiques et dans les différentes aires géographiques à prendre en compte.

Again, I'm not here to agrue about LIPP -- that's beside the point. The point is that the established convention we follow on the project for reconstructioning PIE is that #VC- only possibly exists in pronouns, if even there. See {{R:ine:IEL|52}}. – Sokkjō 23:03, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@Sokkjo, I read the whole review. I even quoted from the second page. As I said before, a reservation does not equal a invalidation.

The validity of LIPP is very much on point. I would like to mention an alternative reconstruction *én (and if others agree move the page), which is supported by evidence instead of on some misplaced assumption. You preclude any discussion by rejecting the evidence out of hand.

In addition, I would like to continue citing LIPP, so your violent objection to it ("embarrassment to the academic community") is relevant to me. I think it is fair to say that if you could back up your objection you would have done so by now.

I am of course aware that roots had a CₓVCₓ structure. There are good reasons for assuming this. However, this is not the case for suffixes, it is not the case for pronouns, it is not the case for adverbs and it is, indeed, not the case for particles.

Your "established convention" that #VC- entries aren't allowed, doesn't exist. If you think otherwise please point to it. WT:AINE does not mention the phonotactics of entries. And at any rate, WT:RECONS clearly says that "variants and disputed forms can then be addressed in great detail within the text of the pages themselves". If you don't want *én on the page, you need to have (at the very least) substantive arguments why the evidence supporting it is wrong.

But I'd ask you to please be more careful about your references. You keep quoting things which don't support your position. {{R:ine:IEL|52}}: "It seems that onsetless initial syllables (#VC-) were rare" ie not nonexistent. LIPP, the first systematically study of Indo-European particles, documents evidence for a substantial number of exactly these. —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 01:23, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

I'm aware of what I cited, "rare" meaning they are limited to pronouns, and to continue on to the following sentence, "It is common practice now to reconstruct initial laryngeals even when not strictly provable". You seem to be under the impression that I, created this "common practice" and I set that convention here on the project. I'm honored you think I have that seniority, but despite contributing here for over a decade, it long preceeds me. If you want to argue against the status quo, not just on this project, but in academia at large, the weight is on you to do so. – Sokkjō 03:51, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

February 2022

mannerism, Mannerism

The art/literature senses are defined very differently at the two entries, which seems like a problem. One is already tagged for cleanup, so, good luck! Equinox ◑ 00:21, 1 February 2022 (UTC)

shnor, schnorr

Different spellings of the same word, from Yiddish. 70.172.194.25 19:46, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

joged, joget

They look mergeable. Equinox ◑ 20:36, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

• @Equinox Did you mean just the English sections? Both entries also have Indonesian sections. — excarnateSojourner (talk · contrib) 19:52, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I meant the English sections. Merge request stands! Equinox ◑ 02:51, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

meat puppet, meatpuppet

Seems like meat puppet sense #6 is the same as meatpuppet. 70.172.194.25 06:10, 19 February 2022 (UTC)

• Support – it's essentially the same meaning with a different spelling. AP 499D25 (talk) 23:55, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

ولا سيما

The conjunction وَ (wa) is not part of the phrase really. The phrase does occur frequently with it, but this is mainly owing to the "idiomaticness" of conjunctions in Arabic, mostly in prose. It is a sentence in itself, roughly "There is no(thing) equal to", not like the English adverbials that have comparable meanings (such as particularly and especially or above all). The entry should therefore be moved لَا سِيَّمَا (lā siyyamā), with the "variant" with وَ (wa) deleted. Roger.M.Williams (talk) 18:11, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

March 2022

Merge 參巴#Chinese, 叁巴#Chinese

—Fish bowl (talk) 05:38, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Merge lyme#English, lime#Etymology_4

—Fish bowl (talk) 14:55, 6 March 2022 (UTC)

I agree this should be merged. Federico Falletti (talk) 12:30, 9 January 2025 (UTC)

sparrowhawk, sparrow hawk

Some circularity, with each form linking to the other for certain senses. Equinox ◑ 00:20, 8 March 2022 (UTC)

I think I was trying to show that the open form was used more commonly for some definitions and the closed for others. Is there pure circularity remaining? DCDuring (talk) 17:18, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

I have tried to make clearer the differences and have simplified the "Further reading" sections. I don't see why they should be moved, merged, or split, whichever it is that you are seeking. DCDuring (talk) 18:08, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

serynga, syringa

These look like the same word. 70.172.194.25 09:17, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

It's not, just a doublet that came into the language by a different (rather convoluted) route. Serynga is listed as an alternative form at English seringa, but it looks like it's really a borrowing from French, where it's an alternative form of French seringa. The spelling is no doubt influenced by the taxonomic name.

From what I can gather, Latin syringa developed into Dutch sering, which was borrowed into Portuguese as the name for rubber plants in the genus Hevea and into French for the syringa, Philadelphus coronarius, both with an "a" added. English borrowed Portuguese seringa for the rubber plant and French serynga for the syringa.

If you're not confused by all of this, you're not paying atttention... Chuck Entz (talk) 15:40, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

So, are the definitions in both entries correct? Because they currently claim to both have the same first two definitions... in which case we should either have {{syn}} crosslinks between them or reduce both senses on one to {{synonym of}} (+gloss) of the other. - -sche (discuss) 08:07, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

bezoar, enterolith

Defined recursively in terms of each other. Equinox ◑ 22:36, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

downward, downwards

Lots of duplicate information, including but not limited to translations. — Fytcha〈 T | L | C 〉 19:27, 13 March 2022 (UTC)

I doubt that the adjective downward can be merged, besides that, there are quotes. DonnanZ (talk) 12:48, 27 March 2026 (UTC)

Downward has been more common on Google NGrams (relying on NGrams PoS parsing) for both PoSes since about 1890. Apparently, it has always been overwhelmingly more common as adjective. Before 1890 downwards was more common as adverb. The entries can't be fully merged, but can be improved IMO. DCDuring (talk) 15:33, 27 March 2026 (UTC)

I've added an adjective PoS section at downwards and usage notes at both PoSes for both terms. It MIGHT be possible to merge the adverb translations at downward, but I wonder whether some definitions may find downwards more congenial than downward. DCDuring (talk) 16:06, 27 March 2026 (UTC)

Downwards is usually an adverb in British English, and downward an adjective: "The road goes downwards towards the river." DonnanZ (talk) 16:27, 27 March 2026 (UTC)

One can investigate pondic differences using subcorpora at NGrams, I think. DCDuring (talk) 17:21, 27 March 2026 (UTC)

OneLook seems to agree with you. In which case, these entries cannot readily be merged. We need some labels and possibly some adjustment to the usage notes. DCDuring (talk) 17:24, 27 March 2026 (UTC)

In adverb usage, downward has reached parity lately (post 2010) with downwards in the NGrams Brit. Eng. corpus and is more than five times as common in the US corpus. As one might expect, as an adjective downwards is a bit more common in Brit. Eng. (4%) than in US Eng. (1%), but still rather uncommon. DCDuring (talk) 17:32, 27 March 2026 (UTC)

April 2022

point-blank, point blank

also Talk:point-blank#merge with point blank. – Jberkel 23:51, 12 April 2022 (UTC)

Oxford and Collins list only point-blank for both adjective and adverb. DonnanZ (talk) 15:03, 22 December 2023 (UTC)

Both pointblank and point blank are attestable. They probably should both be alt. forms. DCDuring (talk) 16:23, 27 March 2026 (UTC)

Cantonese: main entry at 𧿒腳 or 䂿腳?

—Fish bowl (talk) 07:42, 13 April 2022 (UTC)

מ־שׁ־ך

To מ־ש־ך, to be consistent with other Hebrew entries. 70.172.194.25 18:13, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

May 2022

Witzelsucht

• Witzelsucht -> witzelsucht

This is only an English entry, and on English Wikipedia it is not capitalized inside the middle of sentences. The rationale for capitalizing it in 2007 was that it is a German language entry, except there has never been a German language section on this page. -- 65.92.246.142 03:20, 13 May 2022 (UTC)

• Science Direct: "witzelsucht"
• Prezi: "witzelsucht"
• MD Edge Neurology: "witzelsucht"

a few or few

We have a few fries short of a Happy Meal (created by @Equinox) and few cards short of a full deck, few cards shy of a full deck, few sandwiches short of a picnic, few X short of a Y, which were moved/created by @TNMPChannel. J3133 (talk) 08:21, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

IMO these should all be at "a few...", since a few means something quite different from few. —Mahāgaja · talk 09:21, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

Whichever form we lemmatize, I guess we might as well leave redirects from the other. Several of these also have variants like google books:"several fries short of a" Happy Meal / happy meal, google books:"several cards short of a" full deck / full pack, which presumably need hard or soft redirects. - -sche (discuss) 19:00, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

I definitely agree that all of the headwords mentioned should be at "a few ...". Unfortunately there are probably more (attestable?) alternatives besides what -sche has found. Redirects from "few ..." are especially useful because many with beginning knowledge of English seem to have problems with English determiners. DCDuring (talk) 19:23, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

This is a good issue to raise. I've mentioned before that, with proper nouns, we don't seem to have (or at least we don't consistently use) anything about the determiner/article: I mean it's the Eiffel Tower and the Cold War, but ∅ Dijkstra's algorithm and ∅ Greenpeace. Proper nouns aside, I usually drop the determiner/article from entry titles unless it seems absolutely 100% necessary all the time. But that's pretty vague and comes out of my wacky head. Equinox ◑ 01:53, 4 June 2022 (UTC)

@Equinox: Yes, but it's [ a few ] [ cards short of a full deck ], not [ a ] [ few cards short of a full deck ] (note the alternative form one card short of a full deck, where "one" replaces "a few" ) Chuck Entz (talk) 02:14, 4 June 2022 (UTC)

Maybe. Yeah. I would imagine "some few..." etc. might be possible. But even I have better things to do than attest them. Just an observation. Equinox ◑ 02:17, 4 June 2022 (UTC)

It's a snowclone with many possible variants. I dont think many people are going to look up few or short of expecting to find this full phrase. And those words arent in every variant anyway ... one can also say "two cards shy of a full deck" which uses neither of them.

What would be nice is if the Appendix namespace was in the default search space so that the snowclone page might at least turn up in a search. As it stands, I don't think we need all these mainspace pages since they are all exact synonyms of each other, but if we delete them there will be no way for a naive user to find the snowclone pages unless they somehow know that it's tucked away in the Appendix. —Soap— 20:05, 30 June 2023 (UTC)

June 2022

دلکو

I've created the page using the wrong character. It should be moved to دلكو instead. Dohqo (talk) 07:21, 18 June 2022 (UTC)

@Dohqo: Because there's already a Persian entry on the same page, and the character is correct for Persian, it doesn't make sense to move the page. Just delete the Old Anatolian Turkish section from this page and create it on the correct page. You can do it all yourself, no admin rights needed. —Mahāgaja · talk 08:36, 18 June 2022 (UTC)

carhop, car hop and also car-hop

Duplicate definitions and potentially missing parts of speech. — Fytcha〈 T | L | C 〉 15:42, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

• The hyphenated form is now defined as an alternative of the spaced form (but the solid and spaced forms still need to be merged). — excarnateSojourner (talk · contrib) 21:38, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

Wiktionary:Requested entries (Chinese)/Xiang Chinese

Wiktionary:Requested entries (Chinese)/Teochew Chinese

These were recently moved by @Apisite from their own user namespace to the Wiktionary namespace under "Requested entries (Chinese)". All of these pages are not requested entries but pronunciation requests. I'm not entirely sure where these should be moved instead, but I don't think they're in the right place currently. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 16:59, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

Seems like they should be subcategories of Category:Requests for pronunciation in Chinese entries. —Mahāgaja · talk 20:50, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

fibre -> fiber

Duplicate content, move all to fiber. Ngram — Fytcha〈 T | L | C 〉 19:17, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

@Fytcha: A word of caution: anything involving pondian variation should be handled carefully. There are good arguments for going either way on most of these, and we don't want to start any kind of conflict. Our general practice has been to arbitrarily go with whichever version was first, though it's been a while since one of these came up. Chuck Entz (talk) 20:17, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

In this case, fibre is older, but by only 14 hours. Also, the translation tables are all already at fibre, so I feel like making fibre the primary spelling and fiber the alternative spelling will be less work. —Mahāgaja · talk 21:09, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

From Google N-Grams: Since 1911 fiber has been more common. As of 2009 it is about three times as common. DCDuring (talk) 21:14, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

We don't apply that when it comes to AmEng/BrEng differences. Theknightwho (talk) 21:37, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

Who says? DCDuring (talk) 21:51, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

Also, since 2016 fiber has been more common in Google's British English N-Gram corpus andsix times more common in American English corpus. DCDuring (talk) 21:54, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

@Chuck Entz: I see. If that is de facto policy then the meat should go to fibre. However, if I could have devised the policy, I would have made it so that it always aligns with the frequency because that way the users land on the non-redirecting spelling more often. — Fytcha〈 T | L | C 〉 22:26, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

We actually had an attempt by a Russian internet troll (geolocating to Crimea) to get us arguing about UK vs. US issues, but it went nowhere. At the time I just thought it was odd, but with the revelations after Trump was elected I finally put two and two together and realized what was going on. I still have no idea why they even bothered, since our discussion forums aren't exactly the center of the universe. I do know that the mutual respect between our US and UK editors, helped by this kind of practice, was the main reason it was such a non-issue. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:20, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

@Chuck Entz I have it on my to-do list to build a template that duplicates the material from the "primary" entry, which should hopefully circumvent issues like this anyway. I've done something similar with Tangut already (e.g. see 𗁘 (*rjijr²), 𗁩 (*tẽ¹), 𗀏 (*par²)), though the implementation would need some tweaking. Theknightwho (talk) 00:18, 27 June 2022 (UTC)

• @Fytcha Both of these entries have sections for English, Danish, and Norwegian Bokmål. Can you confirm that you are only talking about the English sections? — excarnateSojourner (talk · contrib) 21:49, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

  @ExcarnateSojourner: Yes. Only English. — Fytcha〈 T | L | C 〉 14:17, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

July 2022

almond furnace and almond-furnace

One is tagged as obsolete and defined as A kind of furnace used in refining, to separate the metal from cinders and other foreign matter., another not obsolete defined as A furnace in which slags of litharge left in refining silver are reduced to lead by being heated with charcoal.. Good luck to the potential merger Dunderdool (talk) 18:06, 29 July 2022 (UTC)

August 2022

don't try to teach grandma how to suck eggs > teach one's grandmother to suck eggs

This idiom is far more versatile than the specific and somewhat informal phrasing we have here (which doesn't even match the quotation we have), it's a fully fledged verb phrase — see the examples at Teaching grandmother to suck eggs.

Two points: there is such a wide range of familiar terms for grandmother that can be used in this phrase so I think it's best to stick with "grandmother". However I think it's worth investigating if it's more common with or without the possessive pronoun (here "one's"); to me it sounds more natural with it but there are citations both ways. 86.145.59.120 18:42, 14 August 2022 (UTC)

We also have teach grandma how to suck eggs. J3133 (talk) 08:19, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

I'm somewhat inclined to pick a most common or general negative form to lemmatize like not teach grandmother how to suck eggs, and also have the positive form (maybe teach grandmother to suck eggs since a possessive doesn't seem required? or if a pronoun is more common, then redirect the pronounless form to the pronouned form, either works). This is both because it's unclear how many translations can have the negative removed and because in general, as I said in the discussion of all it's cracked up to be further up this page, when we redirect a negative expression to a positive one or vice versa there's a risk that a reader who doesn't notice they were redirected will come away thinking the phrase means the opposite of what it actually means. To avoid duplication we could make the negative form almost a soft redirect, defining it like "To not teach grandmother to suck eggs (“presume to give advice to someone who is more experienced”)" or even "To not teach grandmother to suck eggs (see that entry)"; I don't know, I don't like splitting content across multiple pages, but I also think it's risky to silently strip away the negative polarity with a seamless little redirect and expect IPs who sometimes don't even notice they're on Wiktionary and not Wikipedia to notice and understand that the polarity of the headword has changed and thus that the definition of the term they looked up is the opposite of the one we're giving them. - -sche (discuss) 15:20, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

Negative polarity is "licensed" in many forms, starting with the negative being separated from the rest of the expression: conditionals, questions, infinitives with certain verbs (eg, try to) or other expressions (eg. hard to). These might lead someone to look up the positive form. I think that a "negative-polarity item" label (with link to WP or our Glossary), usage examples with adjoining and disjoint not and n't, and redirects would enable us to use the positive form as the lemma. I don't see how to use redirects in the other direction. Even usage examples would be problematic with not in the headwords. DCDuring (talk) 21:07, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

What I mean is, I'm somewhat inclined to have both "not teach grandmother to suck eggs" defined as "not give advice to someone more experienced", and then also "teach grandmother to suck eggs" defined as "give advice to someone more experienced", redirecting all the various negative forms to the first one and the positive forms to the second one. But I'm not opposed to only having the positive form and redirecting everything to it; I do dislike splitting content across multiple pages, I just also think there's always a danger when someone types "not teach grandmother to suck eggs" into the search bar and as seamlessly sent to "teach grandmother to suck eggs" where they read a definition that's inverted from that of the term they typed in and which they think they looked up. - -sche (discuss) 21:46, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

have one's heart in one's boots, throat, or mouth

Should have one's heart in one's boots be moved to just one's heart in one's boots because it also occurs without have (e.g. when someone stands/waits/etc google books:"with her heart in her boots")? That is why have was dropped from one's heart in one's mouth, according to the edit history. FWIW all three expressions can be found without even the pronouns, as in google books:"heart in throat". - -sche (discuss) 10:35, 28 August 2022 (UTC)

• The throat form has been moved to omit have, and is defined as a synonym of the mouth form. — excarnateSojourner (talk · contrib) 22:17, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

September 2022

bighorn sheep and bighorn

Plenty of overlap, spesh with translations. Maybe there's just one species called this, maybe two... something for the animal nerds here... you know who you are Almostonurmind (talk) 00:48, 8 September 2022 (UTC)

Not finding evidence that O. dalli is ever called "bighorn" or "bighorn sheep". It's called Dall sheep or thinhorn sheep AFAICT. —Mahāgaja · talk 07:09, 8 September 2022 (UTC)

Formally, that's probably true, though I doubt most people make the distinction consistently colloquially. But that wouldn't be particular to bighorn. I think people who didn't make the distinction would be just as likely to use bighorn sheep when describing Dall's sheep. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 15:18, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

I have split both into two subsenses and RfVed the O. dalli subsenses. I have not yet found any evidence that either term is applied to O. dalli. I would include O. dalli and thinhorn sheep under See also at both of these entries. DCDuring (talk) 15:57, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

October 2022

duck decoy and decoy-duck

Probably some crossover here. And alternative forms like duck-decoy and decoy duck to be made. GreyishWorm (talk) 23:01, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Black Book

Split into black book GreyishWorm (talk) 22:32, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

I've recreated the alt form black book. not sure if it should be the main one. Jberkel 10:49, 27 October 2025 (UTC)

no chill

It would seem that have no chill is the proper lemma for this verb. (Probably not possible to instead treat no chill as a noun phrase because it's very awkward to define other than as the lack of the definition for chill, which would be SOP.) 86.144.233.189 13:50, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Not always "have". "I got no chill" is also heard, for instance. Equinox ◑ 19:08, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Kiowa, Kioway

Are these the same? The Kiowa language does not appear to be related to Shoshone, nor does the Wikipedia article on the Kiowa people claim that they are from North Platte, Nebraska. I have a hunch that Kioway is an alt form of something, and this seems like the most obvious answer, but someone should check and try to make sense of this before merging them. 98.170.164.88 07:56, 14 October 2022 (UTC)

Ah, it's likely that Webster was referring to the North Platte River and not the specific city of North Platte, NE (which is where our entry Kioway currently links). But the rest of the confusion remains. 98.170.164.88 08:00, 14 October 2022 (UTC)

Shoshonean is an old term for the northern part of the Uto-Aztecan languages, from Shoshone. Many of the names for the Numic languages are only loosely correlated with linguistic reality, so terms like "Shoshone", "Paiute" and "Ute" are kind of hard to pin down without qualifiers. There is a Shoshoni language, but peoples like the Timbisha and the Bannock are also called Shoshone.

Kiowa is part of the Tanoan languages, which may very well be related to Uto-Aztecan as the Aztec–Tanoan languages, but linguists have yet to completely connect the dots. It was speculative in 1913, and it's still not definitively established in 2022. It reminds me of the Achilles and the Tortoise paradox.

It's all part of the confusion that results from early efforts to classify wide-ranging nomadic peoples who have moved into different regions and adopted different cultural patterns and lifestyles. Just as the Comanche were Great Basin Numic people who moved to the Great Plains and adopted a Plains Indian culture, The Kiowa also moved from the pueblos into the Great Plains and adopted a similar culture.

I would make Kioway a simple alternative form of Kiowa and lose the Interesting Facts™ in the definition. Chuck Entz (talk) 16:17, 14 October 2022 (UTC)

Distinguish slang terms from terms with slang senses

I think it is worth splitting cat:Terms with slang senses by language (and subcategories) out of cat:Slang by language (and subcategories) similarly to how we have cat:Terms with dated senses by language distinct from cat:Dated terms by language and cat:Terms with uncommon senses by language distinct from cat:Uncommon terms by language. I am developing a crossword game that uses Wiktionary data (which I do not wish to link as it is associated with my real-life identity), and it would be useful to me if the categories made this distinction for English in particular. - excarnateSojourner (talk | contrib) 02:47, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

Examples of English terms that have non-slang primary senses, but are currently in cat:English slang because of less common slang senses: aardvark, absolute zero, AC/DC, acid. - excarnateSojourner (talk | contrib) 02:52, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

• I have since changed my Python script to read labels as well as categories, so this no longer makes much of a difference to me. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 00:57, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

November 2022

Taishanese, Toisanese, Hoisanese

The definitions we give for all three terms are essentially identical, but the forms differ because they are borrowed from different Chinese lects (Mandarin, Cantonese, and Taishanese itself, respectively). Should these use {{alt form}} or {{syn of}}? 98.170.164.88 23:08, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Oof, yes; as it stands, the entries make it seem like these refer (respectively) to the inhabitants of three different places. - -sche (discuss) 02:15, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Merged into the first form which, per ngrams, is the most common. (For the place rather than the -ese, Taishan is particularly lopsidedly more common than the alternatives.) - -sche (discuss) 07:26, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

食住花生等睇戲 and 食花生

These two are essentially the same phrase sharing the same meaning, with the more common 食花生 being derived from the other. – Wpi31 (talk) 12:00, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

snowsquall

Requesting to move snowsquall to a space-separated form snow squall. The unspaced form doesn't appear to have been used purposefully or frequently, if at all, in the past or present. It also does not appear to be used by either the US-American NWS or the Canadian MSC, and hasn't appeared in any online news coverage. Bailmoney27 (talk) 19:14, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

I support this. I've never seen the bunched spelling before and I've been following winter weather for many years. It does seem to be in use, but distinctly less common. Wikipedia's favoring of the bunched spelling seems to be largely a matter of the article having been created early in Wikipedia's lifetime, and with a radar scan from 2004 featuring that bunched spelling. Essentially, we had a model to follow and we stuck to it, but it happens that most people, including the national weather services of both the US and Canada, prefer the two-word form. —Soap— 21:22, 10 December 2022 (UTC)

Support. Binarystep (talk) 06:55, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Well, I decided to just move the page myself, as it's been up here unopposed for six months, and because I want to fill in the usual "see also" hatnote which would require that both spellings exist. Since this would make a non-admin move impossible, I moved the page before I put in the hatnote. —Soap— 11:19, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

December 2022

Mass#Etymology 1, mass#Etymology 2

These are just alternative case forms, but they have slightly different glosses and large translation tables on both pages. —Al-Muqanna المقنع (talk) 21:10, 2 December 2022 (UTC)

No, the two have different etymologies (one from Latin missa and another from Latin Massa), and obviously the two have different meanings too איתן קרסנטי (talk) 05:55, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

They look like alternative case forms to me, with almost identical etymologies and definitions. It may be difficult to tease out whether the upper- or lowercase form is more common, based on collocation searches. As a start, since 1870 Holy Mass has been more common than than holy mass, holy Mass, and Holy mass (probably mostly sentence initial) at Google N-Grams and much more common since 1940. (Is Holy Mass SoP???) And o'clock mass and o'clock Mass have been roughly equal since 1900. DCDuring (talk) 14:30, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

haha, ha-ha

Etymologies 1 and 2 (including translations) should be merged. J3133 (talk) 05:02, 10 December 2022 (UTC)

Not sure this is a good idea. Etymology 1 is directly imitative; etymology 2 is from the French. — Sgconlaw (talk) 18:55, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

@Sgconlaw: I meant that “Etymology 1” and “Etymology 2” (but not “Etymology 3”) in one entry should be merged with the respective etymologies in the other entry. J3133 (talk) 19:02, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

@J3133: mmm, I'm seeing only one etymology section in ha ha, and only two in ha-ha (for English, that is; all the other language sections have only one etymology section as well). — Sgconlaw (talk) 19:14, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

@Sgconlaw: Sorry, I meant haha (which has three etymologies), not ha ha—fixed. J3133 (talk) 19:17, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

@J3133: ah, ha ha! I take it you mean that etymology 1 in haha and ha-ha duplicate each other, so one entry should be made the main lemma and the other converted to an alternative form; and likewise for etymology 2 in those entries. — Sgconlaw (talk) 19:19, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

Yes, that’s correct. J3133 (talk) 19:29, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

can't be arsed

Currently this redirects to arsed and, further to the discussion in the Tea Room, I propose that we undo the redirect. After all we aren't currently redirecting can't be fucked or can't be bothered. It seems better to have stub entries for all synonyms of can't be bothered listing them as alternative forms only, with all the synonyms and translations listed on the same page. Though I'm not suggesting creating be arsed and be fucked, we should probably keep be bothered as a translation hub and for the purpose of distinguishing it from the rare word bebothered as we currently do. --Overlordnat1 (talk) 01:49, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

I agree. I hate these redirects to single words - they rarely make sense without the rest of the term, and they're unintuitive even for experienced users. Theknightwho (talk) 23:39, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Agree — Saltmarsh^🢃 08:10, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

 Support undoing the redirect. lattermint (talk) 21:56, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Having a usage example with the transparent supposed idiom would seem to me to address TKW's concern.

I'd be happy to redirect can't be bothered to an appropriate sense of bother#Verb.

I don't know whether there are any other uses of fuck to mean "bother", nor of arse with that meaning.

Why wouldn't we RfV arse#Verb "To make, to bother" if the redirect doesn't seem right? If virtually the only usage with the "bother" sense is can't be arsed there is no reason for this not to be a lemma. DCDuring (talk) 23:44, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

@DCDuring It is possible to use it separately, but it's not common, and I strongly suspect it's a back-formation(?) from can't be arsed. For example, "can you be arsed with this? Me neither." You can do the same thing with fuck, too. Theknightwho (talk) 12:54, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

I've RfDed can't be bothered. — This unsigned comment was added by DCDuring (talk • contribs) at 14:51, 31 July 2024 (UTC).

What is the current status of this? DCDuring self-reverted their RfD nomination of can't be bothered a few minutes after initiating it, and that was a year ago. This discussion has been open 2½ years. Thryduulf (talk) 15:15, 4 August 2025 (UTC)

I think there is fundamental disagreement here. Do we need a BP discussion on this and, relatedly, on presentation of negative polarity items (with/without not), and the numerous be + [ADJECTIVAL] lemmas? Maybe I'm the only one who objects to these.

In the meantime, I'd certainly favor adding usage examples at definitions like the relevant one of arsed (and/or arse) for all comparable existing redirects and phrasal lemmas. They should stand whatever the outcome of any BP discussion. DCDuring (talk) 15:28, 4 August 2025 (UTC)

Monophysite, Dyophysite, miaphysite

The capitalization of these entries is inconsistent, even though they are all coordinate terms for different views on the same issue. Note that Miaphysite and dyophysite don't (currently) exist, while both capitalizations of monophysite do. Also, some of these have adjective senses and some don't. Not technically a request for a move, merger, or split, but it's a similar issue to what often comes up here, so this seemed like a fitting venue. 70.172.194.25 11:37, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

I agree, they should have the same capitalisation for the main lemmas, and lower-case makes most sense IMO. —Al-Muqanna المقنع (talk) 03:48, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

banana bird and bananabird

It seems the two terms are sometimes (erroneously?) used interchangeably. But maybe not. Flackofnubs (talk) 10:39, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

January 2023

one fell swoop, one foul swoop, in one foul swoop

The entry one fell swoop is lemmatized at the noun phrase. one foul swoop redirects to that. Meanwhile, the prepositional phrase in one foul swoop has its own separate entry. I think the latter should drop the "in" for consistency. Perhaps it could even be given as an {{alt form}} or {{syn of}} the main entry, but I'm not sure. 70.172.194.25 08:22, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

IMHO, at the very least, one foul swoop needs explanation and therefore needs a full entry. Also, it has a distinct pronunciation and [[[fell]] and foul are not close cognates, so they don't seem to be alternative forms of one another. One foul swoop seems to refer to (be derived from) one fell swoop. If one foul swoop gets the main entry I think it deserves, then in one foul swoop should redirect thereto. DCDuring (talk) 16:59, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

I agree that one foul swoop deserves a separate entry and that in one foul swoop should redirect thither. —Mahāgaja · talk 11:31, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. As in one fell swoop redirects to one fell swoop, redirecting in one foul swoop to one foul swoop would seemingly be the only logical and consistent course of action. --Overlordnat1 (talk) 11:43, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

well, you better hop to it Spongebuddymaniac (talk) 16:09, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

February 2023

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/(s)mal-

Merge into Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/(s)mel-. Most modern sources agree these are part of one and the same root. The only descendant that (traditionally) requires PIE *a is Latin malus, which fits semantically better with the gloss at *(s)mel- anyway. In fact it is unnecessary to reconstruct *a at all, in light of *mo > *ma unrounding in an open syllable with coda resonant (see de Vaan:2011 p. 8: 7.1; p. 360), the same process that resulted in mare (“sea”) < *móri. In any case the reconstruction of the vowel is irrelevant to whether the Latin, Slavic and Germanic words are cognate, despite the last sentence of the Latin etymology 1 described at malus. — 69.121.86.13 19:31, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

The Boot

English. As the entry says "capitalization varies". I see no compelling reason that this shouldn't be a noun sense at boot with "always with 'the'", or something of the sort. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:43, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

(BTW the Saatse Boot is also referred to as "the Boot".) - -sche (discuss) 23:21, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

The Boot meaning the Saatse Boot should be somewhere uppercase, I think, whether Boot or the Boot or The Boot I'm not entirely sure, because it functions as a proper noun place name. I'm not familiar with how the (b/B)oot meaning Louisiana is used; in the one cite in the entry, or others I can image like referring to LA as America's boot, it seems like a metaphorical general sense for something or somewhere boot-shaped. So it may be an RFV question, does Saatse-style use as a proper noun place name exist (for either place ... I can't actually find the Saatse one in books, either, only online). - -sche (discuss) 17:51, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

:-), :-( → :), :(

The forms with noses are pretty dated at this point and not in widespread use. I think it'd be better if the noseless forms were the main entries, perhaps with a note on the older forms indicating that they were used first. Binarystep (talk) 20:24, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

•  Support per nom. — excarnateSojourner (talk · contrib) 23:22, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
•  Support but i think all emoticons are somewhat dated now, because people prefer to use emojis when possible. —Soap— 11:01, 18 September 2023 (UTC)
•  Abstain While the noseless variant seems to be used more frequently in English, I am not sure whether it is similarly common in other languages. Maybe we could have a proper definition line for both forms and add {{alti}}/{{syn}} to link to the other variant. Einstein2 (talk) 11:16, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

  Noseless variants are also more common in East Slavic languages, albeit eyeless-and-noseless variants are more frequent. However I can’t find data regarding this, I am speaking solely from my experience. БудетЛучше (talk) 20:11, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

 Support I've only ever seen the nosed form from older people BirchTainer (talk) 22:42, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

I'm not sure these should be merged. Nowadays, the nosed forms carry a (context-sensitive) marked nuance beyond our usage note of "used by older people", just as do =) or (: – compare to 🙃 – or :^) – which has no entry. Maybe unhelpfully, I don't know exactly how we would define it, but they at least do not seem interchangeable. Compare the slightly smiling vs. smiling emojis on many platforms, 🙂 and ☺ and see here, or :o) (can't link our entry, I've never associated this with a clown nose) and :0) or :O). Hftf (talk) 12:03, 19 February 2025 (UTC)

Agree with @Hftf that they probably shouldn't just be simple alternative forms of each other. This may be a useful paper to consider. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 06:52, 7 March 2025 (UTC)

March 2023

Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/vьśegъda and Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/vьsegъda

We have two different entries for the same thing, while links generated with {{m}} or {{l}} like *vьśegъda link to the latter (vьsegъda) as they seem to ignore ś in Proto-Slavic reconstructions which IMO is unexpected. This makes the former (vьśegъda) being ignored and forgotten recently. I guess both entries should be merged and the language modules should be tweaked to make Proto-Slavic stuff ś-aware? // Silmeth ^@talk 12:28, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

@Silmethule Converting ś to s seems intentional, and asserts that there's no separate ś phoneme in Proto-Slavic. Reconstructing ś seems ahistorical to me; it's rather that the third (and second ...) palatalizations occurred post-Proto-Slavic. Benwing2 (talk) 06:27, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

@Benwing2: but it has different reflexes in different branches. So, either those palatalizations happened post-Proto-Slavic and *ś is a valid dia-phoneme projected back and reconstructing *s in those places for Proto-Slavic is wrong, or it was an actual Proto-Slavic phoneme with some value separate from both *s and *š that merged with those at a later stage – in which case we’re justified to reconstruct *ś and *s is wrong. In either case, unless we undo all progressive and 2nd regressive palatalizations of *x (and all the other sounds? there are traces of non-palatalization in *otьcь in the east too), we need to treat *ś as a (dia)phoneme of its own and *s is wrong. Also WT:About Proto-Slavic seems to treat *ś as a separate phoneme (and even ascribes a specific IPA value to it). // Silmeth ^@talk 10:00, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

@Silmethule What do the primary sources say? Benwing2 (talk) 15:10, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

@Benwing2: What primary sources? Proto-Slavic is a reconstructed, not directly attested, language.

If you mean etymological dictionaries and historical linguistic papers – depends, you get all sorts of things (*vьšь in Polish dictionaries, *vьsь in some southern ones, non-palatalized *vьxъ in Vasmer, etc.) – although in general progressive and 2nd regressive palatalizations are commonly marked. But *x is problematic as it has different reflexes in the west vs south+east; hence Derksen’s notation with *ś, as he puts it:

The introduction of *ś, on the other hand, could not be avoided, cf. *vьśь ‘all’ vs. *vьsь ‘village’

// Silmeth ^@talk 17:04, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

@Silmethule We need some other people to weigh in. The current situation with no ś was done intentionally so we shouldn't change it willy-nilly. Benwing2 (talk) 20:35, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

OK. I’ll leave some pings then: @Fay Freak, Ivan Štambuk, Sławobóg, Thadh, Useigor, Vorziblix, ZomBear. // Silmeth ^@talk 20:54, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

I already agreed that we should use ś. Third palatalisation is only absent in Old Novgorodian and most of our entries already do apply the sound law to stops, so I don't see why we should treat the sibilant any differently. Thadh (talk) 22:23, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

I agree that *ś should be used. Make the main reconstruction - *vьśegъda, and the form *vьsegъda (maybe?) as a redirect. ZomBear (talk) 06:43, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

• Keep Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/vьśegъda and delete Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/vьsegъda. Old Polish wszegdy proves it can't have been *^×vьsegъda. —Mahāgaja · talk 20:17, 27 June 2023 (UTC)

heave to and heave-to

They are defining the same thing, using various grades of nautical jargon Van Man Fan (talk) 10:39, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't think this would normally be spelled with a hyphen, at least not as a verb. heave-to with a hyphen looks like a noun, probably meaning "the act of heaving to", though as a landlubber I don't know if such a noun exists. —Mahāgaja · talk 10:47, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

April 2023

kaffir and kafir

kaffir should probs be the main form It is probably (talk) 08:11, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

You may be right as kaffir seems to be slightly more widely used than kafir, though oddly enough we (and Wikipedia) have an entry for Kafiristan and not Kaffiristan (which is a far more prevalent form on GoogleBooks). Though on a raw Google search 'Kafir' is twice as popular as 'Kaffir' and 'Kafiristan' is a lot more popular than 'Kaffiristan' and there does seem to be a slight tendency of late to differentiate the 2 words so that 'kaffir' is the Souh African insult and 'kafir' is the Islamic one. --Overlordnat1 (talk) 09:06, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

My perception (which seems to agree with yours) is that, when it's used in the sense of "infidel [as judged by Muslims]," in contemporary "Western" English, the word is almost always spelled with one "f." (I have few or no observations of how it's spelled in, say, Nigeria, or Pakistan.) That's true both of use as a self-description/reclaimed slur, and use by Muslims.

I'd guess that the two-to-one ratio in Google search results is a severe underestimate of this tendency, given that it will also include racial and ethnic uses, references to "kaffir corn" and "kaffir limes," uses in much older documents, etc.

Notably, all of the news articles I've seen talking about Hegseth's tattoo are using a single-f spelling. That's anecdotal, but probably could be quantitatively analyzed fairly easily (compared to a far greater difficulty for "all uses in which it means 'infidel'").184.75.151.213 22:10, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

As an extra data point and excluding terms like kaffir corn and kaffir lime, Google NGrams shows kafirs to have been more common before 1940 (much more common from 1900), then neck and neck with kaffirs from the mid-1940s to the present, but leading by a nose in this millennium.

I suspect this means that some uses occur with one spelling and others with the other, perhaps more or less following our current entries. This would need to be verified for the non-slur definitions, I suppose. DCDuring (talk) 14:23, 6 April 2025 (UTC)

Splitting Haketia from Ladino

So from doing a lot of research and hearing testimonies from elders who speak this North African Judeo-Spanish language, I think there should be a separate list and code for Haketia. It has been associated as just a dialect of Ladino but that is not the case. Haketia has consonants and words directly from Arabic that are never used in Ladino as well as an array of different phrases and spellings. It is a separate language. Let me know if this can be done. I have a lot of words, pronunciations and phrases ready for adding to it after it is set up. Shukur/thanks. Nevermiand. (talk) 18:43, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

od's niggers → Od's niggers or Odd's niggers

Looking at google books:"od's niggers" and google books:"odd's niggers", it seems like the O is always (or almost always?) capitalized, as if treated as a name, like Odd, which we currently only have as Norwegian but which is also attestable in English—as a non-God-related given name, I mean. Odd might also be attestable as a minced oath for God, given the variety of other oaths like this I see used or mentioned in old books, including Odd's pittikins, Odd's blood, Odd's hounds, Odd's dickens, Od's fish, Od's heft. For od's bobs the hits are more split, but that entry too should possibly be capitalized. - -sche (discuss) 04:32, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

IMO these are usually uncapitalised in later use, though it's quite hard to tell because it's usually the first thing in a sentence so gets a capital anyway. And older texts, pre-mid-19th century, would capitalise nouns fairly commonly anyway. But conventionally ods bodikins, od rat it, odzooks etc. are written with small Os. The OED and Chambers both lemmatise od and derivatives uncapitalised. Ƿidsiþ 13:32, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

May 2023

akrasia and acrasia

“akrasia” is currently listed as the alternative spelling of “acrasia”, which contradicts Wikipedia, as well as the fact that “acratic” is (correctly) listed as the alternative of “akratic”. Also, “akrasia” has 4.5× as many Google results as “acrasia” does. (There’s probably a better metric I could cite, but oh well.) IMO we should swap the two and make “akrasia” the main one. —⁠Will ⁠• ⁠B ^[talk] 23:30, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

be up to and up to something

Tagged a long time ago, I'm just bringing it here. I tend to think they should be merged to be up to, as all of the citations include a form of to be. 76.100.240.27 19:54, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

• Note that both of these terms now have open RFDs: be up to, up to something. — excarnateSojourner (talk · contrib) 01:06, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

Other static copulas can replace be. Should we consider be a generic static copula as we might consider do a generic transitive verb and something a generic NP? DCDuring (talk) 01:17, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

be up to is now a hard redirect to up to, while up to something was kept at RFD. Nothing more to do here. This, that and the other (talk) 12:07, 12 January 2026 (UTC)

put behind one

Should be put behind oneself methinks. 76.100.240.27

Also whip it on someone should be at whip it on and trust someone to should be at trust to. 76.100.240.27

• @76.100.240.27 How is the idiomatic meaning of trust someone to used in a sentence? Would one say, "I trust her to spend all day reading" to mean "It is predictable for her to spend all day reading"? If so that makes our current gloss unsubstitutable. Is it ever used without any words between trust and to? If not I think we should not move it. — excarnateSojourner (talk · contrib) 16:34, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

• @76.100.240.27 I don't think so: "It was a rough time, but I've put all that behind me now." Cambridge Dictionary has, "You need to put it behind you now". — excarnateSojourner (talk · contrib) 16:34, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

  I agree with ExcarnateSojourner about put behind one.

I agree that trust to is a worse location for the expression than trust someone to, though both are worse than trust + to, IMHO.

Doesn't whip it on require a person (or personified object) as complement? I suppose we could handle that with a label. Also. it is possible that there might be another meaning involving inanimate objects or other expressions. I would probably then be easier on users to be able to compare meanings. DCDuring (talk) 00:42, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

I would not move this entry. People say "I put it behind me" and "You need to put it behind you and move on", not *"I put it behind myself" and *"You need to put it behind yourself and move on". —Mahāgaja · talk 06:48, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

• Move to put behind with an explanatory note and a ditransitive tag P. Sovjunk (talk) 08:49, 13 October 2023 (UTC)
• I agree with the anon nom about oneself, but the other (direct) object has to be between put and behind, so I'd advocate put something behind oneself as the target of the move. DCDuring (talk) 16:11, 13 October 2023 (UTC)
• Move to put something behind one. Hftf (talk) 12:07, 19 February 2025 (UTC)

molly-mawk

molly-mawk is given as an alternative form of mollemoke, and not of mollymawk. The etymologies given for those two are half-different too, while both mention fulmars. There's probably some obsolete taxonomy in there too, so a taxo-specialist's eyes would be more than welcome. Skisckis (talk) 20:40, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

June 2023

Vulcanian

English. Needs splitting into vulcanian. Probably some crossover Elevenpluscolors (talk) 08:03, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

@Elevenpluscolors Per the OED entry, no, it shouldn't be split but geological senses (and probably the cuckold sense too) should be separately listed as appearing with a lower-case initial letter. Whichever is currently the more common form should be the main entry. The other one should still have those senses but use the template for alternative case form of. — LlywelynII 22:04, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

queer someone's pitch

The pronoun doesn't have to be present: google books:"queer the pitch". Should the lemma be moved to queer the pitch, or should that be a synonym, ...? - -sche (discuss) 18:12, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

I am familiar with the similar queer the deal, defined by "NetLingo" as "To ruin a potential business deal or arrangement despite all favorable odds. For example, 'They are a liberal company, so don't queer the deal by letting them know our conservative tactics.'" The "deal" version is more common with "the" than with possessive pronouns. But I wonder whether the right approach isn't to make both the "the"" and the "someone's" versions redirect to the right sense of queer#Verb, adding usage examples there. DCDuring (talk) 20:15, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

Sense 4 of queer#Verb is the right definition for these. I wouldn't have called these dated, but then I'm dated. DCDuring (talk) 20:21, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

July 2023

cotton on to

English. cotton, cotton on, cotton on to, cotton to. – Jberkel 18:57, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

It looks like the only quotations for cotton could be moved to one of the other two. Unless someone has a quote without a preposition/with other prepositions, that would seem to be the best solution. Then the verb entry at cotton could simply be deleted. Mazzlebury (talk)

The meaning embodied in the various expressions, as well as that in take a cotton to, clearly needs its own entry. I'd argue it is at least as sensible to delete the various cotton + PREP entries. We also need a noun PoS section for this etymology of cotton. DCDuring (talk) 13:57, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

the bee's knees

English. Move to bee's knees: like shits for "the shits". 恨国党非蠢即坏 (talk) 03:58, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Maybe, but does bee's knees attestably occur other than as a part of the bee's knees? DCDuring (talk) 15:33, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

@DCDuring: Are attestations needed to leave "the" out? Other entries seemingly just always leave "the" out, like United States。 恨国党非蠢即坏 (talk) 10:52, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

It would be better if we had some evidence for all similar cases. OTOH, if we think new normal users are able to use the failed-search page, then they would find [[bee's knees]], even if they searched for "the bee's knees" (and vice versa). I personally think that normal users can't be assumed to make good use of that page. DCDuring (talk) 12:53, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

We are quite inconsistent about whether we include the or not, e.g. cat's pyjamas redirects to the cat's pyjamas, contrary to the direction of the the shits → shits redirect. It would be better to try to decide on a general approach rather than move entries piecemeal. DCDuring, you argued in favor of redirecting verb oneself to verb even when it's never attested other than with a reflexive pronoun; it seems to me the same logic would make it better to centralize content at bee's knees, too. "The" is dropped from constructions like this when they're used attributively and in certain other cases (peruse the cites at google books:"and bee's knees"), and in headlinese ("Mayor Says New Parks Are Bee's Knees"). I pointed this out about Talk:The Rock, too. - -sche (discuss) 16:15, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

Note that this entry was already moved to the bee's knees, per a previous RFM discussion (see the talk page for a link to it). Andrew Sheedy (talk) 02:29, 18 August 2023 (UTC)

save your clicks 恨国党非蠢即坏 (talk) 02:49, 21 August 2023 (UTC)

The following discussion has been moved from Wiktionary:Requests for moves, mergers and splits (permalink).

This discussion is no longer live and is left here as an archive. Please do not modify this conversation, but feel free to discuss its conclusions.

---

bee's knees

Suggest merging the bee's knees into bee's knees. Per redirect at the the cat's pyjamas. I'm not sure of Wiktionary SOP, so noting here. HTH. Quiddity (talk) 23:10, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

I would suggest, instead. merging the other way: is bee's knees ever used in any other combination than with "the", as in the bee's knees? Chuck Entz (talk) 00:34, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

I too would suggest unifying them as the bee's knees. Mglovesfun (talk) 19:44, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

Moved. - -sche (discuss) 04:17, 1 February 2016 (UTC)

• It seems we are missing an alcoholic beverage sense. — excarnateSojourner (talk · contrib) 23:10, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

August 2023

Template:circa2 into Template:circa

@-sche, Sgconlaw {{circa2}} was created apparently to work around the fact that {{circa}} adds (or added) a comma automatically. Now that I'm changing {{circa}} (along with {{ante}} and {{post}}) not to do this, I don't see any use for {{circa2}} and propose merging it into {{circa}}. Benwing2 (talk) Benwing2 (talk) 21:47, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

@Benwing2: it seems like {{circa}} and {{circa2}} serve different purposes. The template {{circa}} (and {{ante}} and {{post}}) appear to have been created for quotations in entries that do not use quotation templates. That is why the year appears in bold and there is a comma after the year. On the other hand, {{circa2}} is for adding circa or c. before a year in other contexts, such as in etymology sections or image captions. I suppose {{circa}} and {{circa2}} could be merged, but then some parameter would have to be added to allow for switching between the two formats. Alternatively, if all quotations using {{circa}}, {{ante}}, and {{post}} were replaced with quotation templates, then {{ante}} and {{post}} could be eliminated and {{circa2}} could be renamed as {{circa}}. — Sgconlaw (talk) 05:55, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

@Sgconlaw I have eliminated the aftercomma from {{circa}}, {{ante}} and {{post}}. What differences remain? Just the boldface? That seems a pretty small thing to have two templates for, esp. given the horrible naming. Benwing2 (talk) 06:17, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

BTW {{ante}} etc. frequently appear inside of quotation templates. What is the way to do without them? Benwing2 (talk) 06:18, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

@Benwing2: can you give an example of {{ante}} being used in a quotation template? I haven't come across this before. — Sgconlaw (talk) 06:40, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

E.g. in cornuto:

{{quote-book|en|year={{ante|1597}}|first=William|last=Shakespeare|authorlink=William Shakespeare|title={{w|The Merry Wives of Windsor}}|section=Act 3, Scene 5|passage=No, Master Brook, but the peaking '''cornuto''' / her husband, Master Brook, dwelling in a continual / 'larum of jealousy, comes me in the instant of our / encounter, after we had embraced, kissed, protested, / and, as it were, spoke the prologue of our comedy}}

I am cleaning all of them up to use e.g. a. 1597 instead. Note that |origyear=, |year_published=, etc. now support a., c. and p. prefixes. Benwing2 (talk) 08:22, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Hmm. I would not merge these as things stand now, with them having the differences re bolding that they do, and the differences in where they're used: they currently serve different purposes. (Since we don't normally bold years in etymologies, descendants lists, etc, a template used in etymologies to qualify a year as circa shouldn't bold the year either, whereas we do normally bold years at the start of quotation metadata, so a template that supplies circa there should bold the year.) However, if we replace all of the relatively few (~680) uses of {{circa2}} with just the spelled-out word "circa" — formatted however: "circa", "c.", whatever we decide — rather than a template, we could just delete {{circa2}}. And/or if we made sure all uses of {{circa}} were inside quotation templates (not manually-formatted quotations), then we could presumably have the quotation templates know that if year={{circa|####}}, then format #### in bold (but don't bold circa?), and then if {{circa}} and {{circa2}} stopped differing in the formatting they apply, they could be merged. - -sche (discuss) 16:06, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

@Benwing2, -sche: strange, I've just received a ping from -sche relating to this discussion from 2023. What's happening with {{circa2}}, anyway? — Sgconlaw (talk) 14:06, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Was the ping specifically to this discussion? Fascinating. (If it was just to this general page, I might speculate that my recent removal-then-readdition of a bunch of discussions pinged people somehow, even though it shouldn't because I think you have to add four tildes at the same time as linking someone's username to ping them.) Pings seem to be wonky lately; AG202 pinged me in an edit summary on this entry recently and I didn't get the ping, only noticing that it existed because I had the entry in my watchlist and was looking at the edit history. - -sche (discuss) 14:59, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

@-sche @Sgconlaw I just got a bunch of pings that claim to be from -sche but were actually old responses of mine *TO* -sche. Strange. As for {{circa2}}, I am not sure anymore; I think when I looked into this awhile ago, I concluded they indeed serve slightly different purposes, although the naming is definitely bad. Benwing2 (talk) 19:32, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

I notice all the pings are from 6 hours ago and are in WT:RFM specifically, so I think they are indeed related to your removal/readdition of discussions at that time. Benwing2 (talk) 19:38, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

@-sche: when I clicked on the notification I was led to this discussion. Anyhoo, about this discussion, @Benwing2: what about changing {{circa}} to {{circa-quote}}, and {{ante}} and {{post}} similarly since they are all intended only for use with quotations (though they should be phased out in favour of the {{quote-*}} templates), and then renaming {{circa2}} to {{circa}}? Would that be confusing? — Sgconlaw (talk) 19:43, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Welp! I apologize to everyone who just got a bunch of pings from that, then. 😮😅 - -sche (discuss) 20:10, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Template:lj and Template:jaru into Template:rja

Both {{lj}} and {{jaru}} are aliases for {{ruby/ja}}, which calls {{ruby}} and wraps it using {{lang|ja|...}}. Now, why doesn't {{ruby}} take a lang code in the first place? That is strange. But the aliases are terrible; I propose eliminating them both in favor of {{rja}}, which is a logical shortening of "ruby/ja". We could have for example {{rko}} for Korean ruby, if it is so needed. Pinging the Japanese work group (Notifying workgroup: Eirikr, TAKASUGI Shinji, Atitarev, Fish bowl, Poketalker, Cnilep, Marlin Setia1, Huhu9001, 荒巻モロゾフ, 片割れ靴下, Onionbar, Shen233, Alves9, Cpt.Guapo, Sartma, Lugria, LittleWhole, Chuterix, Mcph2): , sorry for the wide ping. Benwing2 (talk) 08:14, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

All three -- {{lj}}, {{jaru}}, and {{ruby/ja}} -- were the creations of Fumiko Take. They did very little to document any of the templates or aliases they created, and if dim memory serves, they were even aggressively oppositional when asked to provide documentation.

• Stepping back -- what is the use case for this infrastructure? Do we not already have functional ruby text provided by {{ja-r}}?

Granted, {{ruby/ja}} offers the ability to specify arbitrary ruby text -- but I struggle to think of when we'd actually want that. It's used to great effect in manga, when authors will not uncommonly spell a word to convey a particular sense, and gloss it with ruby to indicate a different word entirely -- but for a dictionary, this is aberrant behavior outside of direct quotes of such texts. I suspect that, in most cases, {{ja-r}} would do just fine for our needs.

• Stepping back a bit further -- do we need ruby text at all?

Serious question. Tiny kana over the kanji is something that only provides value to people who can already read kana, and is otherwise likely to confuse anyone unfamiliar with Japanese typography (which is probably the greater part of our user base). If a given user can already read kana, they are likely to be savvy enough to be able to match up any provided romanized string to the kanji, much as we get when using {{m|ja|TERM|tr=romanization}}.

I argue that kana ruby text over kanji is snazzy, but it also presents usability issues.

At any rate, I would welcome an overhaul of the listed {{lj}}, {{jaru}}, and {{ruby/ja}} templates. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 08:34, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

@Eirikr I'm in full agreement that these are superfluous to {{ja-r}} (and {{ryu-r}}), but I disagree that we should be getting rid of rubytext. I think the aim should be to incorporate rubytext into {{l}}, {{m}} (et al). The infrastructure for language-specific formatting in links already exists (and is already used by Chinese and the Chinese lects to generate simplified forms), so we could add something for the Japonic languages that essentially reimplements {{ja-r}} (for the relevant language). Theknightwho (talk) 22:09, 15 August 2023 (UTC) Forgot to ping Benwing2. Theknightwho (talk) 22:12, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Just to add a bit further to this - I'd also like to automate much of the kanji/kana mapping which is currently necessary with {{ja-r}}. It won't be possible to do away with it entirely, due to redlinks or when there are multiple possibilities, but {{ja-pos}} (and all the other headword templates) are able to do this already by looking at the input for {{ja-kanjitab}}, so there's no reason why link templates shouldn't be able to do this as well.

This would greatly simplify a lot of the complexity encountered when adding Japanese links, which would help with the usability issues Eirikr mentions. Theknightwho (talk) 22:17, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

@TheknightwhoIs there a way to automatically convert {{ruby}} to {{ja-r}}? There are over 1,000 uses of {{ruby}} (often appearing as {{lj}}) and I'd like to get rid of them if possible. Benwing2 (talk) 22:36, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

@Benwing2 It doesn’t look like it’ll be straightforward, as the syntax is pretty different unfortunately. I’ll need to look at it more in-depth to get a better idea. Theknightwho (talk) 23:11, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Blah. So much crappy East Asian code (and templates) out there. Even if the conversion is possible auomatically in only say 80% of the cases, that would probably be good enough, as we can do the remainder by hand or just leave them. If for example there are cases that can be handled using {{ruby}} and not with {{ja-r}} that is probably fine, but we should not have two ways of doing the same thing and randomly use one or the other. Benwing2 (talk) 23:31, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

@Benwing2 Yeah, I suspect a conversion is possible, and as a last resort 1,000 uses is doable manually if a few of us handle it.

On the subject of crappy East Asian templates (and before I forget), it’s worth you having a look at the templates reliant on Module:th and Module:km as well. Theknightwho (talk) 01:30, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

@Theknightwho, my usability concern is not about editing, it's about reading, and about accessing the text as it is rendered in the browser.

• On the reading side, things like 漢方(かんぽう) (kanpō) are visually unclear to anyone not already somewhat familiar with Japanese typography -- it looks like the entire block of kanji + furigana together is the Japanese "word", ruby and all, when in fact the Japanese term is 漢方. Even if a reader understands that the ruby text is not actually part of this term, the kana are only useful for someone who already knows how to read kana. The kana are also superfluous, as we already include a romanization, which provides the same information just in a different script.
• In terms of the accessibility of the rendered text, for reasons obscure to me, the <ruby> element in the HTML seems to render the Japanese term un-copyable. If I select the text "things like 漢方(かんぽう) (kanpō) are" as rendered, and hit CTRL+C and then try to paste that somewhere, I only get "things like (kanpō) are" -- the Japanese text itself is missing entirely. Meanwhile, if I select the text "the Japanese term is 漢方." and do the same, I get "the Japanese term is 漢方." -- the pasted text includes everything I expected.

I'm curious, why do you think we should use ruby more? ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 23:00, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

@Eirikr I think realistically, most Japanese entries are going to be used by people already familiar with Japanese enough to know what the function of the rubytext is. Although we’re a dictionary in English, that doesn’t change the reality that most dictionary entries are of little use to a complete novice.

You’re right about there being an issue from a copy and paste point of view, and it’s something that it would be good to solve if at all possible. I’m sure there is a solution, but I’d need to look into it. Theknightwho (talk) 23:07, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Also, just adding that the rubytext does actually serve an additional purpose to the romanisation, as it shows the reading for each kanji; romanisation can’t do that (unless we used rubytext for that instead, which I don’t think would be very helpful as it wouldn’t show semantic word breaks). Theknightwho (talk) 23:14, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

If folks are familiar enough with Japanese to where they understand both kana and how furigana (kana used as ruby text) work, then they also have some idea of how Japanese phonemes break down, and how kanji readings work -- so again, furigana wind up largely superfluous to the only audience that knows how to use them.

I really think we (speaking generally) get too caught up in technical details and the coolness factor, and lose sight of usability and usefulness. Outside of those manga-esque cases were the spelling and the intended reading are really orthogonal, like 騎士(ナイト) (naito), I honestly don't think that furigana are useful enough to offset the negative impacts on usability.

... One idea occurs to me. Is there any easy way of toggling ruby display on and off? Thinking further, would there be any way of indicating in the wikicode if ruby is really needed (as in the 騎士(ナイト) (naito) example, otherwise anyone who can read Japanese that looks at 騎士 would expect to read it as kishi), or if the ruby is optional (such as when the ruby just indicates the regular reading of a given spelling)? ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 19:51, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

@Eirikr I know next to nothing about Japanese but I can see how ruby text is useful. For example, I can read Cyrillic but I don't know the ins and outs of irregular pronunciations in Russian; in cases like that we show a respelling in Cyrillic as well as give the IPA, and I think the Cyrillic respelling is useful. I imagine there are plenty of Japanese learners who will be able to read Hiragana (it's probably one of the first things taught) but have difficulty with Kanji (keep in mind it takes around 10 years for native speakers to learn to read and write Kanji, and probably only a few weeks to learn Hiragana). Benwing2 (talk) 20:30, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

I was afraid of some confusion, and indeed, here we have it.  :)

Speaking specifically about ruby for Japanese -- I grant that there are plenty of other use cases in other languages. By no means do I advocate for getting rid of {{ruby}}. I'm looking solely at the use case for {{ruby/ja}} and redirects.

→ For Japanese itself, how is ruby using kana any more useful than simply providing the romanization in parentheses? ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 20:58, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

@Eirikr The ruby text seems to allow for convenient markup of running Japanese text without interrupting the flow; putting romanizations in parens in the middle of a sentence would interrupt the flow, which is why it gets added at the end. I could imagine putting romanization in ruby text but it seems that isn't conventional. Benwing2 (talk) 21:05, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

{{usex|ja}} and {{ja-usex}} put romanization afterwards, not mid-text. I can't think of any case where a romanization would be inserted in the middle of an otherwise-running Japanese text.

• {{usex|ja|これは見本です。|This is an example.|tr=Kore wa mihon desu.}} →

これは見本です。

Kore wa mihon desu.

This is an example.

• {{ja-usex|これは見本です。|これ は みほん です。|This is an example.}} →

これは見本(みほん)です。

Kore wa mihon desu.

This is an example.

We could also leverage {{ja-r}}.

• {{ja-r|これは見本です。|^これ は みほん です。|This is an example.|linkto=-}} →

これは見本(みほん)です。 (Kore wa mihon desu., “This is an example.”)

In terms of the wikicode used to call the templates, I'd argue that {{ruby/ja}} is more of a mess, and the syntax is confusingly different from the rest of our Japanese infrastructure.

From the markup example on the Module:ja-ruby page (what {{ruby/ja}} actually invokes):

• [[振る|[振](ふ)り]][[仮名|[仮](が)[名](な)]]

Yuck. Granted, part of the problem here is borderline link abuse, but by way of comparison, we could use {{ja-r}} to similar effect, with a more straightforward syntax:

• {{ja-r|[[振る|振り]][[仮名]]|ふりがな}} →

振(ふ)り仮名(がな) (furigana)

Separately, in looking for examples of {{lj}} just now, I'm finding cases where {{lj}} seems to have been used as a replacement for {{lang|ja}} -- there are no ruby characters provided. See this snippet of the wikicode source at 会う#Japanese, for instance:

• {{quote-book|ja|year=1923|author={{lj|夢野久作}}|title={{lj|約束}}}} →

This kind of template misuse should probably be cleaned up as part of this overhaul. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 22:32, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

@Eirikr I completely agree. BTW I have added language prefix support to the quote-* templates, so you can just write this:

{{quote-book|ja|year=1923|author=ja:夢野久作|title=ja:約束}}

and it produces this:

1923, 夢野久作, 約束:

which ought to be the same as (ab)using {{lj}}. Benwing2 (talk) 02:13, 17 August 2023 (UTC)

Brilliant, thank you! That looks to be much more elegant of a solution. Cheers! ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 16:47, 17 August 2023 (UTC)

@Eirikr For reference, on MacOS, using Chrome, when I copy the text with Ruby in it and paste it into TextEdit I get this:

things like 漢方

かんぽう

(kanpō) are

The same thing happens using Safari, which suggests it's an OS issue, although possibly there are carriage returns in the underlying text that are leading to this. Benwing2 (talk) 23:10, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Geez. I asked this one in February and again in March to update the documentation of Module:languages/data/2 for the "generate_forms" stuff that is otherwise largely unexplained. With the promise "I'll add it shortly" half a century passed and the documentation is still nowhere to find. Now he suddenly jumps out and complains how Japanese does not follow the Chinese model... -- Huhu9001 (talk) 01:54, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

@Huhu9001 Not interested in your drama. Theknightwho (talk) 04:02, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

"Eliminating them both": does "both" mean t:ruby/ja and t:ruby, or t:lj and t:jaru? -- Huhu9001 (talk) 08:36, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

@Huhu9001, Eirikr My original proposal was to rewrite {{lj}} and {{jaru}} into {{rja}} as a shortcut for {{ruby/ja}}, but given what Eirikr says, maybe we don't need either of them, or {{ruby/ja}} for that matter. It sounds like maybe the best thing is for {{ruby}} to take a language code and use it to wrap the generated text appropriately, and to simply use {{ruby|ja|FOO}} when you really need to display arbitrary ruby that can't be handled by {{ja-r}}. Then we can get rid of {{ruby/ja}} and its shortcuts. Thoughts? Benwing2 (talk) 19:42, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

That sounds like a saner approach (using something like {{ruby|ja|FOO}}), but I say this in ignorance of the implementation details. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 20:36, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

T:ruby sometimes serves to prevent double wrapping of language HTML classes, mainly in |title= or |chapter= of quotation templates, like this one |title={{lw|ko|s:님의 침묵/생의 예술|{{ruby|[生](생)의 [藝](예)[術](술)}}|tr=Saeng-ui yesul}} in 열.

If anyone wants to get rid of t:ruby and replace it with t:ja-r entirely, that could mean you will have to type {{ja-r|.....|linkto=-|tr=-}} every time you want just pure text but nothing else. -- Huhu9001 (talk) 01:54, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

@Huhu9001 We seriously need to avoid having to wrap one template in another. Maybe we need to make {{ruby}} smarter so that it can handle cases like the one above. Can you enumerate other cases where {{ruby}} gets wrapped in another template, or vice-versa, that can't simply be replaced by the equivalent of {{lang|FOO|{{ruby|...}}}}? Benwing2 (talk) 03:43, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

There are some cases when you want to ruby only a part of text. Then it can be done like: {{lang|LANG|unrubied text, blahblah, {{ruby|somehow rubied text}}, more blahblah}}. One such usage is in 閣下. -- Huhu9001 (talk) 04:14, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

@Huhu9001 Assuming that {{ruby}} is modified to do lang markup, why can't you just wrap the whole text in {{ruby}} and only annotate the portion of text you want the Ruby stuff added to? Benwing2 (talk) 04:26, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

1. Sometimes wrapping the whole text produces repetition. It may become:

   {{lang|LANG|unrubied text, blahblah, {{furigana|text to be rubied|ruby}}, more blahblah}} vs

   {{furigana|LANG|unrubied text, blahblah, text to be rubied, more blahblah|unrubied text, blahblah, ruby, more blahblah}}

2. Sometimes the wrap is not t:lang. It may be t:quote, like when you have {{quote|ja|text=(ruby text)...}}. How do you "wrap the whole text" for this one?

-- Huhu9001 (talk) 05:05, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

@Huhu9001 You need to think outside the box a bit. For #1, we're talking for the moment about {{ruby}} not {{furigana}}, but {{furigana}} can be made smarter like {{ruby}} is, so that you can annotate part of the text. For #2, {{quote}} should be modified not to language-tag text that already is language-tagged, so it's OK to write {{ruby|ja|...}} inside of {{quote}}; and/or we make a ruby-quote template, similar to how we already have {{ja-x}}; and/or we add built-in support to {{quote}} for ruby text. In general, having to manually wrap using both {{lang}} and {{ruby}} inside of each other is super ugly and should be avoided. Benwing2 (talk) 05:22, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

@Huhu9001 What I'm probably going to do is modify {{ruby}} so it takes a language param, but you can write {{ruby|-|...}} to force no language wrapping, so that if you really want to embed one template in another, you can do it without fear. Benwing2 (talk) 05:27, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

I do not think inside or outside the box. I just tell you the current situation because you asked. -- Huhu9001 (talk) 05:40, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

I don't see any real need for {{lj}} or {{jaru}}, but I haven't looked at any current uses. It seems to me that {{ruby|ja|}} should suffice. As regards e.g. {{ja-r}}, it makes sense to me to use hiragana ruby with kanji, as this is fairly commonly done in Japanese-learning materials. It seems to me (again naively, without having done any specific research into the question) that users are likely to include a fair number of Japanese language learners. Cnilep (talk) 01:49, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

อ‍ย

Translingual.

Asked to request a move because this is not attested as 'translingual', being so far found only in Northern Thai. I don't know why we'd want to request a move rather than just fixing the section header. kwami (talk) 14:14, 27 August 2023 (UTC)

ฺSee WT:Beer parlour/2023/July, especially Chuck Entz's reply of 01:32, 17 July 2023 (UTC) in WT:Beer parlour/2023/July#Translinguality of Characters in Thai Block. --RichardW57 (talk) 07:18, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

@Kwamikagami: The analogy is that we would be moving อ‍ย#Translingual to อ‍ย#Northern Thai - and such things are ultimately likely to become pages of their own. --RichardW57m (talk) 08:43, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

If that's what this forum is for, then sure. I thought 'moving' meant renaming pages. kwami (talk) 10:14, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

That's why this is a test case, to confirm that it is indeed an appropriate forum for such changes as @Chuck Entz advised. For precedent, see #busy above, whose main-space alerting template is {{rfm-sense}}. --RichardW57m (talk) 12:21, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

September 2023

hinge, hinge on

The same sense is in both places; it shouldn't be. Either leave it at hinge where it has a usage note about the "(up)on", or move it to hinge upon and reduce the relevant sense-line at hinge to a {{used in phrasal verbs|en|hinge on}} pointer. - -sche (discuss) 01:16, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

'Druther have a redirect from hinge on to hinge. Personally, I am loath to assert that hinge on is a phrasal verb. If it really is one, we should have an entry for it.

OTOH, MWOnline has entries for both hinge#Verb and hinge on. They have a definition that says "used with (up)on" and other dictionaries (not just idioms/phrasal-verbs dictionaries have hinge on entries. DCDuring (talk) 20:20, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

second

There are two sense for "To agree as a second person to", which are even acknowledged in the entry itself. One's enough, I guess Jewle V (talk) 12:35, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

I would vote for putting the sense under the top one, because that's where people will look for it. Additionally, even if the true etymology is from Latin, it's certainly not widely seen that way, since people will say "I second this" ... "I thi0rd this", and so on, rather than using whatever the appropriate Latin word would be. —Soap— 16:53, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

All senses are from Latin, displacing native twoth. The problem here is that the "agree" sense is partly (and originally) from Etymology 3, and partly rederived from Etymology 1. Rather than reduplicating the sense a better solution would probably be to stick to one section and note the reinforcement in the etymology. —Al-Muqanna المقنع (talk) 18:24, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

Rather, it muscled in on the territory of native other, for which at Wiktionary we have to go back to Old English ōþer. I can only find twoth as part of a compound ordinal, which is a new function for the meaning 'second'. --RichardW57 (talk) 23:44, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

portass and porteous

They're the same word. While you're at it, Middle English porthors, which I just sloppily created to house to Chaucer quote, needs a tidy too. This, that and the other (talk) 05:37, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

Hope - valleys

There are two senses which are probably the same. Etymology 3 - A hollow; a valley, especially the upper end of a narrow mountain valley when it is nearly encircled by smooth, green slopes; a combe. and Etymology 4 - A sloping plain between mountain ridges Jewle V (talk) 18:48, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

going to

English. To be moved to be going to. Most modern grammars and some dictionaries treat be going to (" ~ will") as an idiom. The inflection line for [[going to]] has long been "(be) going to". Edit summaries show that contributors here have thought the expression included be. I can't think of another copula that could substitute for be. I also can't picture anything other than adverbials like yet, still, later, and some other short temporal adverbs (with or without not) appearing between be and going to. IOW, it's close to being a set phrase. The adverbial insertions would look good in some of the usage examples. DCDuring (talk) 18:51, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

Support. (Though it occurs to me that the pronunciations and "gonna" altforms will need to be handled if it's moved.) —Al-Muqanna المقنع (talk) 19:53, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

Indeed. DCDuring (talk) 23:52, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

I think colloquially the "be" can be elided (especially when there's pro-drop), so it would be best to keep it at going to IMO. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 17:36, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, I did wonder about that after writing the above and apparently in Early Modern usage (according to the chapter I cited as a source for the etymology) it appears without be as well. So I'm not sure. It might be worth first collecting attestations without "be" to verify how to treat the elided use (e.g. it could be moved and the elided version turned into an informal altform). —Al-Muqanna المقنع (talk) 18:08, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Aren't are our normal users better off with a main entry at an unelided form with redirects from any elided forms. In this case, were we to have an additional entry at going to, we should have at least three definitions at going to, to wit, 1., "elided form of be going to; 2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see going,‎ to.; 2.1 "moving toward" (subsenses for 2.1.1 progressive verb, 2.1.2, for gerund?); and, possibly, 2.2, et seq. DCDuring (talk) 22:11, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

I think I'm thinking of the "be elision" kind of as "be elision" in other cases, such as with "be" + adjective. In other words, the "be" is not core to the construction. But perhaps this is debatable. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 02:49, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

I would consider this expression to be distinguishable from, say, about to/be about to because there are copulative verbs that can occupy the be slot (seem and the other perception copulas.). DCDuring (talk) 12:53, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

I think it should probably stay at going to, with be going to as a redirect. We just moved be supposed to back to supposed to (where it started out) since supposed to can sometimes occur without be, and it feels to me similar to the going to case. Sometimes people use going to without be; it may be an ellipsis but it's common. Benwing2 (talk) 03:48, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

Surface comparisons can be misleading. English has lots of collocations that seem word-by-word analogous, but behave differently. I think supposed to is a false parallel. Supposed to can (infrequently) be used with other copulative verbs. I'd like to see evidence that going to is used without be in recent (~200 years) English. The few (2) other OneLook dictionaries (MWOnline, Collins) that cover (be) going to cover it at be going to. DCDuring (talk) 11:58, 19 July 2024 (UTC)

under one's wing

English. to under someone's wing (now a redirect to under one's wing), per recent discussions on use of one for reflexive verbs and other cases where a subject is identical to the referent of one. I don't care whether we would keep the (new) redirect after the move. DCDuring (talk) 00:24, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

on one's way

English. I have moved senses (and their translations) between on the way and on one's way, making on the way a lemma with most of the definitions from on one's way rather than an alternative form. It occurs to me that there might be a pondian difference that would account for the previous arrangement. In any event, please review the changes. DCDuring (talk) 15:00, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

October 2023

Articles with national anthems

Compare Afrikaans Die Stem and English The Call of South Africa with French Marseillaise (instead of La Marseillaise) and English Star-Spangled Banner (instead of The Star-Spangled Banner). J3133 (talk) 14:45, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

• Well if some national anthems are referred to with an article and some without I think it would be more helpful for us to document these differences (as we seem to be doing) rather than creating and imposing an artificial consistency. Besides, isn't The in The Call of South Africa part of the official title of the song? Wouldn't removing it be like removing The from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe? — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 20:22, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

  @ExcarnateSojourner: The in The Star-Spangled Banner is also part of the official title of the song. Wiktionary has the wrong titles instead of, as you assumed, differences that we are documenting instead of imposing an artificial consistency. J3133 (talk) 07:22, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

  • @J3133 In that case I think we should move Marseillaise and Star-Spangled Banner to add articles to both. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 18:18, 27 March 2025 (UTC)

  Just to make sure, you're suggesting to move (parts of) Marseillaise → La Marseillaise and Star-Spangled Banner → The Star-Spangled Banner? Jberkel 08:16, 24 June 2025 (UTC)

  • @Jberkel Yes. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 17:12, 14 January 2026 (UTC)

pro-shipper to proshipper

proshipper seems to be the more common formatting. pro-shipper is less searched on Google, for example. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 17:29, 13 October 2023 (UTC)

 Support Binarystep (talk) 13:00, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

 Oppose – The citations for both senses almost exclusively feature the hyphenated form. Google Trends results shouldn't be the guidepost here. This would also create unnecessary asymmetry with the antonym anti-shipper. WordyAndNerdy (talk) 23:00, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

@WordyAndNerdy: The citations for the second sense are from print media, which doesn't reflect common usage of the term. If we included social media citations (which we could, per current policy), proshipper would outnumber pro-shipper 10-to-1. As for the asymmetry, this assumes that anti-shipper is more common than antishipper, which isn't necessarily true either. Hyphens in general are becoming increasingly uncommon in English, and slang terms like proshipper are naturally some of the first to reflect this trend. Incidentally, this is why I don't think the citations for the first sense should be counted in this discussion – that sense is rather dated, and not really used anymore in fandom spaces. I don't think it benefits readers to have the lemma form be at a spelling that they're unlikely to even encounter in the first place. Binarystep (talk) 10:48, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Unhyphenated forms may occur more in online spaces less for orthographic reasons and more as a product of often-poorly-punctuated informal Internet speech. We wouldn't have entries for hannigram or dni based on Internet-speak all-lowercase tweets like "proshippers dni, hannigram sucks" (the links are to the standard forms). This seems like a solution in search of a problem. The current weight of evidence supports the prevalence of the hyphenated form. I don't think we should set out to tip the balance in the other direction for prescriptive reasons. Readers can easily locate the current lemma through the unhyphenated redirect. WordyAndNerdy (talk) 11:15, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

@WordyAndNerdy: There's a difference between all-lowercase typing (which is inconsistent with standard English orthography) and using prefixes without hyphens (which isn't grammatically incorrect). You're right, we wouldn't have entries for hannigram or dni – but we do have an entry for proshipper, because it's an equally valid spelling, not a mere error resulting from informal speech. Further proof is the fact that one can easily find plenty of uses from people who use standard spelling and punctuation. I also find it rather ironic that you'd characterize my reasoning as prescriptive, given that my argument is based solely on frequency of use; if anything, it's more prescriptive to invalidate proshipper on the basis of it being "a product of often-poorly-punctuated informal Internet speech". Binarystep (talk) 19:13, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

Something I discovered while attesting comship/comshipper is that a not-insignificant number of people seem to regard proshipper (unhyphenated) as a blend of problematic + shipper. This strikes me as a rather unlikely folk etymology. Forgive the prescriptiveness but I now favour retaining the hyphenated form to avoid creating confusion over which etymology is more likely to be accurate. The pro- + shipper interpretation is better supported by evidence. WordyAndNerdy (talk) 08:14, 1 June 2024 (UTC)

Oppose based on the cites. Google results are notoriously unreliable (they'll say a search finds X hits, but only display far less); I don't know if Trends are any better. - -sche (discuss) 04:54, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

 Oppose (provisionally) - I have never seen or used the word, but I do see that Teen Vogue used the unhyphenated version at least once- see [5]. I would like to see more citations on the unhyphenated version before a final analysis be made. I am always wary of downplaying of hyphenated words in favor of unhyphenated words because of what I dimly perceive to be a "systemic bias" (accidental or intentional) against hyphenated words on Wiktionary caused by various factors. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 10:09, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

November 2023

Cat:English Reddit slang: merge to Cat:English internet slang

The description of Cat:English Reddit slang reads:

English slang terms whose usage is typically restricted to users of the website Reddit.

However, I am not sure that "Reddit slang" is a particularly viable subcat of "Internet slang"; a lot of these terms didn't originate on Reddit and aren't actually restricted to Reddit. It probably only seems that way because of the prominence of Reddit as a site where people use Internet slang heavily.

The only terms that genuinely seem to belong in this category are downdoot, updoot, and AITA and its related terms (ESH, NTA, NAH, YTA). This isn't enough for a slang category IMO. The terms AMA and karma farm can persist in Cat:en:Reddit without being in this category, because the denotation has to do with Reddit itself. This, that and the other (talk) 02:36, 3 November 2023 (UTC)

@This, that and the other  Support. I agree with your reasoning and I imagine there are few terms with currency on Reddit that haven't "escaped" into the wider Internet. Benwing2 (talk) 06:55, 3 November 2023 (UTC)

Support per nom. - -sche (discuss) 18:03, 3 November 2023 (UTC)

I would say karma farm is another one that's Reddit-specific, given it references Reddit karma (upvotes). Theknightwho (talk) 19:10, 5 November 2023 (UTC)

I support, I guess. Heyandwhoa (talk) 01:27, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

@This, that and the other: You're right that "Reddit slang" isn't a discrete category in and of itself (aside from the few you mentioned), but there are plenty of terms which are restricted to particular subreddits. Therefore I  Oppose this proposal as written. Maybe the category should be moved to Category:English Internet slang originating from Reddit? By the way, karma and its derivatives aren't actually Reddit-specific, as the concept exists on (and possibly originates from) Slashdot (see e.g. karma whore). Ioaxxere (talk) 21:23, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

Even if "Reddit" isn't enough for a category, isn't it enough for its own label. And if a usage or, at least, a term originated in Reddit, shouldn't there be an etymology saying so? DCDuring (talk) 22:13, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

God rest his soul et al and rest one's soul

Some overlap here Jewle V (talk) 21:28, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

シービーエス, エヌエッチケー

Japanese. Move to CBS#Japanese and NHK#Japanese. —Fish bowl (talk) 06:05, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

• NHK done. Sorry if this is controversial, but no one has objected in nine months. Cnilep (talk) 04:28, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

I found 460 hits for "CBSテレビ", versus only one hit for "シービーエス・ソニーグループ" (CBS/Sony Group), in archives for Mainichi Shimbun. I would say the romaji is the common form, and should be used, if the proper name is kept. Cnilep (talk) 04:37, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

Done. I moved both to the respective romaji pages, leaving ja-see at the katakana pages. Cnilep (talk) 04:39, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

December 2023

Template:→

Move {{→}} to {{borrowed arrow}} (or some other English words). Wiktionary:Templates § Naming templates says, "If you can, try to avoid using characters outside the ASCII encoding". A single character, non-ASCII template name with no aliases makes it hard to use, hard to link to, and hard to search for (at least for people like me with ASCII keyboards). — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 20:44, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

 Support but let's please keep {{→}} as an alias. Catonif (talk) 17:21, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

• For sure. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 18:08, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Venus' comb

Needs merging with Venus's comb and possibly Venus comb. Ultimateria (talk) 20:11, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Indeed, according to Google NGrams, since about 1960 Venus comb is the most common form, with the others more of less in a tie. DCDuring (talk) 22:45, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

But there are two species with the common names, one a plant, the other a shellfish. I'll see whether “Scandix pecten veneris”, in OneLook Dictionary Search. and “Murex pecten”, in OneLook Dictionary Search. can help resolve this. DCDuring (talk) 22:50, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Still not sure about Murex pecten's vernacular names.

The main issue here is strictly a matter of orthographic rules: how do you spell the combination of the possessive clitic, 's, with a word that ends in "s" in the singular? I was taught " s' ", but it looks like professionally edited works have used " s's " as well, or just avoided the issue by omitting the clitic. There's variation along those lines for both the plant and the mollusk. I suspect the differences in occurence of the spellings has as much to do with time and place of publication as with any difference between usage of the plant name vs. the animal name. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:17, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

Template:⇒

Move {{⇒}} to {{reshaped arrow}} (or something similar) to make it easier to type, as with #Template:→ above. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 22:54, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Do we even need a template like this in the first place? HTML symbol codes exist for a reason: →, ⇒. - saph ^_^^⠀talk⠀ 23:06, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

January 2024

open-pit mine

English. Move to open-pit (POS??) This, that and the other (talk) 05:16, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

It would be an adjective, but is anything other than mines ever called open-pit? —Mahāgaja · talk 08:03, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Mining can also be open-pit, as can work in older texts.

(In my part of the world people sometimes talk of open-cuts (open-cut mines, a synonym we don't have - I wonder if it is highly regional). So I was really wondering if open-pit could be a noun that is used attributively in open-pit mine. It's hard to tell.) This, that and the other (talk) 09:16, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

This seems like a cleanup operation, covering several entries and potential entries.

No other OneLook dictionary has open-pit mine. MWOnline, Oxford, Dictionary.com, and Collins have open-pit, Collins having it as a noun. (Attestable as noun, but SoP?) Also we have some of opencast, open-cast, open cast. We should use GoogleNGrams to determine the most common for each of the -pit, -cast, and -cut forms, use Google Books/News to determine which are attestable, include all attestable forms as alt forms, and make sure that at least the main forms show the main form of the other groups as synonyms. There is also the possibility that some of these are used adverbially. DCDuring (talk) 15:18, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

• openpit, open-pit, open pit - “open*pit”, in OneLook Dictionary Search. - Google Ngram Viewer

• open pit is most common

• opencut, open-cut, open cut - “open*cut”, in OneLook Dictionary Search. - Google Ngram Viewer

• open cut is most common, but sample includes many about wounds

• opencast, open-cast, open cast - “open*cast”, in OneLook Dictionary Search. - Google Ngram Viewer

• opencast is most common

Not checked to confirm that most usage is about mines and similar. DCDuring (talk) 15:49, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

eon

Move definition to aeon and mark eon as an American alternative spelling of aeon, so as to align with Wikipedia and as aeon was borrowed from the Latin aeon, not eon. eonian, eonic and light eon included. A Westman talk stalk 03:22, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

Don't. eon is demonstrably (at GoogleNGrams) more common: eons recently thrice as common as aeons and eon more common than aeon. (Plural is nearly three times as common as singular. DCDuring (talk) 13:07, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

Agreed. As a general rule we don't change the spelling of terms with Pondian differences once the entry has settled on one spelling or another. (There are exceptions, e.g. if British spelling allows both A and B equally and American spelling prefers B, I think it would be reasonable to move a term spelled as A to B.) Benwing2 (talk) 02:53, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

If we check frequency, we should be ready to change which is the main entry. Google NGrams makes it easy, though it covers books (only?). Whether the criterion should be recent usage or all usage is a matter of judgment, at least for now. One can also search in News for usage by location (nation, province/state?) of the source. DCDuring (talk) 16:06, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

English 's and -'s

I understand that the distinction between 's and -'s is that the former is a contraction of is, was or has and the latter is a possessive, but I think this distinction is likely to be lost on the majority of Wiktionary users and is better made by merging both pages to 's and making the distinction using different Etymology sections. As it is, there is some duplication between these two entries. Benwing2 (talk) 22:44, 31 January 2024 (UTC)

We should be able to have something at -'s#English that directs users to the appropriate etymology section at 's. (Is -'s an alternative form, as we use the term, of 's?) DCDuring (talk) 13:10, 1 February 2024 (UTC)

(Oppose unless it can be demonstrated that we don't normally lemmatize suffixes like this at titles with hyphens.) I'm very sympathetic to the fact that content being somewhere that some people don't expect is a problem, and to need to prominently flag when content is on a different page than some people expect, not just in this kind of case, but also e.g. when we usually lemmatize singulars but occasionally put some senses at the plural, or usually lemmatize without the but occasionally have some senses at separate the X entries, or when we lemmatize phrasal verbs outside the main verb entry. I'm a big fan of Template:used in phrasal verbs and "See..." links like at message. But if lemmatizing the possessive at -'s is technically correct and is consistent with how we treat other suffixes, then we should continue lemmatizing at -'s and just take whatever other measures we can to obnoxiously prominently crosslink it to and from the other page... because if we make an exception and lemmatize this page at an incorrect title, it's inconsistent with other entries... do we also move -'#English? What about -'s#German and -'#German? What about -s? And that inconsistency confuses other users and editors who do understand our system, and look in the right/expected place, only to find that the content isn't there because we moved it to an incorrect/inconsistent place to try to outsmart them. I think we have to do things consistently (e.g. if suffixes usually start with hyphens, do so here too), and use prominent "See also..." links where necessary. For verbs linking to phrasal verbs, and for things like message, such links can just be on definition lines; here, I'd be fine with the link taking the form of a big T:LDL-esque yellow box or something if people want, if people feel a ===See also=== link is insufficient. Obviously, any incorrect duplication should be cleaned up. - -sche (discuss) 14:31, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Oppose per -sche (note that links have been added to the top of both entries). J3133 (talk) 05:51, 30 October 2025 (UTC)

Agree

To me, the distinction is that -'s is an affix attached to words, and 's is its own word.

I think we should only have entries on 's where there’d be a space between them and words before them. Similar to 'tis. One would write He said 'tis a happy evening, not He said'tis a happy evening.

I don’t currently see anything like that on the 's page. Theanswertolifetheuniverseandeverything (talk) 22:03, 5 May 2026 (UTC)

February 2024

Reconstruction:Proto-Italic/atta

Proto-Italic. Identical to Reconstruction:Proto-Italic/attā. The two should be merged at this page.

March 2024

merge 翖侯, 翕侯

Originally at 翖侯, copied to 翕侯. I do not remember why I chose 翖侯.

Should the 翖侯 entry point to 翕侯 instead? And if so, can the page history be merged from 翖侯 to 翕侯? —Fish bowl (talk) 08:20, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

April 2024

Template:en-decades/documentation

English. Move/convert to Appendix. Any red-linked item included in this automatically causes that page to be "wanted" thereby clogging Special:WantedPages with pages almost all or all of the "wants" for which are created the template. There are now 13 such redlinks.

Other templates of a similar nature exist, but should probably be handled one at a time. DCDuring (talk) 20:28, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

May 2024

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/ǵʰer-

*ǵʰer- (“to yearn for”) should be moved to *gʰer-. *ǵʰer- (“bowels”) should be moved to *ǵʰerH- (suggested June 2019). —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 17:49, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

Both roots have been moved. Exarchus (talk) 14:00, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

tail wagging the dog

We give this as a noun, but our cite shows it's a verb that can occur in other tenses. Do we move it to tail wag the dog? Or do we consider it too awkward to find a tail-containing title for the verb to live at, leave the verb on wag the dog, and make this entry a phrase "the tail is wagging the dog"? Either way, it needs to be moved and re-POSed, no? - -sche (discuss) 06:33, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

I'd rename it [[the tail wags the dog]] rather than "is wagging". —Mahāgaja · talk 09:49, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

As worded it is clearly and correctly an NP headed by tail.

The lexicographic issue is the appropriate headword, which, in our case, is influenced by our avoidance of the idiom PoS, MWOnline has "the tail wagging the dog" as an idiom. Most OneLook dictionaries don't seem to cover this at all. DCDuring (talk) 14:21, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

 Support User:Mahagaja's suggestion. Benwing2 (talk) 08:20, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

@Benwing2 I think we should have a policy for phrases in English which can take multiple tenses, as this comes up relatively often and it would be nice to have something to point to (e.g. time stand still was recently moved to time stands still after quite a long thread at WT:RFDE). As with other parts of speech, I’d prefer we had a consistent lemma format, even if it’s not usually said that way (e.g. lemmatising at kiss one's ass goodbye, which I can only find one durable use for with the pronoun one, despite being relatively common). Theknightwho (talk) 11:58, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

What should be the lemma? Should there be entries, redirects, or nothing for classes of the often-numerous alternative forms (variations in verb inflection, number, pronoun, determiners, grammatical structure, licensed adjective or adverbs, etc)? Do we have to research relative frequency of the forms to make these decisions? How should the variations be acknowledged on the lemma entry? What differences by language type or individual language? DCDuring (talk) 13:16, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

This is the kind of thing that, I believe, other dictionaries cover in a style guide. We could use Wiktionary:Style guide as a location for a set of subpages on relatively narrow lexicographic issues, so that they would be easy to find. Entry types, like this one, that recur would benefit from some principles inferred from examples and will probably generate disagreement, but not major conflict. We could have votes and make individual subpages policy, but that should not be necessary. DCDuring (talk) 12:48, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

@Theknightwho I totally agree. Sometimes I've moved pages to try to make them more consistent, which sometimes led to complaints, so I think a style guide or whatever would be very helpful. For example:

1. try to avoid "one" or "someone" in a lemma unless it's unavoidable, e.g. it's in the possessive; so kiss goodbye not kiss one goodbye or kiss someone goodbye;
2. if "one" or "someone" needs to be expressed, use "one" if it is the same as the subject, "someone" otherwise; hence kiss one's ass goodbye is correct, not kiss someone's ass goodbye; take someone's word for it is correct, not take one's word for it (which is correctly a redirect); but someone's ass off should be one's ass off (the latter is incorrectly a redirect to the former);
3. use the infinitive for verbs occurring at the beginning of an expression (in a verb-object phrase), but the simple present for verbs occurring with a subject (hence the tail wags the dog not the tail wagging the dog; time stands still not time stood still, time standing still, time stand still, etc.
4. there should be something about whether to include the word "the", e.g. in tail wags the dog or the tail wags the dog.

Benwing2 (talk) 23:15, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Those seem like good rules to me. There is an interaction with what I think is our preference not to have headwords with leading the. Also, to clarify, when you say infinitive you mean the 'bare infinitive', not the 'to infinitive'. When should something be used instead of someone? (Does it depend on the relative frequency of use of the expression with non-gendered things? Threshhold?) Are there circumstance in which we would go with a different lemma headword? Should we have alt form entries for some of the inflected and other variant forms or just hard redirects. I don't know how complete we should try to be. To much detail might delay implementation and course correction. DCDuring (talk) 01:53, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring These are good questions. You are right that I mean "bare infinitive" rather than "to-infinitive". As for something vs. someone, I think if it can reasonably occur with both, one should be a soft redirect to the other. Generally I prefer soft redirects over hard redirects, although I understand that hard redirects are easier to enter. Another issue is, what's the inanimate equivalent of one's? Is it its? I will bring these rules to the BP and see what people say. Benwing2 (talk) 03:01, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

OK, based on the discussion above it seems like the second definition of wag the dog, added by JasonCarswell last year and noticed and reworded by me today, should be moved to the tail wags the dog. Presuming it is attested ("The tail wagging the dog is the central bank's interest rate decision, which is affecting the whole economy."?), I suppose tail wagging the dog is a correct noun entry as DCDuring says, though whether the translations were cognizant of this or were intended to go on the phrase entry that didn't exist until now is TBD. I have edited all of the entries I just mentioned; please improve or comment if needed. - -sche (discuss) 07:19, 13 October 2025 (UTC)

Peraia

It seems like this is just a capitalization of the lowercase common noun peraia when referring to a specific one. See Citations:peraia (one cite explicitly says ""The peraia" is not a place name but a common noun"). Should Peraia be moved to lowercase and redefined as a common (rather than proper) noun, maybe with the capitalized form left as an {{altcase}}? (Or, compared to e.g. "the boundaries of the (City|County|State|Province|Duchy|Kingom) in the area of the river", does the Greek-ness or some other factor make the meaning of the capitalized entry different or unintuitive enough that we should have both?) - -sche (discuss) 18:46, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

 Support your suggestion of putting the main form at peraia and making the other forms use {{alt case}}. Benwing2 (talk) 08:19, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Let's do it! peraia is at WT:REE so this would resolve that too. 2A00:23C5:FE1C:3701:EC5C:27F2:F52C:93D2 20:35, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

OK, I have moved it. The Latin (and modern Greek) translation is still capitalized because when I searched for that Latin word (albeit not exhaustively), I only spotted capitalized occurrences. - -sche (discuss) 22:19, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

@-sche: You have given peraias as a plural, but I'm not sure this is right. peraias can be found but seems to be a Greek word/form of its own (compare ἥρως heros and many other Greek words ending in -is or -os). 2A00:23C5:FE1C:3701:EC5C:27F2:F52C:93D2 01:24, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

Hmm, OK. I will suppress the plural for now and look into it more later. Thanks for pointing this out. - -sche (discuss) 04:18, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

Template:spelling of, Template:alternative spelling of

There seems to be no semantic difference between these two. I propose a merger into Template:alternative spelling of, which is more used and has shortcuts so it won't be any longer than Template:spelling of. Note that Template:spelling of is mostly but not exclusively used for alternative spellings in different scripts, and has special support for categorizing such spellings according to the script, but there's no reason that support can't be integrated into Template:alternative spelling of. Benwing2 (talk) 23:11, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

Note: {{spelling of|lang|Foobar|term}} becomes {{alt sp|lang|term|from=Foobar}}. Benwing2 (talk) 23:13, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

Sounds good.

While we’re at it, could we add an experimental parameter (to this and {{altform}}) that disables “standard” categorisation (like POS, gender, etc) and dumps words into a “[language] alternative forms and spellings” category? Nicodene (talk) 04:04, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

@Nicodene I don't think such a parameter on these templates would work. The parameter would have to go in the headword instead. Benwing2 (talk) 04:12, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

@Benwing2 How would you suggest going about it? With frp-headword for example. Nicodene (talk) 05:01, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

@Nicodene There would have to be an extra setting passed to full_headword() in Module:headword that indicates that the term is an alt form, which would change the categorization to Category:Franco-Provençal alternative forms and spellings (or whatever) and would disable all the normal categorization into lemmas, by gender, etc. You'd then need to thread a param for this through the various frp-* templates. This is assuming you want whatever inflections/etc. get auto-generated by Module:frp-headword; if not, you could just say {{head|frp|alt form}} or whatever. Benwing2 (talk) 08:16, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Thesaurus:female genitalia (vs Thesaurus:vulva and Thesaurus:vagina)

Looking at the contents of this page vs Thesaurus:vulva vs Thesaurus:vagina, I am doubtful that a three-way split is sensible or maintainable. I suggest splitting the contents of Thesaurus:female genitalia between the existing Thesaurus:vulva vs Thesaurus:vagina pages. (Terms which refer to both can be listed on both pages, as is already happening. I take no position at this time on whether the vulva and vagina pages themselves would be better off merged.) - -sche (discuss) 20:08, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

Or maybe have Thesaurus:female genitalia, with subsections for those terms that are more specific. Chuck Entz (talk) 20:57, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

That would also work. - -sche (discuss) 16:10, 1 June 2024 (UTC)

 Support doing something about it. Fay Freak (talk) 13:22, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

 Support female genitalia—User:Vealhurl (talk 21:17, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

June 2024

Merge some child categories into parent categories

Beer Parlour discussion here: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Beer_parlour#c-Ysrael214-20240523124100-Categories_of_child_languages_also_be_a_subcategory_of_parent_language

I guess admins should still decide which languages (like Chinese) shouldnt be merged but have borrowed terms of a child language must be a subcategory of the parent language. Already working in derived terms, just need to be implemented with borrowed terms as well. 𝄽 ysrael214 (talk) 20:59, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

• Here's an unbroken link to the Beer Parlour discussion. The request is to make e.g. cat:Tagalog terms borrowed from Mexican Spanish a subcategory of cat:Tagalog terms borrowed from Spanish. As Ysrael points out, cat:Tagalog terms derived from Spanish already contains cat:Tagalog terms derived from Mexican Spanish. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 02:55, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

Template:clipping of, Template:aphetic form of; Template:clipping, Template:aphetic form

"Aphetic form" is just a fancy way of saying "clipping at the beginning". I doubt we need to make such a fine distinction, and using opaque linguistic jargon is IMO not helpful. I propose eliminating "aphetic form (of)" in favor of "clipping (of)". Pinging User:PUC (creator of {{aphetic form of}}, with only 60 uses) and User:Adam78 (creator of {{aphetic form}}, with only 71 uses). Benwing2 (talk) 00:13, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

Might as well merge ‘syncopic form’ into ‘clipping’ while we’re at it. Nicodene (talk) 01:17, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

@Nicodene What about {{apocopic form}}, {{apocopic form of}}? Benwing2 (talk) 01:21, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

BTW the usage counts (mainspace only) are {{syncopic form of}} (86), {{syncopic form}} (145), {{apocopic form of}} (1023), {{apocopic form}} (33). Benwing2 (talk) 01:23, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

That too, now that you mention it.

‘Clipping’ covers all of these, is a proper term used in linguistics, and is much more comprehensible to the average person. Nicodene (talk) 01:36, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

To me, clipping has a slightly different connotation. Aphesis, apocope, and syncope suggest that the word was reduced slightly by rapid speech or "laziness" whereas a clipping has been shortened in a much more substantial way, like favourite > fave or unprofessional > unprofesh (where an entire chunk of the word has been "clipped" off). Ioaxxere (talk) 21:26, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

@Ioaxxere: They are, formally, subsets of clipping. The following are synonymous (confirmable by searching them):

• aphesis: initial clipping, fore-clipping, front-clipping
• syncope: middle-clipping, mid-clipping
• apocope: final clipping, back-clipping, hind-clipping, end-clipping

Nicodene (talk) 23:13, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

• I don't think anyone would ever consider the Ancient Greek apocopic forms, for example, "clippings". Yes, they both involve removing the end of a word, but there's a world of difference in intention and function between saying δύνατ’ (dúnat’) for δύνατο (dúnato) and saying fave for favorite. —Mahāgaja · talk 06:29, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  No, there really isn't. It's entirely accurate to call them clipped forms. Nicodene (talk) 06:52, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  It's not strictly incorrect to call them clipped forms, but it's not how people actually think of them. Anyone seeing the Ancient Greek forms labeled "clippings" in a dictionary would be baffled by it, and would want to correct what they would perceive as either mistaken or laughably pedantic. I'm trying to think of a parallel case where something that's technically accurate falls so short of common sense that we can't realistically expect anyone to do it. The best I can think of right now off the top of my head is the fact that we categorize CAT:Birds directly under CAT:Vertebrates and not under CAT:Theropods < CAT:Dinosaurs < CAT:Reptiles. Yes, birds are technically theropod dinosaurs, but classifying them as such here would fly in the face of how people actually think. —Mahāgaja · talk 07:28, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  I don't know where you got this impression? I do think of them as clipped forms, because that is what they are. And of the two words clipping and apocope, the latter is infinitely more pedantic– the average person wouldn't even recognize it.

  If it's useful to have a specific subcategory for forms produced by regular final clipping in Greek (or Italian), that's fine. Nicodene (talk) 07:44, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  Hmm, the average person wouldn't recognize the term "apocope"? That doesn't make it pedantic, that makes it unfamiliar. If only there were a website that provided definitions of words so that people who were unfamiliar with them could look them up and find out what they mean. Something like a free online dictionary, maybe. —Mahāgaja · talk 07:51, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  I don't know what definition of pedantic we're supposed to be operating with, then, because in my world, insisting on fine-grain distinctions and the usage of unnecessarily obscure terminology is in fact more pedantic than not doing so.

  As I've said, if it's useful to have subcategories of this sort, so be it. That is an entirely different matter. Nicodene (talk) 08:01, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  The technical terms are used for phonologically-induced changes. Most of what I would call clippings are more a matter of style than necessity. There's no phonological process that changes "brother" and "sister" to "bro" and "sis"- otherwise we'd be calling parents "mo" and "fa". Chuck Entz (talk) 08:42, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  There is nothing about phonological regularity (nor for that matter style or necessity) in the actual definition of apocope. Likewise syncope, aphesis, and clipping. Nicodene (talk) 09:32, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  @Mahagaja There is already a problem with editors having a hard time keeping apart ellipses from clippings, and having three more subvarieties of clippings just adds to the confusion, not to mention the opaqueness of using Greek-origin terms that few people have ever heard of. Possibly we could keep apocope of referring specifically to loss of a single final vowel, since this occurs frequently in Greek and Italian, but I would be definitely opposed to keeping aphesis and syncope, which are underused and I would posit are even more obscure than apocope (since apocope is somewhat well-known specifically in the context of the languages where it is a regular process). Benwing2 (talk) 07:16, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  @Benwing2: "There is already a problem with editors having a hard time keeping apart ellipses from clippings." Actually, by a cursory scroll through User:Ioaxxere/ellipses I couldn't find a single instance where {{ellipsis of}} was used improperly. Also, I would like to note that not all syncopic forms are "clippings" by our definition ("a short form created by removing syllables"), since (for example) collard and its etymon colewort have the same number of syllables. Ioaxxere (talk) 20:52, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  @Ioaxxere I found plenty of examples (e.g. in Vietnamese) where {{clipping of}} is used for ellipses. Benwing2 (talk) 20:58, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  Is there a widespread problem with it in every language? This feels like forcing a one-size-fits-all solution. Theknightwho (talk) 15:22, 12 November 2025 (UTC)

  That's impossible to know, but the fact that {{aphetic form of}} is barely used and that we also have {{apheretic form of}} (what's the difference?) is indicative of the fact that hardly anyone knows what this term means, which means it's not helpful to use in a dictionary definition. We also have {{syncopic form of}} and {{apocopic form of}}, equally opaque. Maybe we should just have a single {{elision of}}; do we really need to note whether it's omitted at the beginning, the middle or the end? Benwing2 (talk) 17:01, 12 November 2025 (UTC)

Template:pcp-cmp

This template appears restricted in its use to Azerbaijani entries. If so, it should be at least renamed to {{az-pcp-cmp}}. I suspect there is still room to improve on that name. This, that and the other (talk) 11:55, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Dungan loanwords

耶提目, 康比尤特, 帕麼多

related discussion: Module_talk:zh-usex#Dungan (regarding retranscription of texts into Han).

My understanding is that Han script forms are typically only used by Chinese researchers for convenience; while they can be defensible for Sinitic morphemes under our current "unified Chinese" scheme, keeping them for loanwords seems forced and unnecessary. —Fish bowl (talk) 23:04, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

@Fish bowl: Super late reply, but I think they can be kept, maybe as alternative forms. 耶提目 is used in some varieties of Lanyin Mandarin / Central Plains Mandarin beside Dungan, I believe, so that should all the more be kept. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 05:05, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

July 2024

God Save the King

God Shave the Queen

Shouldn’t the interjection be at “God save the King”? The entry has the usage example “The Queen is dead! God save the King!”, with a lowercase s. J3133 (talk) 17:34, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Also added God Save the Queen. J3133 (talk) 06:55, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

And God Shave the Queen. J3133 (talk) 11:48, 14 April 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, agreed. Theknightwho (talk) 20:22, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Me, too. DCDuring (talk) 02:25, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Me three. --Overlordnat1 (talk) 07:17, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

logatome

Merge into logatom, the spelling used by OED and compliant with the etymology logo- + atom. I dont think an alternative term page would be necessary. Anatol Rath (talk) 12:09, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

The question is not whether an alternative term page is necessary (It is.) but which form is more common. We also need an English L2 for logatom. DCDuring (talk) 12:47, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

See logatom#English. A case could be made for either based on Google N-Grams. DCDuring (talk) 18:55, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

In that case I suggest making th lemma the form which more clearly indicates the etymological roots of the term. — Sgconlaw (talk) 11:43, 21 August 2024 (UTC)

このざま

Japanese. Move to Latin-script konozama (konozama)? —Fish bowl (talk) 05:24, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Poking around briefly in online search results, it looks like the katakana form is amply confirmable for this sense of reverse-"Amazon OK". The hiragana, however, appears to be just the straightforward SOP of この (kono, “this”) + ざま (zama, “pitiful appearance / situation / state”), and as SOP should probably not have an entry.

Rather than outright moving, I'd suggest keeping コノザマ (konozama) as an alt form and having the lemma at konozama (konozama). (Can anyone explain why the heck {{m|ja|konozama}} is outputting romanization on a romanized term? Not wanted.) For instance, compare:

• google:"コノザマは" -- 226 hits for me
• google:"konozamaは" -- 1,530 hits for me

‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 22:19, 21 August 2024 (UTC)

August 2024

Merging 𐌃𐌄𐌃𐌄𐌕 and dedet

Both these articles duplicate their Faliscan content. Perhaps the articles should be merged? Graearms (talk) 16:46, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Well, not literally merged, but one of them should be listed only as an alternative spelling of the other. —Mahāgaja · talk 20:36, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Agree with महागज. Latin spellings of Faliscan are more rare here, so it's better to move it to the original spelling i guess. Or do you find it problematic? Tollef Salemann (talk) 21:35, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Moving Reconstruction:Gaulish/Wenicaros to Reconstruction:Gaulish/Wenikaros

I am requesting that a user with the required permissions move Reconstruction:Gaulish/Wenicaros to Reconstruction:Gaulish/Wenikaros, which is currently occupied by a redirect page. Antiquistik (talk) 20:03, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Let's give Mellohi! a chance to explain why he moved it from *Wenikaros to *Uenicaros in the first place before moving it back. And why do we need a separate page for the Gaulish reconstruction at all when we have RC:Proto-Celtic/Wenikaros? The latter can list a Gaulish reconstruction without a link and then put Latin Venicarus under that. Having a whole separate entry for the Gaulish reconstruction feels unnecessary. —Mahāgaja · talk 07:21, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

I was basically moving all the Gaulish reconstructed entries to match up with the orthography of actual Gaulish inscriptions (many Latin-script Gaulish inscriptions exist). Latin-script Gaulish inscriptions basically used U for /w/ (and rendered with the letter U in scholarly mentions of words with the glide) and C for /k/. — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 07:58, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Agree that the whole page is superfluous. It contains no new information. A page RC:Gaulish/caros with declension and derived terms would be great though. —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 21:38, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

@Mahagaja A discussion was held, and it the majority of votes was in favour of using phonetic-based Romanisations for certain reconstructions including Gaulish ones. The conversation on this present request continues here below. Antiquistik (talk) 11:03, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

WiFi

wifi is the main spelling today, methinks. Denazz (talk) 12:56, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

I suppose you meant Wi-Fi; WiFi is an alternative form. J3133 (talk) 13:39, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

Strong oppose. It's still officially known as Wi-Fi and that's the spelling you're more likely to see in official, formal, and careful writing (followed by WiFi). It's also the exclusive spelling used by the Wi-Fi Alliance which owns the trademark. wifi remains a largely colloquial spelling. Merriam-Webster, the OED, and Dictionary.com all lemmatize at Wi-Fi as well. If anything, I could see noun sense 3 being moved, since it's already informal, but then that'd put us at a weird juncture. AG202 (talk) 22:11, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

If we are talking "careful writing", then Google Ngram Viewer has Wi-Fi about twice as common as all others combined. WiFi is about a third as common with wi-fi and wifi about equal making up the balance.

I didn't know that we prescribed "careful writing" or gave such sources more weight. As all of these spellings are pronounced the same, "colloquial" doesn't seem the right term to apply to the less formal uses in books. Using durably attested sources naturally gives a major edge to any spelling backed by a plausible legal threat, eg, trademark infringement. DCDuring (talk) 22:38, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

September 2024

pearl-ash / pearlash

Different? Denazz (talk) 14:18, 3 September 2024 (UTC)

Not to mention the well-attested pear-lash, with a similar meaning. DCDuring (talk) 12:51, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

The problem of division of pearlash has been observed. The following is from Riddles and Conundrums (1924):

My first's a precious stone;

My next a well known tree;

Or call my first a fruit,

The next a thong will be.

Whichever way you choose:

This puzzle to divide,

You still will find my whole

A powder will abide.

Pearl-ash, or Pear-lash.

Ash is used in combination to form names of a range of natural alkalis (made from vegetable ash), refined versions, and their synthesized replacements, soda ash, kelp ash, potash.

My hypotheses:

1. pearl ash may have gotten its name not from the product being derived from mollusk shells but by being a refined (white, shiny?, more valuable?) form of potash; hence, pearl-ash, then pearlash
2. I have yet to find any discussion of mollusc shells being used in the manufacture of potassium carbonate. Therefore, I am skeptical of the definition in our entry for pearl-ash, which is sourced from "Universal Dictionary of the English Language [UDE], 1896; under snuff.". Looking it up I found a use of pearl-ash in a discussion of the adulteration of snuff. UDE's definition of pearl-ash did not mention shells or molluscs, just plant ashes. I wondered a jesting or naive folk-etymologist contributor is responsible for the entry.
3. pear-lash is like a norange. DCDuring (talk) 17:36, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

• closed. It is the same --~2026-38024-93 (talk) 10:10, 6 July 2026 (UTC)

Replace -ferous with -iferous

There is only a single word suffixed with -ferous that doesnt have a preceding i (indigoferous); it especially bothers me how many pages have "|-i-|-ferous}}" (which also clutters up the category of -i-interfixed terms). Could somebody make a bot replace all "|-i-|-ferous}}" and all other "|-ferous}}" (except indigoferous) with "|-iferous}}" if thats possible?
-form could also be moved to -iform along with most of its derivations (there are about 17 latinate adjectives in -form without i I think) but i dont think its as pressing.
"|-i-|-stan}}" could also be replaced by a new entry -istan Suryaratha03 (talk) 22:06, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

In general a policy would be useful about whether or not to add -i- to etymologies of the structure "Latin lemma + English suffix" because a linking -i- is something of a default but there are enough exceptions Suryaratha03 (talk) 22:33, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

Your first sentence is false. MWOnline has isidioferous "bearing isidia".

That there are also several at Urban Dictionary suggests that -ferous is productive.

We don't normally adjust category names because someone is bothered. DCDuring (talk) 02:03, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

I just feel its relevant that none of these words have entries on here. Like we might as well keep -ferous as an alternative form of -iferous, but all the "-i- + -ferous" are still unjustified in my perspective, just from a lexicographical view. Suryaratha03 (talk) 14:19, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

@Suryaratha03 It isn't relevant at all - what's relevant is whether they could have an entry, which they could. Theknightwho (talk) 14:23, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

Ok, but as I said in my second sentence, we can keep -ferous but is there any argument against changing -i- + -ferous to -iferous in all these pages? And potentially also -ferous to -iferous in all these lemmas that do end in -iferous? Suryaratha03 (talk) 12:56, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

Comment: Wiktionary seems to be a little inconsistent about dealing with suffixes that are often but not always paired with infixes. On one hand, we have (e.g.) both Category:English terms suffixed with -ification and Category:English terms suffixed with -fication (even though AFAICT we could theoretically decide to view all -ification words as -i- + -fication), and we have both Category:English terms suffixed with -ology and Category:English terms suffixed with -logy (containing, I note, quite a few terms spelled ...ology). On the other hand, we treat redophile and neutralophile as -o- + -phile and don't have -ophile. (As a related issue, I sometimes see people removing any mention of infixes and linking vowels from etymologies: i.e. not changing foobariferous: foobar + -i- + ferous to foobariferous: foobar + -iferous but just changing it to foobariferous: foobar + ferous and leaving the i unaccounted for.) - -sche (discuss) 02:17, 19 September 2024 (UTC)

*bʰrewh₁- and *bʰrewH-

@Victar, @Mahagaja, @Bezimenen, @GabeMoore These pages should be merged. In addition, we need a root *bʰer- (“to flow”) and a root *bʰeru- (“to boil”). The best account of this cluster of roots is {{R:la:Schrijver|pages=252-56}}. Opinions? —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 23:01, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

Foolishly, User:Illustrious Lock moved a draft entry from my sandbox to the mainspace. Moved back. --{{victar|talk}} 07:21, 6 October 2024 (UTC)

Template:non-gloss definition -> Template:non-gloss and remove aliases 'ngd' and 'non-gloss definition'

Per Discord discussion with @Fenakhay, @Vininn126, @Theknightwho I propose the following:

1. Make {{non-gloss}} host the canonical name of the template currently found at {{non-gloss definition}}; the latter name is way too long.
2. Bot-rename occurrences of {{non-gloss definition}} to {{non-gloss}} and eliminate the former template. {{non-gloss definition}} appears to have around 8,500 uses.
3. Bot-rename occurrences of {{ngd}} to {{ng}} and eliminate the former template. {{ngd}} appears to have around 3,100 uses.

After this, we will have a canonical template {{non-gloss}} for non-gloss definitions, and two shortcuts {{ng}} and {{n-g}}. Benwing2 (talk) 21:20, 16 September 2024 (UTC)

Sounds good to me! Vininn126 (talk) 07:03, 17 September 2024 (UTC)

• The proposed move has been made, but many uses of the old template names still exist. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 05:57, 22 November 2024 (UTC)

Moving Gaulish reconstructions

Several Gaulish pages were recently renamed last month without consultation. And since this discussion regarding reconstructions, specifically regarding Gaulish, received enough votes in favour of Romanising reconstructions (including in Gaulish), I am formally requesting for moving:

• RC:Gaulish/Bodiokassos to RC:Gaulish/Bodyokassos,
• Reconstruction:Gaulish/Adiantumaros to Reconstruction:Gaulish/Adyantumaros,
• and Reconstruction:Gaulish/Wenicaros to Reconstruction:Gaulish/Wenikaros. Antiquistik (talk) 11:37, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

But that's the opposite of romanising (in the sense of using the prevalent Latin-based orthography)! —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 12:09, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

@Caoimhin ceallach We clearly meant it in the sense of using the Latin script in the discussion. I apologise for any misunderstanding. Antiquistik (talk) 12:24, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

paddleboard

overlaps with paddle board. Denazz (talk) 16:16, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

merge Template:taxfmt, Template:taxlink and Template:taxlink2

@DCDuring, JeffDoozan, Theknightwho AFAICT, the only difference between {{taxfmt}} and {{taxlink}} is that the former is intended for when we do have a Translingual entry for the taxon in question and the latter for when we don't, and {{taxlink2}} seems to be a failed experiment to replace {{taxlink}}. Whether there's a Translingual entry can easily be autodetermined, so I propose merging all three into a new {{taxlink}} template that autodetermines whether there's a Wiktionary entry and acts accordingly. If necessary, we can add a flag to override the autodetermination. Benwing2 (talk) 05:10, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

 Support - doing all of this manually has been a massive waste of time. Theknightwho (talk) 07:29, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

 Support replacing {{taxlink2}} with {{taxlink}},  Abstain merging {{taxlink}} and {{taxfmt}}. There's no technical reason to keep them separate, but I understand that doing so would break an important process used by the biggest contributors of taxon stuff, although now that wantedpages has been cleaned up, it might be possible to use that instead. See the first few posts at Template_talk:taxlink#Convert_to_Lua for more details. JeffDoozan (talk) 10:34, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

@JeffDoozan: Wantedpages is worthless for "Translingual" and English and probably many other reasonably well-covered languages because it is limited to 5,000 items. The least "wanted" page is wanted on 53 pages. The most wanted taxonomic name is usually wanted at most 20 times and necessarily fewer pages than that. DCDuring (talk) 15:12, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

I have a couple of questions:

1. How will I be able to collect lists of taxonomic names that do not have entries and the counts of their uses? Such lists don't have to be available in real time.
2. Are we now a point where Moore's Law has brought the cost of checking for the existence of entries down so far that we can have lists of hundreds of species without appreciable burden? That was one of the reasons for the existing arrangement. I do not add lists of hundreds of species, but some genus entries have lists of such size, sometimes commented out completely or in part. DCDuring (talk) 15:00, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring As for #2, according to @Theknightwho there are Chinese-language pages that scrape over 1,000 other pages for transliterations without problem, so I don't expect this to be a major issue. I'm pretty sure fetching page contents is not considered an "expensive" operation so we aren't limited by the limit of 500 expensive operations per page. As for #1, there will be categories automatically generated in real time that list all the wanted taxonomic names. For a specific nonexistent taxonomic name, you can check the transclusions in real time using Special:WhatLinksHere to see how many other pages are using the nonexistent taxon, but I don't think it's possible to generate a real-time sorted list of pages by use. However, this can definitely be done offline. It's very similar to the weekly lists already generated by User:This, that and the other, and I imagine if they don't already have a list that will suffice for this purpose, they can easily modify their scripts to generate such a list. Benwing2 (talk) 07:26, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

@Benwing2 is the intent for the new {{taxlink}} to do an existence check on the target entry every time it is invoked? If it also adds something that gets stored in the database link tables (like a WT:Tracking transclusion or even an external link to a fake domain) upon finding a nonexistent target entry, then DCD can manually navigate to WhatLinksHere or Special:LinkSearch to find transclusions of a specific name (although basic search would probably suffice in that case), and I can easily create a new weekly SQL-based todo list. Without the special transclusion or link, I would have to do it by parsing dumps, which is more tedious. This, that and the other (talk) 07:39, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

@This, that and the other Yes, the intent is to merge {{taxfmt}} (which is intended for the case where the target entry exists) with {{taxlink}} (which is intended for the case where the target entry doesn't exist) and check automatically for existence (which means there should be a Translingual section with the appropriate name, and maybe also checking that it has a {{taxoninfl}} header — which BTW we should rename to {{taxonhead}}). I was planning on adding a category for the taxonomic term uses that link to nonexistent entries but I can easily add a tracking page as well. Would it suffice to have a single tracking page for all nonexistent entries or do you want one tracking page per nonexistent entries? If it's easy for you to create essentially a list of nonexistent but tracked Translingual entries on a weekly basis, sorted by number of uses, that would be great. Benwing2 (talk) 08:20, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

@Benwing2 if we want to find the most commonly occurring broken taxlinks, there would need to be a distinct Tracking link for every missing target page. Also that template should really be called {{mul-tax-head}} or {{mul-taxon}}... but I don't care about that too much! This, that and the other (talk) 09:14, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

@This, that and the other OK, sounds good. Benwing2 (talk) 09:22, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

As it is now, pages often have multiple instances of {{taxlink}} for a given taxon, because multiple languages can use the same spelling for the vernacular name for the taxon and the taxon ought to be part of the definition. That seems like something that will be lost using categorization, which is page-oriented, not L2-oriented.

The lists generated by Special:WantedPages, sorted by incoming links were flooded by links from User pages. I commented out most of such pages that were from my user pages, but there are many others that have been run periodically that repeatedly show the same entry, even when blue-linked. The value of the capability to sort ANY searchbox results by the number of incoming links is obviously compromised when User pages and indeed any pages outside principal namespace are included by default.

It is amazing to me that everyone is so solicitous of me wasting my time, without asking me whether I thought I was wasting my time. I actually found that the erroneous uses of {{taxlink}} led me to L2s that had other problems, both errors of commission and of omission. But, obviously others know better whether and how I am wasting my time. Dare I say that perhaps others are wasting their time worrying about me wasting mine. DCDuring (talk) 14:34, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

When someone has a well-established workflow, it's always a good idea to think carefully about how to avoid this. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:58, 29 September 2024 (UTC)

That assumes that person is the only one using the templates, which is a bad assumption to make. Benwing2 (talk) 00:26, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring This isn't just about you - it's about the fact that having completely manual infrastructure for taxonomy makes it very difficult for anyone else to get involved unless they want to dedicate as much time as you do. I also don't understand your point anyway: what exactly would be lost on pages where multiple languages point to the same taxon with {{taxlink}}? The thing it would be checking for is whether the taxon page exists, so the entry's language isn't relevant. Theknightwho (talk) 00:03, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@Theknightwho: The only reason we have "manual" elements of the taxon infrastructure is that nobody seemed to care enough to actually understand, 1., the process I think Wiktionary needs to follow with respect to adding taxonomic name, 2., taxonomic name formatting, and desirable style for taxonomic name entries. I think the number of "wants" is good for prioritizing taxa, so we avoid having too large a proportion of orphan taxonomic name entries. At present we have, almost always, the right formatting if the person adding the taxon has the right taxonomic rank (or equivalent) for the taxon. I don't see how we can usefully automate definitions very much.

I am interested in the number of "wants" from languages, not pages. If five languages use the same spelling for a vernacular name of a taxon, I count that as being worth as much as five pages that refer to the taxon once. DCDuring (talk) 03:45, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring (a) It's possible to automate it by language, and (b) those templates don't currently distinguish by language anyway, so I'm just as confused as @Benwing2 about what the actual problem is here. Theknightwho (talk) 13:50, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

I don't need to differentiate by language in which the entry exists, so I don't do that with the script that tallies the number of {{taxlink}} (not {{taxfmt}}) occurrences for a given taxonomic name. Once the list is compiled, I add the taxa from the list in decreasing order and change {{taxlink}} to {{taxfmt}} for the taxon in question, reviewing the L2 sections as I go, sometimes adding vernacular names, derived terms, incoming and outgoing links, images, etc.

@DCDuring I agree with @Theknightwho. You're not the only one who uses these templates. In particular I've been using {{taxlink}} and {{taxfmt}} myself to clean up formatting on several pages and find it very awkward to have to manually look up each term. You will need to explain to me what benefits the current system provides that are lost when making it automatic. How does the current system distinguish languages? I doubt it does. (For that matter, it's possible to automatically fetch the current section's language and use it in categorization if so desired.) Benwing2 (talk) 00:25, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@Benwing: I am not sure what it is that you manually look up for each term. If an ordinary wikilink for a taxon is red, then it needs {{taxlink}}; if it is blue, we have lately decided it needs to be formatted using {{taxfmt}} to remove the need for anyone other than module programmers to master taxonomic formatting. DCDuring (talk) 03:45, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring It is possible to automatically check (a) whether the page exists, (b) if so, whether a Translingual entry exists and (c) if so, whether that entry is a taxonomic entry. The check would be whether all of those conditions are satisfied. It may be possible to make it even more specific, if necessary. Theknightwho (talk) 03:52, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@Theknightwho: I assumed that (a), (b), and (c) would be possible. I assume that you are talking about real time.

Please tell how the single template will differentiate between names with Wiktionary entries and names missing them in a way that yields a list of missing taxonomic names ordered by the number of occurrences of the taxon enclosed in the template. Can that be done in real time? Does it need to be done by dump-processing (as it is done now)? DCDuring (talk) 18:40, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring Okay, how about you tell me how you're achieving that now? Plus, going by your comment above, you only need to compile that list in order to manually change the template, which would no longer be necessary anyway! Theknightwho (talk) 18:43, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

You miss the point. I add taxa in order of descending number of instances of occurrence of the taxon enclosed in {{taxlink}}. I do a run occasionally of a perl script against a dump that picks out occurrences of {{taxlink}}, groups them by taxon, and orders the taxa by the number of taxlink instances for each taxon. I add entries for the most "wanted" taxa when I have the enthusiasm to do so. DCDuring (talk) 14:13, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

I admit that I selfishly assumed responsibility for taxonomic entries and use of {{taxlink}} when its creator seemed to cease being interested. I was (and perhaps am?) the only one who regularly removed redundant {{taxlink}} and, now, who converts them to {{taxfmt}}. I also seem to be the only one adding taxa based on the number of "wants", though I have advertised User:DCDuring/MissingTaxa a few times over the past dozen or more years. I have offered help to any users who come to my talk page.

The 'workflow' for adding taxa is dispersed among a small number of people who add {{taxlink}} when a bare link (or {{taxfmt}}) is red. We apparently want either {{taxfmt}} or {{taxlink}} to be added for the taxon formatting. {{taxlink}} also provides a means to meliorate over our very modest coverage of taxa by referring people to Wikispecies. It also provides a way to count "wants" for a taxon. In the absence of an explicit proposal (not hand-waving) for dump-processing to identify missing taxonomic names by their number of wants with the merged templates, I don't see how combining these templates offers any reduction in workload to anyone. DCDuring (talk) 03:45, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring I'm completely confused as to how having two templates the choice of which depends on manually checking for a red vs. blue link is superior to doing the same automatically. Maybe you're not understanding my technical proposal, because what you're saying doesn't make a lot of sense to me. If {{taxlink}} does A, and {{taxfmt}} does B, my proposal is simply to have a combined template that automatically does A when the link is red and B when it's blue. How does {{taxlink}} allow us to count "wants" for a taxon that a combined template won't? This doesn't make any sense technically to me so I will need a detailed technical explanation of how this works. Thanks! Benwing2 (talk) 03:52, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring BTW you explicitly mention that some people (not you) use the wrong template, and you have to then go and clean this up. This is exactly the sort of work that will vanish by having only one template. With only one, there's no way to use the wrong one. Benwing2 (talk) 03:53, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

Often, using the wrong template is an indication of other problems. DCDuring (talk) 17:58, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

Please tell how the single template will differentiate between names with Wiktionary entries and names missing them in a way that yields a list of missing taxonomic names ordered by the number of occurrences of the taxon enclosed in the template. If this can been done, why not do it for {{l}} (and {{m}}, and all the column templates and make ordered lists of missing entries in order of "want" for all of our languages? DCDuring (talk) 17:58, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring I do think this is possible offline. However, the more pertinent question is, can you do this currently? If so, please explain how it's done currently and I will explain how to do the same in the new system. If you can't do this currently, why are you insisting on it when you can't do it in any case? Benwing2 (talk) 18:58, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

@Benwing2: I run a perl script against a dump that picks out occurrences of {{taxlink}}, groups them by taxon, and orders the taxa by the number of taxlink instances for each taxon. DCDuring (talk) 14:13, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

@DCDuring I created WT:Todo/Lists/Wanted taxa, which seems similar to your existing list in your userspace, but may be of use to you nonetheless. (Note this is a dump-based list just like yours, so the todo list infrastructure will automatically regenerate it twice a month.) If it is, please let me know and I will try to fix the problems currently present in the list. Otherwise I will retire it. This, that and the other (talk) 12:23, 5 October 2024 (UTC)

If it matches mine, having it outside of user space is better. It's also a little quicker to use because one can scan the 'wanting' pages to get an English vernacular name or other indication of a part of a potential definition. Adding items from these lists at least means that the added items are not orphans, which are often a waste of contributor time. DCDuring (talk) 14:58, 5 October 2024 (UTC)

I've converted all uses of {{taxlink2}} to {{taxfmt}} or {{taxlink}}, so it should be safe to delete {{taxlink2}}. @DCDuring, does WT:Todo/Lists/Wanted taxa work well enough that we can merge {{taxlink}} and {{taxfmt}}? JeffDoozan (talk) 20:23, 29 March 2025 (UTC)

@User:JeffDoozan I was under the impression that WT:Todo/Lists/Wanted taxa depended on the distinction. In any event, I am not confident that items for which we have entries are being properly removed from the wanted list, eg, Eukaryota (15 wks) [doesn't/can't use {{taxon}}], Caenophidia (3 wks), Mysticeti (12 wks), Panulirus (62 wks), Monogenea (8 wks), Anisoptera (30 wks), Tetrao tetrix (26 wks), Euthyneura (55 wks), Aegotheliformes (4 wks), Hypoxidaceae (1 wk), Neoophora (8 wks), Chlorococcales (8 wks), Microsporales (8 wks); redirects Neovison vison, Lophochroa leadbeateri. The entries that are more than 8 weeks old (6, bold above) should not be on the list. 13 items out of 5,000 is a very low rate of error. But their presence makes me wonder whether there is some faulty selection logic.

Redirects to taxonomic entries may be desirable and thus should be excluded, though they may meet the selection criteria currently implemented.

Furthermore, if the availability of this list depends, as a practical matter, on certain specific individuals running and maintaining code not accessible to me, I would not be very happy to lose my ability to run my simple Perl scripts. I have outlasted, even outlived, most of Wiktionary's technical adepts. Perhaps simply redirecting {{taxlink}} to {{taxfmt}} would be sufficient to allow me a fallback should our current excellent adepts, especially TT&O, find other interests. DCDuring (talk) 22:39, 29 March 2025 (UTC)

The [source code] is available and runs on a collaborative wikimedia hosted server (ToolForge) so it runs automatically and is not dependent on any single editor. Looking at the code, it makes no distinction between {{taxfmt}}, {{taxlink}}, or {{taxlink2}}. Any |1=taxon+|2=rank pair found in any of those templates without a corresponding pagename+{{taxon|rank}} is counted as Wanted. In the case of Mysticeti, {{taxon}} has |1=parvorder but the Wanted items refer to |2=suborder. JeffDoozan (talk) 23:50, 29 March 2025 (UTC)

Wonderful, just what I needed: a whole other class of ambiguities to resolve here, but that are not fully resolved IRL. DCDuring (talk) 16:01, 30 March 2025 (UTC)

@DCDuring I can always change the list so that it treats "parvorder" and "suborder" as equivalent, as well as any other such pairs. This, that and the other (talk) 21:23, 30 March 2025 (UTC)

And yes, the list makes absolutely no distinction between {{taxlink}} and {{taxfmt}}. This, that and the other (talk) 21:24, 30 March 2025 (UTC)

I now appreciate the benefits of the listing as you have it. It has surfaced various problems, such as failure to use {{taxon}} and simple errors in rank in use of the {{taxlink}} family of templates. I am not sure how to deal with "real"-world (taxonomic) inconsistencies in the ranks (including use of clade) of taxa. Open Tree of Life, a relatively new database, tags taxa as 'inconsistent' when it fails to find a consensus among the authorities it uses. (I hope this US NSF-funded resource does not degrade (or worse) in the current budgetary climate.) I sometimes have used multiple {{taxon}} templates as subsenses where there seemed to be rank (or other) differences that I could not otherwise resolve. DCDuring (talk) 21:32, 30 March 2025 (UTC)

• Annoyingly, {{taxlink}}, {{taxfmt}}, and {{vern}} (possibly {{taxlink2}}) categorize pages even when used on discussion pages. Specifying "nocat=1" seems to have no effect and wouldn't be a reliable means to eliminate the categorization anyway. DCDuring (talk) 20:04, 26 March 2026 (UTC)

October 2024

Merge Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/ǵʰrem- with Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/gʰrem-

I propose to move the relevant forms at *ǵʰrem- to *gʰrem- insofar as they aren't there already. In practice this means moving the Sogdian forms, but only after correction. Then the forms at *ȷ́ʰárati and subpages would need to be disentangled as different roots are given for those by Cheung (and others).

See also etymology scriptorium. Exarchus (talk) 08:03, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

I've moved the relevant forms at *ǵʰrem- to *gʰrem-. So the *ǵʰrem- page can be deleted. Exarchus (talk) 13:05, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

Template:U:en:non-rhotic rhymes

This is not a usage template, so it should not be named like one. It is actually used on English rhymes pages such as Rhymes:English/ɑː(ɹ)b. I'm open to suggestions for the new name, but I propose {{en-non-rhotic rhymes}}. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 22:50, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

Template:U:en:other rhymes

Same deal. I propose {{en-other rhymes}}. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 22:55, 10 October 2024 (UTC)

Appendix:Fandom slang

Move to Appendix:English fandom slang, since not all appendices are about English. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 19:27, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

tomrig → tomrigg

English. Allegedly the more common spelling. @85.48.184.106 Binarystep (talk) 13:04, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

ἔθω

Ancient Greek. The page already says "The present is used only as a participle", but according to Beekes ἔθων is not related to εἴωθᾰ. I suggest both get their own pages. If there is to be a page for 'ἔθω', I think it should be as reconstruction *ἔθω, like Beekes gives under 'εἴωθα' (p.395). (moved from rfv) Exarchus (talk) 19:37, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

Hello M @Exarchus. I tried to concentrate on attested forms and expressions as we would do at our exams. I do not do Etymologies. Participles have their own pages in en.wikt anyway. (Most of the many quotations seen are for participles, not for the verb). εἴωθα (eíōtha) may have its own page (without repetitions of material) with its own Etymology. The unattested ἔθω (éthō) may have in front of it an asterisk (lemmatised or just added in-page, according to en.wikt's policy for such cases, perhaps with a little template for * with tooltip). Admin @Mahagaja could review. Thank you. ‑‑Sarri.greek ^♫ I 21:18, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

Now I remember: Category:Ancient Greek reconstructed terms. They are dealt like e.g. Reconstruction:Ancient Greek/φυλακέω. But they are just unattested. ‑‑Sarri.greek ^♫ I 21:37, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

I would agree with this request. Bailly 2024 states “ Étym. Étymol. incert. ; cf. p.-ê. ἔθος, mais probabl. l’interprétation de ἔθων c. part. prés. du pf. εἴωθα est à rejeter. ” In English, “Etymology uncertain; cf. perhaps ἔθος, but likely the interpretation of ἔθων as the present participle of perfect εἴωθα is to be rejected.” Therefore, with two modern sources rejecting the connection, the two should not be put under the same etymology or page. MichaelAmpe101 (talk) 17:15, 6 September 2025 (UTC)

Moved to εἴωθα (but no entry for ἔθων yet) Exarchus (talk) 19:16, 6 September 2025 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-West Germanic/falljō

To be moved to what is reconstructed by the references (hint: they don't reconstruct 'fellō'), or to be removed altogether as a Frankic etymon is just one of several etymologies for Latin fellō (“criminal”). I already explained why the Dutch 'descendant' shouldn't be there. Exarchus (talk) 22:14, 29 October 2024 (UTC)

See also here. Exarchus (talk) 22:32, 29 October 2024 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Iranian/hwápati

After I removed a few terms, there are only nouns now (as there were originally). Rastorgueva & Edelman reconstruct *xʷāpa- for those, so maybe the page should be moved to *hwāpa (possibly related to Sanskrit स्वाप (svāpa), but maybe independent creations as the Sanskrit term occurs fairly late). The verb that should be reconstructed for Proto-Iranian is rather a verb on -sati: R. & E. give "*hufsa-, *xʷafsa-", LIV gives the zero grade as original. Exarchus (talk) 22:49, 29 October 2024 (UTC)

November 2024

merge Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Iranian/krā́mHti + Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Iranian/krā́mHati

These are basically two competing reconstructions for the same thing. I'm inclined to think the reconstruction should be *krā́mHti. Exarchus (talk) 11:13, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

History merge: I have no preference on the direction. --{{victar|talk}} 08:01, 16 November 2024 (UTC)

{{R:ine:HCHIEL|1908}} gives *krā́mH- ~ *krámH- ‘step, walk’ for PII Exarchus (talk) 21:15, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

@Dragonoid76, don't blank pages. If they're too be merged, they should be history merged. --{{victar|talk}} 08:38, 17 May 2026 (UTC)

@Victar 👍 Dragonoid76 (talk) 18:16, 17 May 2026 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Iranian/ȷ́ágrastay

This is in any case wrong (see here), and maybe this should simply be moved to PII root *gras- Exarchus (talk) 20:31, 15 November 2024 (UTC)

Surely there is a better alternative than moving it to a root entry. --{{victar|talk}} 07:55, 16 November 2024 (UTC)

Don't see why can't we allow PII root entries when we allow Sanskrit ones. — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 12:55, 5 December 2024 (UTC)

@Mellohi!: It is allowed, we do have PIIr root entries. -- 𝘗𝘶𝘭𝘪𝘮𝘢𝘪𝘺𝘪^{(𝘵𝘢𝘭𝘬)} 14:56, 5 December 2024 (UTC)

how dare you

Move to how dare someone, since e.g. "how dare they!" is also used. I would just do this myself but there are translations to adjust. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 03:57, 22 November 2024 (UTC)

Support. There's also "how dare s/he" MedK1 (talk) 13:05, 27 November 2024 (UTC)

December 2024

Template:da-conj and Template:da-conj-reg

These two templates for Danish verb conjugations could hardly be more different. Not only is the visual appearance completely inconsistent, but the structure doesn't match either: {{da-conj}} has present/past across the top, while {{da-conj-reg}} has active/passive. They don't even have all the same forms.

To add to the confusion, we have some Danish verbs that don't even have a conjugation box at all, like smile.

Honestly I am very confused; @Helrasincke or any other Danish editors, can you help? This, that and the other (talk) 07:24, 4 December 2024 (UTC)

Okay, I have read some Danish grammar books and now I am less confused. It seems that we need to show:

• infinitive and imperative (trivially related)
• present tense
• past tense (five types: add -te; add -ede; vowel change and add -ede; strong verbs; irregulars)
• passive infinitive, passive present, passive past
  • Note: {{da-conj}} shows the active infinitive but not the passive infinitive. This seems counterintuitive. Putting active/passive as the columns of the table allows space for this form.
• present participle
• past participle
• the auxiliary verb to be used (missing from {{da-conj-reg}})

We also need a table for deponent verbs like enes.

The grammar books I looked at don't mention a gerund, but both our templates identify this form. Is it obsolescent?

Anyway here's my first draft of a replacement, merged Danish verb template, using {{inflection-table-top}} to get the benefits of a sensible width and dark mode support:

Conjugation of ...

active passive present ... ... past ... ... infinitive ... ... imperative ... — participle present ... past ... (auxiliary verb have) gerund ...

When viewed on mobile, the participle box automatically moves to sit below the other box.

Obviously this needs feedback from someone more knowledgeable about Danish! This, that and the other (talk) 11:45, 4 December 2024 (UTC)

@This, that and the other Yes, I agree, quite a mess... I started drafting an Appendix to gather my thoughts on the matter before revamping the templates but life got in the way and I'm not sure I'll get back to it in the immediate future.

The situation with the -s form (probably better referred to as middle voice than passive, as elaborated by the pdf linked below. Mediopassive is also occasionally used in the literature and I would prefer either to passive since many are not at all passive and it's also not even the only passive in North Germanic) is further complicated by the fact that the -s forms actually have several different functions, depending on verb, and it can be difficult to tell when a given usage is being used in a passive, anticausative or reciprocal function even when one knows the language well. For instance, see the examples here and at Mediopassive voice. I don't remember off the top of my head but have a vague feeling that some verbs also do not have an -s form, though we should probably confirm that with a native speaker or someone more qualified before acting on that hunch. Additionally, as you mentioned there are a handful of deponent verbs (such as enes, synes), which occur only in the -s forms. Depending on dictionary, -s forms may get their own independent entries, or they may be subsumed under the active form, where possible (for instance Den Danske Ordbog has [6] redirecting to se, but [7] with its own entry; in the Politikens Nudansk Ordbog, both get their own entry). So, what do we call them and should we automatically generate them for all verbs?

Regarding what might be described as the gerund, the so-called centaur constructions or centaur nominals, this seems to be a topic deserving of more academic research (which is obviously beyond our scope here). I believe they are theoretically possible for many (all?) verbs, although I cannot comment on the actual frequency of their usage in the contemporary language. They are certainly very rarely covered by grammar books, with at least one large English work outright denying the existence of a gerund. Full disclosure, I was the one who translated that wikipedia page on centaur nominals from Danish. Helrasincke (talk) 22:38, 5 December 2024 (UTC)

@This, that and the other And the table layout looks fine, but I don't like the loud colour. I would prefer something more subdued like we have for, say, Russian (e.g. сказать (skazatʹ)) or Polish (e.g. mówić), but that's just my two cents. Helrasincke (talk) 22:48, 5 December 2024 (UTC)

@Helrasincke I picked red because it's on the Danish flag! I'll go with brown for now, as it is more muted, but still distinct from Swedish blue. You are, needless to say, welcome to change the palette parameter at {{da-conj}} to whatever you wish!

The situation of the gerund seems rather odd to me - in general I would say we should follow grammar books and dictionaries, but clearly some form like this does exist, and since my knowledge of Danish is extremely limited I would naturally defer to you.

In any case I've made the merge. Please double-check to make sure I got it right. Thanks for your constructive input! This, that and the other (talk) 00:41, 17 January 2025 (UTC)

barlafumble

The two dictionaries I could find which gave a time frame for this word – besides OED, which just calls it obsolete and Scottish – attribute it to "Old Scots":

• Slang and Its Analogues Past and Present: "BARLA-FUMBLE! intj. (old Scots)"
• Google Books also says it's found in A Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue: From the Twelfth Century to the End of the Seventeenth, volume 1, but I don't have access to it.

The earliest use is in Christis Kirk on the Green, from around 1500 and which is in Middle Scots. And James Maidment's A Book of Scottish Pasquils has a quote for it dating from between 1568-1715 (or maybe he authored it himself? I can't really tell, but if it's not him quoting it then it's from 1868), firmly in the range for Middle Scots. The latest use I could find, in the form barley, was in Walter Scott's Waverley, in 1814, which I think would place it in Scots. It should probably be under Middle Scots. -saph668 (user—talk—contribs) 16:20, 6 December 2024 (UTC)

@Saph668: you do have access to A Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue [here]. Chuck Entz (talk) 18:15, 6 December 2024 (UTC)

Oh, I was just looking on Google Books which didn't have a preview. Thanks. -saph668 (user—talk—contribs) 18:17, 6 December 2024 (UTC)

It should be under Middle Scots Rakso43243 (talk) 21:00, 6 December 2024 (UTC)

Split Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Iranian/ȷ́ʰŕ̥dayam and Reconstruction:Proto-Iranian/jŕ̥dayam

There should be a separate reconstruction for forms like Sanskrit हृद् (hṛd) (with Vedic nominative/accusative हार्दि (hārdi)) and Avestan 𐬰𐬆𐬭𐬆𐬛 (zərəd). In {{R:inc:IAIL|page=230}} Lubotsky gives "j́ʰārd-/j́ʰard-/j́ʰrd-; j́ʰrdaia-". I guess most Iranian forms come from the form without -aya-, one example that does come from the latter is Ossetian зӕрдӕ (zærdæ) (says Lubotsky). Exarchus (talk) 09:59, 11 December 2024 (UTC)

@Exarchus  Done: I've split the Proto-Indo-Iranian into *ȷ́ʰā́rd and *ȷ́ʰŕ̥dayam, and also split the Proto-Iranian into *jā́rd and *jr̥dáyam. — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 00:00, 22 March 2025 (UTC)

@Mellohi! Is the difference in accent between PIIr. *ȷ́ʰŕ̥dayam and PIr. *jr̥dáyam intentional? Exarchus (talk) 08:53, 22 March 2025 (UTC)

I've now seen your note at Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Iranian/ȷ́ʰŕ̥dayam. I added the reference for Cheung, but I'm not aware where Kümmel talks about it. Exarchus (talk) 09:29, 22 March 2025 (UTC)

Added the Kümmel presentation. — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 14:25, 22 March 2025 (UTC)

have a bun in the oven

Should be moved to bun in the oven - the citation given doesn't even include the "have"! Translations will need to be checked. Smurrayinchester (talk) 09:43, 18 December 2024 (UTC)

 Support — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 03:32, 22 February 2026 (UTC)

eat away at

Redundant to eat away. — Sgconlaw (talk) 18:53, 25 December 2024 (UTC)

black jack

English. Merge with blackjack and black-jack

• Yeah it's a big task. Needs more skillful users than me! TypeO889 (talk) 22:07, 30 March 2025 (UTC)

• • Gosh, what a mess! I'll recruit ppl to help Vealhurl (talk) 21:19, 22 August 2025 (UTC)

Cumbric lemmas

As far as I know, Cumbric is not attested directly. It seems that the following terms are only either mentioned in documents in other languages or deduced from things like place names and personal names, so they should probably be moved to Reconstruction: space:

• badd (“boar”)
• galnes (“blood money”)
• gos (“servant”)
• pen (“head, top, summit”)

See also Wiktionary:Requests for verification/Non-English#Cumbric lemmas for a discussion of terms from a conlang intended as a reconstruction of Cumbric. —Mahāgaja · talk 18:47, 1 January 2025 (UTC)

• Updates:
  1. In August, 2025 DogOfDoom moved gos to Reconstruction:Cumbric/gos and pen to Reconstruction:Cumbric/penn.
  2. In March 2026 badd was recreated as a Cornish term. I don't know what happened to the Cumbric entry, as Reconstruction:Cumbric/badd has never existed.

Only galnes remains. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 05:58, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

January 2025

Template:jv-set

Template:jv-set is meant to cover Javanese words in various registers. For example, ꦲꦤꦏ꧀ (anak) in ꦏꦿꦩꦔꦺꦴꦏꦺꦴ (krama ngoko) must be grouped with ꦥꦸꦠꦿ (putra) in ꦏꦿꦩꦲꦶꦁꦒꦶꦭ꧀ (krama inggil). Should we rename Template:jv-set to Template:jv-registers? Javanese is divided into three distinct registers called ꦔꦺꦴꦏꦺꦴ (ngoko), ꦩꦢꦾ (madya), and ꦏꦿꦩ (krama), but ꦏꦿꦩꦔꦺꦴꦏꦺꦴ (krama ngoko), ꦏꦿꦩꦲꦶꦁꦒꦶꦭ꧀ (krama inggil), and ꦏꦿꦩꦲꦤ꧀ꦝꦥ꧀ (krama andhap) are sets of vocabulary that can be used in any register. --YukaSylvie (talk) 01:33, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

@Aprihani @Bismabrj @Corypight @Dejongstebroer @FlintstoneSpark @Flyflower234 @KIDE777 @NeilCooper @Pras @Rex Aurorum @Riemogerz @SamanthaPuckettIndo @TAC0799 @Xbypass YukaSylvie (talk) 04:02, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

Appendix:I don't speak

Merge with I don't speak English § Translations (“I don't speak (fill with the name of the current foreign language)”), as both serve the same purpose (instead of duplicating the content in two places). J3133 (talk) 06:00, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

Portuguese pre-reform spellings with accents

Note: the proposal below has been updated after discussion with User:AG202. The previous version of this proposal can be viewed here. Polomo47 (talk) 21:19, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

A summary of the proposal is below. The rest of the proposal, as well as the first comment in the thread, comprise rationale, examples, and detailing.

• Spellings like accôrdo, appêllo, máo shall be mentioned in usage notes under accordo and appelo, mao rather than in entries of their own.
• Spellings like pessôa, vêr, and most* of words where, if you take the accent away, you just get the normal spelling shall be kept.
• *Spellings like espêlho, as well as inflections like almôços, arrôtos are more commonly — if not exclusively, to the point of otherwise not passing WT:ATTEST — seen as misspellings from 1911–1945 or 1943–1971. I'm proposing their deletion.

This request for merge concerns Portuguese entries in [[Category:Portuguese forms superseded in 1911]] and [[Category:Portuguese forms superseded in 1943]] — and anything currently listed as “archaic” or “obsolete” that gets put in that category in the future — that contain accents.

The proposal is, generally, to merge entries for accented pre-reform spellings with the equivalent entries without accents, (if one exists), where a usage note will be added.

Examples of changes:

• appêllo shall be merged with appello (and thus deleted).
• aerólitho shall be merged under aerolitho (and thus deleted).
• céo, chapéo shall be merged under ceo, chapeo (and thus deleted).
• máo shall be merged under mao (and thus deleted).

A possible usage note:

Use of accents prior to the spelling reforms of 1911 (in Portugal) and 1943 (in Brazil) varied greatly between authors. The spelling appêllo, with an explanatory accent, was occasionally seen.

Conversely, words that were more commonly spelled with an accent than without it will be merged under the accented form. A usage note will be added. These are chiefly spellings that use ⟨é⟩ as an etymological way to write the diphthong /ɛj/.

• idea → idéa
• europea → européa
• onomatopea → onomatopéa

A possible usage note:

In this pre-reform spelling, the letter ⟨é⟩ represented a diphthong sound. The unaccented spelling idea may be occasionally seen, especially in older texts.

Compare also pellings that end in stressed ⟨á, é, ê, ô, ó⟩, commonly spelled with accents.

• adherirá, accenderá...
  • Words ending in ⟨as, es, is, os, us⟩, with or without accents, were also written ⟨az, ez, iz, oz, uz⟩ prior to the reforms. This and other factors make it that very few spellings of this type differ at all from the word’s modern spellings (as such, there are few such entries).
  • Spellings ending in ⟨í, ú⟩, which were less common, are often categorized instead with {{pt-1931|mis=1}} or as general misspellings.

Additionally, some spellings are excepted from any changes. If a corresponding unaccented spelling did not exist, the words shall be kept.

1. Derivates of the word á, such as áquelle (which have an accent for different reasons) shall be kept.
2. Words that, aside from their accents, do not differ from the modern spelling. These entries shall be kept so as not to remove them entirely from the dictionary, and they shall employ (uncommon), especially when listed in Alternative forms sections.
   • propôr, pessôa, corôa, vêr, lêr...
   • Excepted from this criterion are words which are significantly more frequently attested as misspellings from the 1911–1971 period; it is pointless to keep misspellings from a bygone era.
     • Misspelled plurals such as acôrdos, govêrnos, azêdos...
     • Mispelled singulars such as manêjo, espêlho, rapôsa...

A possible usage note for the latter case:

Use of accents prior to the spelling reforms of 1911 (in Portugal) and 1943 (in Brazil) varied greatly between authors. The spelling with no accent, ver, was significantly more frequent overall.

Polomo47 (talk) 01:51, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

@MedK1 and I are convinced that use of accents was entirely up to an author’s whims. For any and all pre-reform spellings with stressed a, e, o, you can attest spellings that clarify the the stressed syllable and its height by writing á, ê/é, ô/ó — however, the two of us have, without fail, found the unaccented forms to have been much more common. These "clarifying" accents were often employed even when there were no homographs (such as with ceo, or even any possible ambiguity in reading (such as with pessoa); see the common spelling of João Pessoa’s name as João Pessôa. There is precedent that supports this proposal — how we handle languages with inconsistent (i.e., optional) or frequently unmarked diacritics — but it stands alone even without drawing the connection.

Our reason for this change in handling is to not give the wrong idea about what was the norm in pre-reform Portuguese spelling, because accents were not it. We also aim to greatly reduce the size of "alternative forms" sections for words like apelo — note that, if that section were complete, it would also include some of apélo, appélo, appéllo, apéllo...

It’s worth clarifying that currently the only entries that get classified under the 1911 and 1943 categories are spellings that were still in use immediately prior to the reforms being enforced, so nothing that had long fallen out of use — we’ve been counting those as obsolete. Spellings that were used right before 1911/1943, but then stayed in use up to later reforms (or are still used today), are not listed under such categories either — this means that words like espêto are not counted in this proposal because they were the correct spelling up until 1945/1971. However, spellings like espêtos, azêdos were not standard during the same time period and are mainly attested in pre-1911/1943 texts: in order for them to receive an entry, they would need to be attested in works using post-1911/1943 orthography.

To address the exception from the proposal: unlike most former uses of accents, marking oxytone words with ⟨á, é, ê, ô, ó⟩ was indeed the norm; funnily enough, putting aside verb forms, a majority of these are just the same as the modern spellings of the words. It’s worth noting, however, that this was not the case with using ⟨í, ú⟩ — such words are instead marked as 1931-prescribed spellings if they have more than two syllables, or as misspellings if not.

Examples of two authors’s writing. Just because I wanted to talk about this.

• Maria Amália Vaz de Carvalho used bountiful accents in her writing; however, her choice between accentuating or not may be inconsistent within seemingly equivalent words.
  • She would always mark the pluperfect tense with -êra, -ára, etc.
  • She would always accentuate the diphthongs -áo, -éo.
  • She would accentuate most oxytones ending in a, e, o, like lá, má, pé, dá, avô, but notably not the verb há (spelled ha)
  • She would write some infinitives with -êr, and some with -er: verem but revêrem.
  • She would write fóra and fôra, but also côr.
• Graciliano Ramos comparatively used very few accents in his writing.
  • Of course, he would accentuate all oxytones ending in a, e, o.
  • He would accentuate to distinguish some homographs: fóra and fôra, pêlo from pelo...
  • He would write porêm, but ninguem, alguem etc. Also vôo.

— Polomo47 (talk) 01:51, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

 Strong support, but it'd also be good to give information on the usage of accents before 1911 or 1943 somewhere. Davi6596 (talk) 02:17, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

Right. I considered, for a moment, making a usage note template — something like that could be used on pre-reform pages like appello, but we couldn’t place one on a page such as pessoa. I think the best idea is to include this on the Appendix to-be we’re working on over at WT:Aliança Galego-Portuguesa/Reforms of Portuguese orthography.

I think we could move that to the Appendix namespace already, but before finishing the page, we’d need to figure out what format makes it easiest to digest all the information (because I know what we have now isn't very good). Polomo47 (talk) 02:23, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

 Support. However, I must say I'd be hesitant about implementing the last bullet point (concerning pessôa, corôa, etc.) alongside this merger as it is possible that those still existed as misspellings decades after standardization (somewhat akin to pêras). Otherwise, 100% agreed. MedK1 (talk) 05:51, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

I must clarify that we should still include the spellings I mentioned if they are thrice-attested in works that otherwise follow the reforms. If pessôa remained a common misspelling after 1911/1943, then it would still be a worthy inclusion. If it did not, then that just shows the use of the accent was just as a reading aid.

Note, however, that we need to distinguish quotes not by date, but rather by the general orthographic choices in the work. There are many books published well into the 1910s that refused to implement the reformed spelling — just like there are many Portugal news outlets today that refuse to implement the 1990 reform, lol. Polomo47 (talk) 20:00, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

 Support. Trooper57 (talk) 14:54, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

 Support Stríðsdrengur (talk) 19:40, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

 Oppose. I see no benefit in deleting pages with obsolete/superseded spellings. If [[appêllo]] becomes red, and someone searches for it, they'll be taken to the search results page and have to decide whether the word they're looking for is [[appello]] or [[appellò]], which is a waste of their time for no benefit. And if the Portuguese section of [[máo]] gets deleted, but the Chinese section remains, then someone looking for the Portuguese word [[máo]] will land on a page with no Portuguese entry, which will disappoint and annoy them, and may even incite them to create a Portuguese section saying that it's an {{obsolete spelling of}} mau, without realizing the page used to say that until it was deleted. Keeping these entries as they currently are, soft redirects using {{obs sp}}/{{sup sp}}, certainly does no harm, while deleting them would do harm. —Mahāgaja · talk 14:43, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

Consider that, at the moment, Wiktionary has entire languages with this search problem. If someone sees the Yorubá word dára, they’ll search for it and have to decide between Dara, dara, dará...

I think that yours is a valid concern, but the problem extends much further than these Portuguese words.

Further consider that these pages have very few views. In the past four years, the average page seems to have around 80 views. This is the case for Hyrcânia. Some pages, like Bósphoro, have less than 40. Further compare how Zéphyro received 80, while Zephyro got 170, and Zéfiro got 512.

These word are actually readily recognizable, so there's not much reason for someone to look them up unless they wanna know about the spelling itself. I imagine most of these pages are found by clicking on "See also", because carthaginez has very few views.

I totally support doing something about the "Diacritic" languages in WT:LOL, but I don't see any development on that front. This change to Portuguese pages harms very little and helps way more: I did point out how such entries make Alternative forms sections harder to navigate (and would even more if they were complete) — I hold the section precious, after all, because it is the place to documents how a word’s spelling developed.

If something was also done to improve Yoruba etc., I would understand your thinking. Polomo47 (talk) 18:48, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

As mentioned in my comment below, the situation with Yoruba is different from the one you're proposing. And yes, it is a bit frustrating that someone has to go to dara to find the Yoruba entry, and it's too much effort to try and move them now. (Though I'm not sure why they'd need to go to Dara or dará) We have proposed creating soft redirects so that there's a Yoruba entry at dára that points to dara, but I have not followed up on it yet. AG202 (talk) 19:07, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

Getting very few views is also not a reason to delete anything. And while these words may be readily recognizable to someone with a very good knowledge of Portuguese, someone with a beginning level may genuinely not know whether [[máo]] is an old spelling of [[mau]] or of [[mão]]. —Mahāgaja · talk 20:10, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

I did not mention the amount of page views as a reason for deletion, but rather to show that these pages are not useful in the way you are hypothesising. I mentioned in my opening comment that these spellings are considerably rarer than the equivalent spellings with no accents, such that I consistently manage to find just over 3 citations for the accented forms, while the forms with no accents have hundreds. The data I got was just to support that (1) there really aren't many people looking for these words in the first place and (2) the words people do look for are the ones without accents (by almost double?). Polomo47 (talk) 20:25, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

 Oppose for now. We should aim to have every word in every language. Since these forms aren't "misspellings", which would put them under the misspellings policy in WT:CFI, they should be subject to the same WT:ATTEST rules like any other word. They must be cited in 3 different texts from 3 different authors spanning at least a year; if they do not, then they would not pass WT:RFV under the normal rules. We are not limited by space on Wiktionary, and plenty of languages, including English, include obsolete spellings all the time. There is no harm in including them.

"There is precedent that supports this proposal - how we handle languages with inconsistent (i.e., optional) or frequently unmarked diacritics."

This isn't really accurate or the full picture. For languages where we strip diacritics from the entry title, we still include the diacritics in the headword line, and this proposal doesn't propose that. That also makes this more of a WT:RFD issue than a WT:RFM issue. On the other hand, there is precedent of direct precedent for maintaining older obsolete spellings like English cœnæsthesis, Spanish ántes, French extraördinairement, and Italian ànno. Again, if these are misspellings then that's another thing (and would go through RFD), but if not, these should just be subject to the normal WT:RFV guidelines per WT:ATTEST. AG202 (talk) 19:02, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

"I must clarify that we should still include the spellings I mentioned if they are thrice-attested in works that otherwise follow the reforms." I just saw this comment. Why not just have these forms go through the normal RFV process? AG202 (talk) 19:10, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

I wrote that comment considering the words’ inclusion as misspellings post-1911/1943. I wrote this RFM precisely because subjecting most of these to RfV would end up with them passing, because for every weird use of accents, there was a very small minority of authors who wrote with them. Note that I’m not really trying to delete the spellings, but rather combine them under a single page aiming to maximize the usefulness of the dictionary. It is not useful for readers to see equivalent forms máo and mao listed separately and taking up double the space in Alternative forms sections — space is a concern for sections like the one in apelo. While I'm, sadly, unacquainted with Yorubá, I'm not ignorant to how Russian works, and this accent usage is very close to the situation with Russian-language acutes to mark stress.

I did not initially propose changing the headword on these entries because the most common spellings did not use accents. My impression is that part of the reason we include optional diacritics in other languages’s headword lines is to clarify the pronunciation (even though we have the Pronunciation section, we do it because dictionaries do it; though I'd appreciate if you could tell me more reasons), and since these Portuguese words are listed for the spelling and not any other content, then I don't see a value to including them.

I am open to ideas about how to clarify that every single Portuguese word had, at some point, a spelling that used weird accents. I plan to make a usage note template like I mentioned to Davi above, but that would unfortunately not work for all entries. Polomo47 (talk) 19:22, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

Space is really not a concern for Wiktionary. Someone seeing an additional word or two on a line is frankly not really a justification for deleting entries and historically reduces our usefulness. Plenty of entries have many more alternative forms, and the alternative forms section is not the section that takes up the most space on average. I don't think you'd advocate for limiting the pronunciation section to just two standard pronunciations for space reasons or limiting the etymology section to just one ancestor. Space optimization really only becomes a concern with super long lists, and even then, we have collapsible tables for a reason and compression methods, way before we get to the point of deleting entries. I've never seen entries get deleted for the purpose of "saving space", and I don't want to see it start now. We're an dictionary on the internet for a reason; we don't need to save paper. Ideally we want to have as much information as reasonably possible as a wiki.

Nonetheless, if they are actually misspellings, then they should be sent to RFD under our existing misspelling policy. There's no need for an RFM. If they are not, then they deserve to have their own entries like the ones I mentioned above, following WT:ATTEST, with another example being English coöperate.

Optional diacritics are not just for clarifying pronunciation. Some languages like Yoruba require diacritics in the standard orthography for disambiguation, but the reason why they're not in the entry title is that they're not often used by the general populace. Additionally, Yoruba does have archaic diacritics like in ẽrú; we simply have not created all of the entries yet, as we have other things we're focusing on right now. But we wouldn't outright eliminate them. AG202 (talk) 19:51, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

Clarifying: the reason for deletion is not to save space — I worded it poorly. The reason is that it is not useful for a reader to see, in an Alternative forms section, two entries for what is really the same spelling: appêlo and appelo; appello and appêllo; apello and apêllo. My thinking is that the only reason for someone to click on that is if they want to know more about the word’s historical spelling, and for that purpose it’s only convenient to consolidate in that page information about how accents were occasionally used (by means of a usage note).

Note that the situation is different for this from how it is with things like English coöperate, in that there really are people who want to know about the spelling with diereses. Not the case with Portuguese, for a variety of reasons I mentioned previously.

Some data: coöperate has >6700 views in the past four years; English cooperate has 10k views (i.e., the alternative spelling gets 2/3 as many views). In comparison, apelo has 1540 views while appêllo has 170, which is closer to 1/10.

The diacritics are also different from the Yorubá diacritics in that there was no standard orthography prior to 1911/1943. At least these diacritics were used to clarify pronunciation, which is why I drew the comparison with Russian. And, in Russian, I am under the impression that one of the reasons we include the diacritics is for learners of the language, which does not apply for such Portuguese words. Polomo47 (talk) 20:21, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

We really should not base things on views. Obviously more archaic spellings are going to get fewer views. More minority languages are going to get fewer views. I work on Jeju and I'm sure that -으키여 (-eukiyeo) & -으키어 (-eukieo) get similar amounts of views that appêllo gets (mostly from myself), but that doesn't mean that it devalues the entry or that I should delete one of them. No, the goal of Wiktionary is to describe and document a language, regardless of how popular an entry is. An accurate entry will always be useful. If we based our work on popularity, then 95% of the languages covered would simply not exist on this site.

For Yoruba, there was no official standard orthography before 1966, so entries like ẽrú do give a somewhat parallel situation (it was replaced by eérú in that orthography). The tilde was used by some authors to show the long vowel. AG202 (talk) 21:10, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't think you get it. These variations aren't comparable to English naïve/naive or fœtus/foetus/fetus. They're analogous to Latin mensa/mēnsa/ménsa in that albeit helpful for learners, the variants with the diacritics are rarely used (due to a feeling that its presence should be obvious for any user of the language), not considered 'more correct' than the accentless version and the matter of 'what accent to use' being actually fairly contentious. Indeed, we don't mention "ménsa" at mensa, even though some people employ it on purpose because acutes look closer to apices on Classical inscriptions than macrons do.

I actually can agree with putting accent marks in the headword for all these pre-standardization forms as, like with Latin, that's what people would do when teaching the language (see my user page for evidence of this). Plus it's what the plan is for Old Galician-Portuguese, so that's nice too.

I don't think these points should be ground for an entire 'oppose' vote though. Accents back then did not constitute new words — unlike in the modern day — and so there's no real reason to treat them as such, especially since the treatment for Latin is so much closer to the reality of the day.

It might be worth noting that the didactic value an altered obsolete headword can bring — informing a word's pronunciation — is severely diminished when chances are those pages' readers came from the page for the modern-day spelling, which already gave them the pronunciation. In the case they didn't, then the modern spellings (with all the information they could need) are just one click away.

Polomo's point about page views is to drive home the idea that unlike with Latin or with superseded/antique English spellings, nobody really hops into the Portuguese L2 hoping to learn about the etymological spellings, especially not beginner learners. The people who do tend to know a thing or two about the language. This is to say, although I see where you come from when you bring up accenting all these headwords, there's really no reason to find these accents' presence a big deal at all — again, they're of a different nature from the modern-day obligatory accent marks. MedK1 (talk) 04:00, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

My concern centers around removing attested spellings in running text without putting them somewhere in the mainspace, whether in the headword line or in their own entries. I've already given the caveat for misspellings. And FWIW, you and Polomo have given two very different situations. Are they spellings to mark pronunciation or are they misspellings? I also gave more examples in other Romance languages that are more analogous, not just English. If the spellings were obsolete and rare, but attested, then we could easily use {{lb|pt|rare}} {{obsolete form of|pt|...}}. It's also possible to put labels in the headword line, if folks would prefer that over full entries, as with roof. CC: @Benwing2 for more on that. I simply do not want attested spellings to disappear. AG202 (talk) 04:30, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

I never addressed what you said about misspellings because I didn't recall mentioning misspellings in the context of the proposed merges. So, to elucidate: no, they are not misspellings; the misspellings I mentioned are different types of entry.

Also, I was mentioned employing usage notes (mentioning that the use of accents did exist), which would still mean mentioning the accented spellings in mainspace — I indeed do not wish to remove all mentions of the spellings.

If this is the one point of contention, then it applies only to terms for which the only thing setting them apart is the accent: vêr, pessôa, propôr, etc. I didn’t feel that strongly about deleting those anyway, so I think what could be done is, for these words, to keep the entry and add a usage note stating the converse (that the form without an accent was more common).

I think this would actually be more satisfactory to me, though I just thought about it now. Polomo47 (talk) 05:03, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Yes, I would personally support that option that you mentioned at the end of your comment. Sorry that this took so long to resolve. AG202 (talk) 05:07, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Also sorry. Wish I'd figured this arrangement out sooner! I'll see then. Polomo47 (talk) 05:16, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

@Polomo47 Sorry can you restate your proposal as it is now after the discussion with @AG202 and @MedK1? I couldn't quite follow what the exact proposal is now. Benwing2 (talk) 23:41, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

@Polomo47 I am generally sympathetic to the idea of not including loads of obsolete spellings and especially not misspellings. One thing to keep in mind is the |altform= flag to {{head}} and corresponding internal flag in Module:headword; this takes alternative forms out of Category:Portuguese lemmas and the corresponding POS category and puts them in Category:Portuguese alternative forms (which doesn't yet exist; there isn't yet a split by POS in this category but it could easily be implemented). I would recommend using this flag for obsolete alternative spellings, so they don't clog up the lemma categories. As for the proposal itself, I had some difficulty following it; would a form like espêlho and rapôsa (which I suspect was relatively common pre-reform) go in the ==Alternative forms== of espelho and raposa, or go nowhere? Benwing2 (talk) 00:17, 27 January 2025 (UTC)

Just FYI I spoke with @Polomo47 over Discord and he explained in more detail what some of my confusions were, and I  Support this proposal. Benwing2 (talk) 04:02, 27 January 2025 (UTC)

And I’m gonna try and add the things I said (which were summarizing... in dire need, heh) to here. Polomo47 (talk) 14:02, 27 January 2025 (UTC)

@Mahagaja do you also wanna look again and see if your concerns have been addressed? Polomo47 (talk) 00:51, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

Same here:  Support. AG202 (talk) 20:11, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

The Latin analogy actually takes away from your point: if the disambiguation issue were as pervasive as in Latin and the orthographic situation comparable to that of Latin, noting these forms on every Portuguese entry would be of utter importance. That's why the citation form of a Latin word in just about any dictionary includes the diacritics, and why we display the headwords that way (in {{head}} or a language-specific variant). That same practice exists for Russian and various Slavic languages, among others, hence Wiktionary's adoption of the headline form with diacritics. I am not proposing we do this with Portuguese, but based on this discussion I would say the situation with Portuguese is far more akin to that with Italian. — 2600:4808:9C30:C500:5472:3DDE:ACC3:B692 20:25, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

The point was that while Latin entries have diacritics in their headwords for clarification, it doesn't make sense to do it for Portuguese non-lemmas (these are alternative spellings; pre-reform spellings) when the feature of interest is precisely the spelling quirks. Did you understand that this is not modern-day Portuguese, but Portuguese from ~120 years ago?

Indeed my comparison are flawed because I don't believe any other language — as currently implemented on Wiktionary — has the same scenario as Portuguese pre-reform spellings. Polomo47 (talk) 20:33, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

I fail to see why it needs different treatment from other languages' pre-reform spellings. — 2600:4808:9C30:C500:DE4:9484:460E:B333 02:34, 5 February 2025 (UTC)

Please enlighten me as to how other languages’ pre-reform spellings are treated, and how those correspond with Portuguese and the accent trouble I mentioned. Having “the same treatment” would mean there is a same a scenario. Polomo47 (talk) 10:32, 7 February 2025 (UTC)

ᮒᮨᮔᮥᮔ᮪ᮌ᮪

Sundanese. Misspelling of the word/Title. This one says /tə.nun.ɡ/ instead of the correct /tə.nuŋ/. It should be moved to "ᮒᮨᮔᮥᮀ".

Udaradingin (talk) 19:06, 22 January 2025 (UTC)

Adding Old Tatar language to etymology languages

Could anyone add Old Tatar language (tat-old) to Module:etymology_languages/data? There are already Wiktionary pages that are dedicated to Old Tatar words, for instance: en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D9%82%D8%B2%D8%A7%D9%86#Tatar. Here's it's Wikidata page: www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q2093002. And here's it's Wikipedia page: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volga_T%C3%BCrki Bladorthin2941 (talk) 19:31, 24 January 2025 (UTC)

Could someone response? Bladorthin2941 (talk) 21:33, 31 January 2025 (UTC)

@Theknightwho, @-sche, @Surjection Bladorthin2941 (talk) 13:14, 2 February 2025 (UTC)

This has been discussed at Wiktionary:Beer_parlour/2024/May#Volga_Türki_language. Vahag (talk) 18:23, 2 February 2025 (UTC)

• @Bladorthin2941 Has this been resolved, or should this discussion stay open? — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 15:53, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

February 2025

ᚨᚢᚷᛁᛉ

Proto-Norse: move to Reconstruction:Proto-Norse/ᚨᚢᚷᛁᛉ. Only found in the compound ᚷᛚᛇ-ᚨᚢᚷᛁᛉ (glï-augiʀ), from what I can tell. — 2600:4808:9C30:C500:5472:3DDE:ACC3:B692 20:09, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

But the emphasis is on found. Fay Freak (talk) 02:23, 5 February 2025 (UTC)

Great input as always… — 2600:4808:9C30:C500:DE4:9484:460E:B333 02:35, 5 February 2025 (UTC)

lithium ion battery, lithium-ion battery

Duplicate content. Binarystep (talk) 23:46, 6 February 2025 (UTC)

Smell-O-Vision and smell-o-vision

Duplicated information. I am not sure that a productive distinction is really made via alternatively lettercased forms in general usage between a hypothetical and the actual scented release system invented in the '50s (see inconsistency in quotes on the page itself!). If there is, I feel it should still be handled at a single canonical entry with labels or usage notes about casing. There are also a variety of missing forms (smellavision, etc.), and we relatedly also need smell-o-phone (and variants). Hftf (talk) 09:06, 19 February 2025 (UTC)

@Hftf: I'm unsure. Based on the quotation data, it appears the uncapitalized form smell-o-vision was coined first, and then in 1959 Mike Todd Jr. used the form Smell-O-Vision for the specific invention. It's probably impossible to know whether he was aware of the pre-existing uncapitalized form of the term. The capitalized form seems to be used largely to refer to the invention. As for the uncapitalized form, it is occasionally used to refer to the invention, but mostly for the general concept. I would imagine that after the 1950–1960s uses of the uncapitalized form were influenced by the name of the invention. — Sgconlaw (talk) 19:31, 19 February 2025 (UTC)

nuke it from orbit

English.

Move to nuke from orbit - doesn't need "it". * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 18:50, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

But that's not the idiom. Volfied (talk) 14:44, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

"Nuke" is transitive, so it needs something- move it to nuke something from orbit. Chuck Entz (talk) 15:19, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

We don't usually include "something" in the lemma of a transitive multiword verb. A few examples are: avoid like the plague, take at face value, take seriously, and add to the list. I agree that the lemma should be nuke from orbit. —Mahāgaja · talk 18:31, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

In my experience it is a set phrase. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 23:45, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

𐌀𐌀𐌐𐌀

The term is reconstructed and therefore should be in reconstruction namespace. The entry explicitly labels itself as a reconstructed term and the sources (de Vaan for the article, I found Literaturbericht Italische Sprachen and The Indo-European Language Family: A Phylogenetic Perspective on my own) all mention aapam and aapas as the only attested forms. Rex Wallace seems to consider the term to not be reconstructed, but, as far as I can tell, he is alone in the view. Graearms (talk) 01:41, 24 February 2025 (UTC)

@Graearms: IIRC we have sometimes had Latin (and Ancient Greek?) entries for the lemma form in mainspace rather than reconstruction space when enough of the inflected forms are attested to assure us that the lemma form must have existed and that we know what it should have been, but it didn't happen to have been in any texts that survived. I believe the idea was that we use the lemma entry to house all the information about the term as a whole, and having it hidden off in reconstruction space makes it harder on our readers.

Of course, Latin is much better attested and there have been lots of dictionaries over the centuries that have given the principal parts for terms even when not all of them are actually attested. I don't know if we want to do that for this language, but I thought I would mention the practice. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:56, 24 February 2025 (UTC)

For Gothic (better attested than Oscan, I believe, but nowhere near Latin and Greek) we allow entries in the main namespace under the lemma form even when only inflected forms are actually attested. I suggest we do the same for Oscan: if this word is attested only in the accusative and genitive, we can still have an entry for the nominative in the main namespace. —Mahāgaja · talk 08:06, 24 February 2025 (UTC)

Kabballah

Move it (and Kabballah bracelet) to Kabbalah with one L, fix all incoming links. Unclear why it's been under this spelling for 20 years. Hftf (talk) 08:17, 25 February 2025 (UTC)

Now that this has been soft-moved (out of process?), can someone fix all the incoming links and really any instances of the string? To my understanding, all two-L'd variants should probably be purged outright and are likely to be misspellings or Wiktionarisms (due to ruinous citogenesis), but even if not, I think it's better to completely start over here and require serious attestations of two-L'd variants. Hftf (talk) 00:51, 17 March 2025 (UTC)

• Resolved. I fixed the one link I found (outside of userspace and the like) to the double-L spelling, but it looks like someone got most of them already. J3133 started an RFV discussion for Kabballah that's still ongoing. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 16:33, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

March 2025

durch die Weltgeschichte reisen

and durch die Weltgeschichte gondeln, in der Weltgeschichte herumgondeln, in der Weltgeschichte herumreisen. these entries would be better as prepositional phrases (durch die Weltgeschichte, in der Weltgeschichte), or as a new noun sense at Weltgeschichte. 217.229.72.65 21:09, 1 March 2025 (UTC)

pescetarian

to pescatarian. Google Ngrams shows a 10x lead for the -a- variant developing since 2005. Bring along pescetarianism. Hftf (talk) 14:09, 16 March 2025 (UTC)

joual

Surely the English term should be capitalized, as it is consistently on the corresponding Wikipedia article. — 2600:4808:9C30:C500:C1A8:E5B3:4E9E:7031 03:13, 24 March 2025 (UTC)

It depends on whether you treat it as a lect or as a sociolinguistic stratum. Searching on Google for "talk joual" or "speak joual" turns up some "Joual", but mostly "joual". Apparently a lot of Canadians see it as the same sort of thing as "slang": a less-educated, informal variant of the same language, not a separate lect. People outside of Canada who view it as an academic subject are more likely to capitalize it. Also, as long as we have it as a common noun, it doesn't seem right to capitalize it. If we're going to capitalize it, we should also move it to the proper noun POS. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:38, 24 March 2025 (UTC)

There are lots of common nouns that are capitalized in English: demonyms, month names, and days of the week, for example. —Mahāgaja · talk 08:01, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

Template:ug-personal suffixes and Template:ug-personal pronouns

There's a strong case for merging these two boxes, as if you want to know about the pronouns, you likely also want to learn about the suffixes, and vice versa.

I raise it here because I wonder if this is a general issue for Turkic languages. Are "personal suffixes" a widespread concept in these languages? Should they be added to the personal pronoun boxes? This, that and the other (talk) 01:37, 27 March 2025 (UTC)

bos

Cornish. The conjugation tables need to be merged into Template:kw-conj-bos, storing the merged result in the template (not hard-coded into the entry as currently). This, that and the other (talk) 05:54, 29 March 2025 (UTC)

April 2025

Template:grc-personal pronouns/1 and Template:grc-personal pronouns/2

Here we have two more archaic right-aligned declension-type tables, with all the accompanying issues (interrupts the flow of the entry on mobile, non-standard look, etc). I would merge them and place the merged template under the "See also" L3 header, which is the standard location for personal pronoun boxes:

Ancient Greek personal pronouns

			nominative	genitive	dative	accusative		adjective
singular	1st person	stressed	ἐγώ (egṓ)	ἐμοῦ (emoû)	ἐμοί (emoí)	ἐμέ (emé)		ἐμός (emós)
		enclitic	—	μου (mou)	μοι (moi)	με (me)		—
	2nd person	stressed	σύ (sú)	σοῦ (soû)	σοί (soí)	σέ (sé)		σός (sós)
		enclitic	—	σου (sou)	σοι (soi)	σε (se)		—
dual	1st person		νώ, νῶϊ (nṓ, nôï)	νῷν (nōîn)	νῷν (nōîn)	νώ, νῶϊ (nṓ, nôï)		νωΐτερος (nōḯteros)
	2nd person		σφώ, σφῶϊ (sphṓ, sphôï)	σφῷν (sphōîn)	σφῷν (sphōîn)	σφώ, σφῶϊ (sphṓ, sphôï)		σφωΐτερος (sphōḯteros)
plural	1st person		ἡμεῖς (hēmeîs)	ἡμῶν (hēmôn)	ἡμῖν (hēmîn)	ἡμᾶς (hēmâs)		ἡμέτερος (hēméteros)
	2nd person		ῡ̔μεῖς (hūmeîs)	ῡ̔μῶν (hūmôn)	ῡ̔μῖν (hūmîn)	ῡ̔μᾶς (hūmâs)		ῡ̔μέτερος (hūméteros)

Or, with transliterations alongside rather than beneath:

Ancient Greek personal pronouns

			nominative	genitive	dative	accusative		adjective
singular	1st person	stressed	ἐγώ (egṓ)	ἐμοῦ (emoû)	ἐμοί (emoí)	ἐμέ (emé)		ἐμός (emós)
		enclitic	—	μου (mou)	μοι (moi)	με (me)		—
	2nd person	stressed	σύ (sú)	σοῦ (soû)	σοί (soí)	σέ (sé)		σός (sós)
		enclitic	—	σου (sou)	σοι (soi)	σε (se)		—
dual	1st person		νώ (nṓ) νῶϊ (nôï)	νῷν (nōîn)	νῷν (nōîn)	νώ (nṓ) νῶϊ (nôï)		νωΐτερος (nōḯteros)
	2nd person		σφώ (sphṓ) σφῶϊ (sphôï)	σφῷν (sphōîn)	σφῷν (sphōîn)	σφώ (sphṓ) σφῶϊ (sphôï)		σφωΐτερος (sphōḯteros)
plural	1st person		ἡμεῖς (hēmeîs)	ἡμῶν (hēmôn)	ἡμῖν (hēmîn)	ἡμᾶς (hēmâs)		ἡμέτερος (hēméteros)
	2nd person		ῡ̔μεῖς (hūmeîs)	ῡ̔μῶν (hūmôn)	ῡ̔μῖν (hūmîn)	ῡ̔μᾶς (hūmâs)		ῡ̔μέτερος (hūméteros)

This, that and the other (talk) 09:50, 1 April 2025 (UTC)

Do we need transliterations at all? {{grc-decl}}, {{grc-adecl}}, {{grc-conj}} and {{grc-correlatives}}, not to mention the two templates you're looking to replace, don't use them. —Mahāgaja · talk 10:38, 1 April 2025 (UTC)

@Mahagaja that's not quite accurate - {{grc-decl}} (κύων#Declension) and {{grc-adecl}} (ἀγαθός#Declension) do have transliterations. It's true that the other two do not.

To be honest I have always been on the fence about whether we should include transclusions in Greek-script inflection tables, which applies equally to Modern Greek. Of all the scripts out there, Greek script is arguably the one which least needs transliteration into Latin script. But that's just a relative argument: perhaps our readers who are less versed in Greek script (non-STEM folk for instance) do find the transliteration useful. This, that and the other (talk) 11:04, 1 April 2025 (UTC)

I don't know whether STEM people are more likely to read the Greek script than humanities people (STEM people know the individual letters, but that's not the same as reading whole words), but I do tend to think that the people who will want to use the templates are people who can already read Greek. At any rate, if you do use transliterations, maybe make them gray, like {{grc-decl}} and {{grc-adecl}}, whose transliterations are so unobtrusive I forgot about them when making the comment above. —Mahāgaja · talk 16:05, 1 April 2025 (UTC)

@Mahagaja sorry, I missed this. The transliterations in the first proposed version above actually are grey; in fact they are as grey as they can be without falling out of compliance with Web accessibility guidelines. Specifically, the WCAG AA guideline recommends a contrast ratio of 4.5, and the grey transliterations in {{grc-decl}} only achieve a ratio of 3.25. However, I am not really sure of the merits of this ratio when it comes to shades of grey. To me, the black-on-dark-grey text in the header rows and columns of {{grc-decl}} is harder to read than the transliterations, yet it achieves an excellent contrast ratio of 11.25!

I'll see about making the transliterations "greyer". This, that and the other (talk) 02:56, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

Module:dum-conj and Module:dum-verbs

Middle Dutch. Two competing verb conjugation tables that generate different forms. This, that and the other (talk) 00:57, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

oh dear, and conjugations for "to be" and "to have" seem completely absent

I'd have to study this a bit closer before I can help out here Exarchus (talk) 21:34, 9 November 2025 (UTC)

synaxis and Synaxis

Lowercase proper noun is usually a red flag Vilipender (talk) 17:00, 6 April 2025 (UTC)

кайын→каен?

Tatar, "relative in-law"

https://suzlek.antat.ru/ has

• 0 results when searching for КАЙЫН;
• 1 relevant result when searching for КАЕН (all other results are related to the sense "birch tree"): Тсинон 1999 КАЕНИГӘЧ → (старшая сестра мужа или жены) → игәч; каен игәч; кайнигәч;
• 4 results when searching for КАЕНИГӘЧ: Таңлат 2015-2021 Хатынга ирнең апасы. ("To a woman, her husband's sister")

—Fish bowl (talk) 05:18, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

Appendix:English/my hovercraft is full of eels

English. Move to Appendix:my hovercraft is full of eels and make the old link redirect there because Wiktionary doesn't prefix terms with language names in mainspace. 67.209.130.43 03:18, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

We do prefix titles in Appendix-space though. What's your point? This, that and the other (talk) 05:03, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

Maybe I just didn't really understand how appendices work. If this move request is closed as not moved, the proposed target should remain a redirect instead of being deleted. 67.209.130.43 06:42, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

@Surjection deleted the redirect. I tend to agree that the redirect should be kept, since we've never bothered to fully organise Appendix space. This, that and the other (talk) 09:31, 22 April 2025 (UTC)

μειδάω

Ancient Greek. Modern dictionaries have μειδιάω as lemma, as the present μειδάω is unattested (though can be reconstructed on the basis of μείδημα and μειδάμων, see Chantraine). So I'd suggest to move this. Exarchus (talk) 19:36, 24 April 2025 (UTC)

May 2025

in modo da, in modo che

Italian. I propose to merge them into in modo.

They mean the same thing (in order to, so (that)); they are simply using different syntax.

"In modo da" takes an infinitive mood verb inflection and can be used when the subject of this infinitive verb would be the same as the subject of the main clause:

in modo da fartelo vedere

in order to let you see it ("so that subject lets you see it")

(in most uses, its meaning is similar to per + infinitive which is more common colloquially, similar to English to: per fartelo vedere ― to let you see it)

"In modo che" takes any finite verb inflection, and, especially when using a subjunctive mood verb inflection, che can be omitted:

in modo che lo puoi vedere

so that you can see it

in modo (che) lo possa vedere

so (that) I/you/he/she/it can see it

in modo io lo possa vedere

so I can see it

This is similar to subordinate clauses introduced by che being replaceable by di + infinitive if the subject of their parent clause is the same as theirs, in other contexts in Italian.

penso di aver capito

I think I understood

penso che capirà

I think that he will understand

penso (che) abbia capito

I think that he understood

But, for in modo che, with da instead of di. (Though, people do also use "in modo di" instead of "in modo da" without knowing it is actually supposed to be da.)

Also note that fare in modo (fare in modo che ― make it so that) already exists as a single page, and behaves the same way:

• che + finite
• che + (especially) subjunctive
• di + infinitive (here you are actually supposed to use di instead of da)

o/ Emanuele6 (talk) 11:13, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

June 2025

Old English Seaxa etc.

Is there a reason why several OE ethnonyms have separate entries for their singular and plural forms? See Seaxa and Seaxan, Frisa and Frisan, Scott and Scottas, Brett and Brettas, etc. Zacwill (talk) 16:31, 19 June 2025 (UTC)

It seems to have been Hundwine's decision, but that user hasn't edited Wiktionary in many months. —Mahāgaja · talk 17:24, 19 June 2025 (UTC)

Proto-Celtic *līwos “stone”

Move the Etymology 2 entry to Reconstruction:Proto-Celtic/lesankos (< *lesanks?), or perhaps something much more tentative like Reconstruction:Proto-Celtic/lV(u)s- or even an appendix, given how uncertain all these forms and their relationships are. I'm not an expert in Celtic specifics, but Zair seems to make a convincing argument against *līw-. — Ganjabarah (talk) 04:33, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

On second thought, the section should probably be deleted as an Insular Celtic–only etymon with no PIE precursor, with the etymological information moved to Old Irish lie. The "related terms" at *līwos can get separate Gaulish reconstructions which briefly mention the relevant etymological theory, but no such Proto-Celtic entries warrant inclusion. The reconstruction *līwos serves only to explain one case form of one word, based on etymological presumptions that are highly disputed (e.g. by both Nikolaev and Zair, for completely different reasons), and Matasović doesn't even mention *līwos overtly, just implies it (or athematic *līus) based on his etymology almost as an afterthought. — Ganjabarah (talk) 18:12, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

eudicots

Translingual. Request to move the Translingual eudicots to Translingual Eudicots. Please review this RFV discussion for background. As I understand it, there are enough citations to attest Eudicots. To prevent unreasonable deletion, I desire to have this request answered before continuing the RFV discussion. Pinging potentially interested stakeholders: @幽霊四, Fay Freak, SemperBlotto, DCDuring, Chuck Entz | TranqyPoo (talk) 17:19, 29 June 2025 (UTC)

July 2025

bomb site

And bombsite. 2A00:23C5:FE1C:3701:5C9:9C1E:C592:E6BA 20:09, 2 July 2025 (UTC)

Bombsite easily cited without any similes. DCDuring (talk) 23:00, 2 July 2025 (UTC)

This is RFM, I'm asking for a merge, not citations (but thanks for the good ones). 2A00:23C5:FE1C:3701:5C9:9C1E:C592:E6BA 23:03, 2 July 2025 (UTC)

The second sense of bombsite is not in bomb site. I wanted to make sure it survived a merge, rather than be carelessly deleted. All three definitions need support and some effort to determine which of the three spellings (including bomb-site is most common for each meaning. You could chip in some of the effort required. DCDuring (talk) 23:08, 2 July 2025 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₂eyḱ-

I can't find any reason whatsoever to assume *h₂- over *h₃-, so move to *Heyḱ-. Note that *h₁o- from an old (Proto-Indo-Hittite/Anatolian) verb like *h₁óyḱe(y) or *h₁óyḱti is also possible. — 2600:4808:9C30:C500:F84C:3DC7:9E59:61F2 01:49, 13 July 2025 (UTC)

Makes sense to me. Maybe the header can be {{ine-root|head1=*h₂eyḱ|head2=*h₃eyḱ}}. --{{victar|talk}} 02:54, 13 July 2025 (UTC)

Appendix:Forms of government

Move to Appendix:English forms of government since appendices aren't just for English. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 19:07, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

Appendix:Legal doctrines

Move to Appendix:English legal doctrines because appendices aren't just for English. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 19:15, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

For both this and the one above, "English terms for..." might be better, otherwise there's a risk that "English" will be taken as referring to England rather than the English language. —Mahāgaja · talk 19:55, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

Category:Tupinambá language + Category:Old Tupi language

Discussion moved to Wiktionary:Language treatment requests#Merging Tupinambá (tpn) into Old Tupi (tpw).

Merging tech bro and techbro?

I propose they are different spellings of the same word, I see no difference in usage between the examples or my experience. Kreuner (talk) 18:41, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

 Support. these really are the same, I believe. Juwan (talk) 13:25, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

• Merged by Rose Abrams. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 17:07, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

capitalizing çolpan

Shouldn't çolpan be capitalized as it's a proper noun? In the official Turkish dictionary (TDK Sözlük; https://sozluk.gov.tr/) it is indeed written as Çolpan. KawaiiAngelx (talk) 01:12, 27 July 2025 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/skel-

Should probably be moved to *(s)kel- as the root is often reconstructed with s-mobile on the basis of Lithuanian kaltas, kalté, and Latvian kalts

• Rix, Helmut, editor (2001), Lexikon der indogermanischen Verben [Lexicon of Indo-European Verbs] (in German), 2nd edition, Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag, →ISBN, page 552
• Pokorny, Julius (1959), Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch [Indo-European Etymological Dictionary] (in German), volume 3, Bern, München: Francke Verlag, page 927
• Derksen, Rick (2015), Etymological Dictionary of the Baltic Inherited Lexicon (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 13), Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, page 222

Graearms (talk) 22:21, 27 July 2025 (UTC)

Edit history merge erchan into erkan

Can someone edit history merge erchan into erkan so the info is preserved? @Griffon77. --{{victar|talk}} 08:09, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

August 2025

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/kl̥H-

There are two problems with this title:

1. *kl̥H- is not a root; it's a zero-grade root stem. The root is of course either *kelH- or *kleH- assuming the laryngeal is valid; otherwise it's just *kel- and there's no issue. We prohibit stems and non-neutral root grades as PIE titles (despite a few stragglers like *koḱs-, *mon- (noun stems), *solh₂- (adjective stem?) and *krows- (verb stem)). Obviously there is the issue of not knowing which root shape to reconstruct, but this can easily be solved with a title *kelH- (for the slightly more likely shape) with *kleH- as a soft redirect defined as an alternative reconstruction thereof. I would even prefer an unconventional title *k(e)l(e)H-, or even just *klH- without the ring below, as this diacritic implies a root form and is never part of the description of a root itself.
2. There is only one derived term, namely *kl̥H-wó-s. While this most likely points to a verbal root *kelH- ~ *kleH- for formal reasons, in lieu of any reflexes of the verb we cannot assume so. (For instance, a foreign/substrate word like *kalwa is also possible, which would explain the weird parallels to *gelH-, *golH-wo- and the lack of internal PIE etymology.) The information on the page is redundant with a hypothetical entry for the adjective, and I argue that the latter takes precedence.

Therefore I suggest we move the entry to Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/kl̥Hwós. I'm not fully convinced by this reconstruction, but that's a separate issue. This move would solve both of the above problems. There is no point in having a separate root entry when the root derives only one word; for this reason we already have many entries for nominals without an associated root entry (e.g. *dlongʰos, *h₃ésth₁, *ḱlównis, *péh₂wr̥, *wósr̥), even though it is understood that every word must belong to a root by definition. In the near future I will be proposing more moves of improper PIE entries on similar grounds. — Ganjabarah (talk) 00:08, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

 Support Given that another descendant has since been added into the page (Latin calvus, from *kl̥H-e/o-wo-s), I believe that moving the page to *kelH- is currently the best option. Also, the vowel on the Latin term's PIE and Proto-Italic parent is uncertain, which makes me doubt as to how it should be represented (since I don't think Wiktionary has a standard way to format doubtful vowels). Hitsuji777 (talk) 15:42, 10 March 2026 (UTC)

northern and western

move the fiction genre senses to the capitalised Western and Northern? Juwan (talk) 00:34, 23 August 2025 (UTC)

+northwestern. FWIW w:Northwestern (genre)/w:Northern (genre) and w:Western (genre) use the capitalised spelling, and the quotation present in northwestern uses "Northwesterns" capitalised. Emanuele6 (talk) 23:21, 16 March 2026 (UTC)

September 2025

Category:Alternative forms by language

Translingual, per continued discussion at Wiktionary:Beer parlour/2024/June#Decluttering the altform mess: this name is confusing, since it implies all alternative forms (entries using {{alt form}}) should be included here. I suggest renaming this to either "byforms" or "sideforms" for clarity. The description should also probably include that whether these categories are used for a language is decided on a per-language basis; something like Finnish would definitely not take out alternative forms from the list of lemmas like this. — SURJECTION ^{/ T / C / L /} 14:09, 5 September 2025 (UTC)

Category:Adapted borrowings by language

Translingual. Wiktionary:Beer parlour/2025/June#Adapted/Unadapted borrowing has plenty of discussion about this, tending towards a consensus that the term "adapted borrowing" is confusing, because people tend to think it applies to any kind of adaptation, whether morphological or phonological, when the term has a much more strict definition (...formed with the addition of an affix to conform the term to the normal morphology of the language...). Editors keep getting caught out by it; I checked them today (at the time of writing and signing), and all of the Romanian "adapted borrowings" did not meet this definition, and neither did the majority of French, German or Italian ones. The English and Vietnamese ones (the latter has words where the syllables have been reordered from the Chinese etymon) are further corner-cases.

Supposedly the term "adapted borrowing" can be found in the sense we use it in some linguistic works, but there are plenty of others (probably more, perhaps even significantly more) that use it in a more broad sense, usually for phonological adaptation specifically.

This really needs a better name - if nothing else, then "X terms derived from Y with morphological adaptation", and also change the definitions to allow e.g. the replacement of affixes, not just addition. We shouldn't probably have "adapted borrowing" as a category or term at all; if we do, then its definition must be broad.

We, at the same time, probably want to get rid of the {{abor}} template entirely, and if we keep the category, should instead make {{af}} categorize when it refers to a term in a different language. Such a category cannot be called "borrowings", though, because it would also include terms derived from parent languages (when no immediate reflex survives in a descendant, only one which has further been derived with e.g. an affix). — SURJECTION ^{/ T / C / L /} 14:17, 5 September 2025 (UTC)

I agree with most of the above, and would like to also note that even within morphological adaptation, it should be made more explicit when something is considered "adapted" and when it's just one language becoming another. In languages with a lot of morphology, any borrowing involves some amount of adaptation (except unadapted borrowings, which we already distinguish), because otherwise the word is not intergrated well into the language. Thadh (talk) 14:25, 5 September 2025 (UTC)

At this point the main thing I want is the ability to categorize it as a both borrowing and as having the given affix. Vininn126 (talk) 14:33, 5 September 2025 (UTC)

Can't we just add a new qualifier like <bor> to {{affix}} and be done with it? — SURJECTION ^{/ T / C / L /} 18:59, 5 September 2025 (UTC)

Can we allow for + like text to be printed when doing so? Vininn126 (talk) 10:09, 6 September 2025 (UTC)

No. We shouldn't have + like text anywhere - but if you insist, then it's going to be something like {{bor(+)|TARGET|SOURCE|TERM}} + {{affix|TARGET|-suffix}} (or one could even make a template wrapping that) - still better than the current mess. — SURJECTION ^{/ T / C / L /} 20:32, 6 September 2025 (UTC)

If Lechitic languages, as understandably painful as it is for you, can keep +-like text, I'd be fine removing the category. Perhaps a better name can be thought of in the future. Vininn126 (talk) 08:09, 7 September 2025 (UTC)

I agree that the current name is bad, at least as long as the intended scope is something (much) narrower than "adapted borrowings". If what is wanted is the ability to category something as a borrowing and also categorize it as having a suffix, don't the existing borrowing templates + (e.g.) {{suffix|LANG||-SUFFIX}} work? - -sche (discuss) 22:31, 16 October 2025 (UTC)

I have cleared out Lechitic and Proto-Slavic adapted borrowings using {{etymon}}. This is the bulk of the category - remaining entries should be looked at. Vininn126 (talk) 12:47, 9 June 2026 (UTC)

Newly encoded 漢字 whose articles need moving

With CJK Extension J [8] being introduced recently, there are a few articles which need moving to their newly assigned codepoints.

漢字 not encoded in Unicode are usually given articles in Wiktionary with Ideographic Description Sequences (IDS), this is a way of "spelling out" 漢字 to give them a Unicode & structural representation.

Once/if these 漢字 are encoded, they need to be moved to their new respective codepoints.

I have identified a few such articles which need moving (this is not all encompassing, I'm pretty busy, but I did find these)

⿰氵𬼁 "" should be moved to 𲨴 (U+32A34) [9]

⿰氵𬼄 "" should be moved to 𲨷 (U+32A37) [10]

⿱十冂 "" should be moved to 𲓜 (U+324DC) [11]

Additionally, the derived Second Round Simplified compound for 越南 (Vietnam) needs moving.

迌⿱十冂 "迌" should be moved to 迌𲓜

If someone could move these articles to their new codepoints that would be awesome!

Cheers & best wishes HanziKanji (talk) 20:10, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

I have moved all 漢字 to their proper codepoints. I am a very casual Wiktionary user, I was not aware that I could move the articles myself. I have done so & will look for more which were encoded as part of CJK Extension J

-Cheers & best wishes HanziKanji (talk) 00:12, 19 September 2025 (UTC)

• Moved by HanziKanji. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 17:19, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

October 2025

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/gʰrendʰ- and Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/gʷʰrendʰ-

The latter appears to be an alternative reconstruction of the former. Graearms (talk) 22:26, 15 October 2025 (UTC)

Convert either one into a soft redirect. Lupgra's recent creation of the latter entry was erroneous, being a duplication. Unfortunately neither of the two reconstructions is obviously preferable (full of incongruities either way), so I suppose the default option is to keep things the original way they were. — 2600:4808:9C30:C500:D408:C1D9:2359:B10B 20:30, 27 October 2025 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₂ékʷeh₂

Not only is there no reason to assume *kʷ based on the Centum-only descendants, but Lusitanian actually excludes it as a possibility, as this would give *apa (see w:Lusitanian language with sources). Move to *h₂éḱweh₂ as this actually has an etymology and fits the data. — 2600:4808:9C30:C500:D408:C1D9:2359:B10B 20:18, 27 October 2025 (UTC)

Let's first establish whether Lusitanian aqua actually exists and if so, whether it isn't considered a simple borrowing from Latin. There's zero mention of Lusitanian in the usual sources. Exarchus (talk) 11:04, 29 November 2025 (UTC)

Prósper in Lenguas y religiones prerromanas del occidente de la Península Ibérica p.396 gives some toponyms (I assume) containing 'aqu-' and indeed suggests PIE *-kw-.

I can't find what Witczak gives. Exarchus (talk) 11:21, 29 November 2025 (UTC)

Category:IPA pronunciations with no pronunciation present and Category:Pronunciation templates without a pronunciation

I don't think we need both of these templates. I'm not sure what the circumstances are that make a page get categorized into Category:IPA pronunciations with no pronunciation present anyway. There's only one page there at the moment, [[-re]], and all of its IPA pronunciations do have a pronunciation present. —Mahāgaja · talk 08:41, 30 October 2025 (UTC)

corper

English.

While this entry is for English, one of the two quotes is Nigerian Pidgin. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:42, 31 October 2025 (UTC)

• Fixed: I've moved the quote to the citations page where it belongs. I was surprised to see that I had the honor of creating the first Nigerian Pidgin citations page (as the category didn't exist yet)! — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 17:35, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

November 2025

Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/vьxъde

The sla-pro-adverbs template shows *vьśь adverbs, such as *vьśьde (this adverb), as their forms after undergoing the third/progressive palatalization. That is the case for all of them except for this one, shown as *vьxъde. Even when clicking on its etymological morpheme *vьxъ, it is redirected to *vьśь instead. For some reason, for this specific adverb, there is a redirect from the third/progressive palatalization form to the form without it.

Unless it is the case that this adverb did not undergo the third/progressive palatalization in Proto-Slavic despite all of its descendants showing symptoms of it, this adverb should be listed as *vьśьde. If that is not the case, it should be added as a comment for clarity with a source to prove it. — This unsigned comment was added by Trubiso (talk • contribs) at 20:40, 7 November 2025 (UTC).

@Sławobóg moved it a couple of years ago. I have no idea why. Chuck Entz (talk) 21:28, 7 November 2025 (UTC)

I'm not convinced we should be implementing the third palatalization in our reconstruction of Proto-Slavic anyway, since (1) it didn't happen in Old Novgorodian and (2) we have to invent a phoneme *ś to account for the different treatment of third-palatalized *x in West vs. East and South Slavic. Right now, we have to say that Old Novgorodian кѣле (kěle) is "from Proto-Slavic *cělъ (from an earlier pre-palatalized form *kělъ)" instead of just saying it's from Proto-Slavic *kělъ, which makes more sense. And we have to say that Old Novgorodian вьхе (vĭxe), Old East Slavic вьсь (vĭsĭ), Old Church Slavonic вьсь (vĭsĭ) and Old Czech veš all come from Proto-Slavic *vьśь (again with a disclaimer on the Old Novgorodian entry) instead of just saying they all come from *vьxь, which is much simpler. —Mahāgaja · talk 08:50, 8 November 2025 (UTC)

The factual situation though is that both existed as Proto-Slavic, and even at the same time if the palatalization change took some time to spread—sound shifts always take decades (we can observe it very well when working through Middle Low German documents for instance, not to speak of the data on 21st-century English chain shifts), and in the case of yer reduction it took four centuries due to the vast mass of land Slavic was spread upon in the beginning of the ninth century already. So by comparison the “older” forms are alternative forms of certain regiolects, which is the way we would portray the language if it were attested in all its extent. Fay Freak (talk) 22:40, 8 November 2025 (UTC)

One can still well model a single phonemic representation, with allophonic and dialect-dependent palatalization. Nicodene (talk) 02:05, 9 November 2025 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Gaulish/wergobretos and uercobretos

These entries appear to cover the same term. Graearms (talk) 04:11, 20 November 2025 (UTC)

Category:Cubeo lemmas with ð to use ꟈ instead

The Cubeo lemmas with ð should be moved to have ꟈ instead of ð. The digital version of N. L. Morse; J. K. Salser; N. de Salser (1999), Diccionario ilustrado bilingüe: cubeo-español, espanõl-cubeo has a d with a middle stroke and the Webonary version has d̶ (U+0064 LATIN SMALL LETTER D, U+0336 COMBINING LONG STROKE OVERLAY) but the atomic character ꟈ (U+A7C8 LATIN SMALL LETTER D WITH SHORT STROKE OVERLAY) can be used. Technically đ U+0111 LATIN SMALL LETTER D WITH STROKE could also be used as it may have various forms, including that with the middle stroke. Cc’ing @GabMarquetto --Moyogo (talk) 16:40, 27 November 2025 (UTC)

Just to note that I cannot view the suggested new character, and am seeing a placeholder symbol instead (I am using the latest version of Mozilla Firefox). If there is a change to the character used, a new font may have to be installed. — Sgconlaw (talk) 18:42, 27 November 2025 (UTC)

• I can see all of the characters used above in Microsoft Edge on Debian Linux. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 06:27, 12 January 2026 (UTC)

splade, splayd, Splayd

See the 2005 (!) comment at Talk:splade. These all refer to the same utensil. Needs working out which is the primary form. Yes, it is a brand name, but it has become genericised, so I don't think WT:BRAND is going to be a problem here. This, that and the other (talk) 10:54, 28 November 2025 (UTC)

December 2025

Appendix:E numbers > Appendix:European food additive numbers

Conflicts with the number appendix of Category:E language generated by {{number box}}. See also Category talk:E numbers#RFM discussion: May 2017–November 2018. – wpi (talk) 12:41, 13 December 2025 (UTC)

The name "European food additive numbers" is not ideal, as the numbers are used outside Europe as well. I would prefer "E numbers (food additives)" for both the cat and appendix. This, that and the other (talk) 05:54, 27 December 2025 (UTC)

atticismos

I request that this Latin entry be moved back to Atticismos, which is the page title at which the entry was created. Theknightwho moved the entry to atticismos without giving a reason. The sole supporting quotation for the entry cites Diomedes Grammaticus, who used the word in the accusative case, Atticismon (capitalised thus). Of course, back in the late fourth century, the letter-case distinction had yet to develop, so the whole work was probably written in minuscule scriptio continua or whatever, so the capitalisation in the quotation is rather a choice of Diomedes' modern editor. But if one is to argue that the choice of capitalisation is arbitrary, then the entry should be moved back to the capitalised form, since the move therefore constituted spell-warring, the prohibition on which was recently reaffirmed in Wiktionary:Beer parlour/2025/December#Please stop Box16/Mysteryroom consistently changing UK to US spellings in every entry he edits. (I actually think the choice isn’t arbitrary, the reasons for which I can get into if asked.) 0DF (talk) 19:29, 13 December 2025 (UTC)

@0DF I don’t really understand your point: as you say, letter-casing had not been conceived of when he wrote it. Theknightwho (talk) 21:18, 13 December 2025 (UTC)

@0DF for a bit more context, see Wiktionary:Beer_parlour/2025/April#Latin_capitalization. After that, I added a bit of discussion to Wiktionary:Latin entry guidelines. I also tend to feel like we should follow the practice of modern editors in whether to capitalize Latin entries, but as you can see, Theknightwho prefers that we ignore that and instead follow our own easy-to-apply rule based on whether a word is a proper noun or not.--Urszag (talk) 21:43, 13 December 2025 (UTC)

@Urszag: Thank you for providing helpful context. On the matter of proper nouns, Atticism(os) might plausibly be regarded as a proper noun, its being the “name…of a…doctrine, or…movement” (literary rather than political), although that isn't really the tack I want to take on this. It is reprehensibly misdescriptive to capitalise only proper nouns and to decapitalise everything else when it comes to Latin; that has never been the operative rule/convention for the language. Generally speaking, capitalisation is “sticky” in Latin, being applied not only to proper nouns, but also to most derivations of those proper nouns; in this case, Atticismos is capitalised because of its obvious and salient indirect derivation from Attica. But all I'm doing hereby is recapitulating what has already been written in the April Beer parlour discussion to which you linked, so I shall resort to pinging the contributors to that discussion, in the hope that some of them will be willing to give their input to this discussion as well: @Nicodene, Benwing2, Saumache, Thadh, -sche, Mahagaja. 0DF (talk) 00:07, 14 December 2025 (UTC)

I personally agree with @Urszag here that we should follow the practice of modern editors even though this involves capitalizing some adjectives and common nouns (as in English). Benwing2 (talk) 00:21, 14 December 2025 (UTC)

Excuse the motivated perception if not, but I count that as three votes for moving this entry back whence it was moved (myself, Urszag, and Benwing2) and one against (Theknightwho). So, who'd like to do the honours? 0DF (talk) 14:39, 14 December 2025 (UTC)

I disagree that atticismos is plausibly a proper noun, but I do agree that if modern editors tend to capitalize it, we should too. I also support having both entries, one of them labeled an {{alt case}} of the other. —Mahāgaja · talk 18:21, 14 December 2025 (UTC)

@Mahāgaja: Well, it's attested, so there's no issue with verification. Would you like to undo the moves? 0DF (talk) 19:45, 14 December 2025 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ @Benwing2, Mahagaja, Theknightwho, Urszag: I have undone the moves. Since I cannot myself, I ask that one of you undelete Atticismi and Atticismo, please. 0DF (talk) 22:56, 29 December 2025 (UTC)

• Moved by 0DF. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 18:02, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/miuzijō

Shouldn't this be *miuzī? Same with Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/faimijō, Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/Frijjō, and Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/marhijō. I don't see why these should behave differently from Category:Proto-Germanic_ī/jō-stem_nouns. —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 01:32, 14 December 2025 (UTC)

Naming of pronunciation templates

across languages, the templates for pronunciations are inconsistently named. this would be better standardised to one suffix.

• {{fr-IPA}}, {{la-IPA}}; {{grc-IPA}}, {{pt-IPA}}, etc.: ending in IPA
• {{es-pr}}, {{gl-pr}}, {{it-pr}}, {{mwl-pr}}, etc.: ending in pr
• {{ja-pron}}, {{th-pron}}, {{zh-pron}}, etc.: ending in pron
• {{fi-p}}: ending in p

the usage of IPA suffix is understandable, as the outputs only contain the automated phonetic transcription. but note the usage of the template where some need an asterisk preceding it while others don't. Juwan (talk) 17:46, 17 December 2025 (UTC)

There's also ones like {{nan-hbl-pronunc}} ending in pronunc. Seems to be coming from how pronunciation modules are usually named Module:Lang-pronunc.

Anyways, I believe there are two distinct types of templates here: {{*-IPA}} for only the IPA, and {{*-p/pr/pron/pronunc}} for those with additional information like rhymes, syllabation, hyphenation, etc.; only the latter should be renamed (if we agree to do so). – wpi (talk) 19:38, 17 December 2025 (UTC)

the "pronunc" naming scheme for modules is also a bit odd to me. it would be better if those were changed to match as well (probably the full "pronunciation"). Juwan (talk) 19:48, 17 December 2025 (UTC)

The problem with {{*-pr}} and especially {{*-pron}} is that they can conflict with the names of headword-line templates for pronouns. {{en-pron}}, for example, is a pronoun headword-line template, not a pronunciation template. {{*-pronunc}} avoids that ambiguity. Many years ago I made all pronunciation templates consistently named {{*-IPA}}, but since that time new expanded pronunciation templates have been created for many languages, often containing dialectal pronunciations, rhymes, and hyphenation. At least one original -IPA template, {{pl-IPA}}, has actually been deleted because it was superseded by {{pl-pr}}. Maybe to avoid confusion with pronoun templates, pronunciation templates that show more than just pronunciation should be named {{*-IPA+}} or something. —Mahāgaja · talk 22:40, 17 December 2025 (UTC)

I can't find any headword templates ending in -pr. All such templates look to be pronunciation templates. I wouldn't mind settling on that suffix for auto-generating templates. To me, a template named ending in -IPA implies it takes a parameter of actual IPA, like {{IPA}} itself. This, that and the other (talk) 07:57, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

I agree with @This, that and the other; I chose the naming of {{es-pr}}, {{it-pr}}, {{pl-pr}} and {{tl-pr}} specifically because -pr isn't otherwise used. We should definitely avoid naming pronunciation templates with -pron because it conflicts with the usage for pronoun headword templates. Benwing2 (talk) 22:20, 15 February 2026 (UTC)

il giorno di San Mai

Italian. Created by @User:GianWiki; defined as a noun, but contains definite article "il".

Also Italian il giorno del mai.

I think they should be moved to giorno del mai, giorno di San Mai without "il".

o/ Emanuele6 (talk) 12:42, 23 December 2025 (UTC)

Special:Search/intitle:/^il .*$/ incategory:"Italian nouns" also finds il sesso degli angeli which should be moved to sesso degli angeli. Emanuele6 (talk) 09:32, 24 December 2025 (UTC)

Also intitle:/^(l'|un'|(un[oa]?|il|l[aeo]|gli|i) ).*$/ incategory:"Italian nouns":

• l'acquolina in bocca
• la notte dei tempi
• l'ultimo avvertimento della Cina
• la ciliegina sulla torta
• una botta e via

These noun entries with articles are mostly created by @User:Imetsia.

There are also these preexisting redirects:

• la quiete prima della tempesta → quiete prima della tempesta
• l'ultima goccia → ultima goccia
• le dolenti note → dolenti note

And i pro e i contro which I think is just a WT:SOP rephrasing of i pro e contro. (cfr. the pros and cons vs the pros and the cons) Emanuele6 (talk) 10:03, 24 December 2025 (UTC)

+French la nuit des temps created by @Mofvanes, linked as cognate of la notte dei tempi.

Hey, @PUC! As you are a French editor, and your recent discussion in WT:Beer parlour/2026/March#RFD'ing hard redirects reminded me of this discussion with its redirects à la l'ultima goccia→ultima goccia, do you happen to have a comment on this? Emanuele6 (talk) 23:07, 16 March 2026 (UTC)

January 2026

-oido

Per WT:Esperanto entry guidelines § Suffixes: since it doesn't always end with -o, e.g. in arboida, it should be -oid-. jlwoodwa (talk) 19:46, 10 January 2026 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/gʷelH-

I think it's clear the ancestor of Greek βάλλω should be moved Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/gʷelh₁- (Beekes and LIV agree), but our root *gʷelH- "to throw" also encompasses LIV's 1.*gʷelH- (whence Proto-Germanic *kwelaną) and I'm not sure whether those descendants should be moved to *gʷelh₁- as well, or be split off and stay at *gʷelH-. Exarchus (talk) 21:09, 17 January 2026 (UTC)

Should -ication be moved to -cation?

The derived terms listed show it is added to verbs ending in -ify (where y changes to i) or rarely to nouns with i (Californication from California). Compare -faction and -fication. J3133 (talk) 07:00, 18 January 2026 (UTC)

@J3133: Etymologically, the "-ify" comes from Latin facio (“make, do”). That means the "c" probably comes from the stem of the ending. In Romance languages such as Old French, sounds like "c" palatalize and are lost around "i", but not if followed by a back vowel like "a". Also, Californication is a blend of California and fornication, so it's not related to this at all. Chuck Entz (talk) 08:45, 18 January 2026 (UTC)

@Chuck Entz: Our entry (Californication) states that is a “superficially apparent” rebracketing “ineluctably mixed into some percentage of the word's usage” and not the etymology. J3133 (talk) 08:53, 18 January 2026 (UTC)

@J3133: whether it's a blend or rebracketing, it's perfectly easy to explain without resorting to this alleged suffix. the alternation of --ify with -ification is pretty much universal, and there are other cases like satisfy/satisfaction/satisfactory and liquify/liquefaction that reinforce this analysis. I don't see anything in the derived terms that can't be explained as something ending with "c" followed by -ation. Chuck Entz (talk) 10:16, 18 January 2026 (UTC)

@J3133: As -cation is used only with the sense of "vacation", maybe you actually mean to move it to -ation or -ification? ※Sobreira ◣◥ 〒 @「parlez」 11:17, 28 January 2026 (UTC)

@Sobreira: Why should it not be moved to -cation? I am not proposing to change the sense. E.g., “equivalent to apply + -ication” in application would instead be “apply + -cation”. J3133 (talk) 12:53, 30 January 2026 (UTC)

But the 〈i〉 in application is /ɪ/, not /aɪ/ like in apply +‎ -able. Exarchus (talk) 21:00, 15 February 2026 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/reh₁ís to Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/(H)reh₁ís

The root itself is sometimes reconstructed as *(H)reh₁- or *Hreh₁-. Moreover, PIE is generally thought to have largely avoided word-initial "r." Graearms (talk) 17:00, 18 January 2026 (UTC)

@Graearms Maybe we should rather move *(H)reh₁- to *reh₁-. Has there been a critique of "Proto-Indo-European Initial *r Revisited" (https://www.jstor.org/stable/27285887) ? Exarchus (talk) 20:53, 15 February 2026 (UTC)

I would caution against moving *Hr entries based solely on a single paper. --{{victar|talk}} 05:41, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

I agree. Saying that PIE didn't have word- or root-initial *r is still very much the mainstream view. —Mahāgaja · talk 07:39, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

It wouldn't be based on a single paper, see the list of reconstructions with *r- on *(H)reh₁-. Exarchus (talk) 09:25, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

Regardless of whether one accepts the existence of initial *r in PIE, I would still favor *(H)reh₁- as it is the most neutral reconstruction since it allows for both possibilities. Graearms (talk) 23:40, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

Uninvolved party here, but I can get behind that. — mellohi! (Goodbye!) 21:45, 19 February 2026 (UTC)

I'm okay with that. Exarchus (talk) 15:24, 28 February 2026 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and preformed the move since it seems as if everyone here now agrees. Graearms (talk) 16:04, 28 February 2026 (UTC)

@Graearms Btw, isn't the connection with Latin rēs the only reason for *h₁ in *(H)reh₁- ? Exarchus (talk) 21:38, 28 February 2026 (UTC)

@Exarchus It seem so, unless I suppose you accept the connection with Old Irish rét. Graearms (talk) 23:05, 28 February 2026 (UTC)

• eh₁ gave Proto-Celtic *ī, not *ē anyway. Old Irish rét could come from a *rantus from a PIE zero grade *HrH-nt-us with any laryngeal.

—Mahāgaja · talk 23:33, 28 February 2026 (UTC)

• Moved by Graearms. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 18:24, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

vigintennial and vigentennial

We have one as a noun only, the other as an adjective only. But they are probably alt forms of each other. Check and, if so, unify at a primary entry and turn the other into an alt-form entry. This, that and the other (talk) 23:27, 22 January 2026 (UTC)

February 2026

Move Larpercore to larpercore

I would like to propose moving this page to lowercase larpercore.

While it was initially created with a capital letter, it functions as a common noun/sociolect (similar to cottagecore or hardcore) rather than a proper noun. Moving it to lowercase aligns with Wiktionary's standard for common nouns and subculture-specific terms.

If an administrator could perform this move, I would appreciate it. ~2026-84599-4 (talk) 11:58, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

pizzabombing

Move to pizza bombing to align with standard English grammar and sources citing the term. ~2026-87870-0 (talk) 22:19, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

Or, since the citations are only in German, move to Pizzabombing and change the L2 to German. —Mahāgaja · talk 23:01, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

I've just added two English citations, one styled pizza bombing and the other pizza-bombing. In addition, I created Citations:pizza bomb with three instances of a verb form (pizza bombed / pizza-bombed) and one plural noun pizza bombs. Perhaps it should be at pizza bomb, with entries for the various noun- and verb forms in the usual way (cf. wreck (noun, verb), wrecked (adjective, past and past participle verb form)). Cnilep (talk) 01:08, 9 February 2026 (UTC)

I have now created pizza bomb, pizza bombs, and pizza bombed. I have not created pizza bombing pending an outcome of this discussion. Does anyone have opinions? Cnilep (talk) 08:53, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Old_Norse/-fǫðr

I request that this entry be moved to the main space, overwriting existing -fǫðr. It is only ever attested in compounds and there is no evidence to suspect it existed as an independent word in Old Norse. Pinging @Blockhaj @AssaultButterKnife. Mårtensås ᛭ Proto-Norsing ᛭ AMA 16:50, 25 February 2026 (UTC)

I dont see why it wouldnt be an analog to Gothic, but fair enough. ᛒᛚᚮᚴᚴᚼᛆᛁ ᛭ 𝔅𝔩𝔬𝔠𝔨𝔥𝔞𝔧 05:19, 26 February 2026 (UTC)

Yes, it should be moved, though I disagree with your apparent certainty that this is a zero-grade form of "father" (which I assume is what you mean by "archaic declension" and could be specified further), though it is certainly a possibility. I do think that "contracted form of faðir" is unlikely and should at most be listed after "archaic declension", as it's formally problematic and unexplained as far as I can see. I don't have access to the first cited article, unfortunately. AssaultButterKnife (talk) 10:09, 26 February 2026 (UTC)

• Moved by Blockhaj. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 20:19, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

snor

Old Norse. According to Kroonen, this should be regularised as snør. See {{R:gem:EDPG|*snuzō-|page=463}}. Exarchus (talk) 15:22, 28 February 2026 (UTC)

March 2026

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₁óh₃s

A reconstruction with both underlying *o and *h₃ doesn't make sense. The reason people reconstruct *h₃ is because the underlying vowel is supposed to be *e. The page was apparently moved here by @Victar on the basis of it originally being an o-grade acrostatic; see talk page.
I'm inclined to suggest a move to *h₁éh₃s. Exarchus (talk) 17:43, 1 March 2026 (UTC)

Just to be clear, NIL does give *h₁óh₃s, but they tend to indicate laryngeal coloring (which I find confusing). Exarchus (talk) 17:50, 1 March 2026 (UTC)

It make sense if you're reconstructing acrostatic *o ~ *e paradigm, as the EIEC and HCHIEL do. I think if it was moved though, I would vote for RC:Proto-Indo-European:h₃éh₁s, which appears to be supported by the majority of sources. --{{victar|talk}} 07:37, 2 March 2026 (UTC)

Is it really scholarly consensus that the phonemes h₃ and o never occurred together? I've never heard that. —Soap— 19:54, 15 March 2026 (UTC)

I wasn't saying that, my point was that if the underlying vowel is *o, then we don't know which laryngeals should be reconstructed, so *HóHs (apart from looking at Hittite). But with alternating *o and *e-grade (which isn't our current declension), that may not matter. Exarchus (talk) 20:16, 15 March 2026 (UTC)

cheap fake

The entry cheapfake already exists, so these articles need to be merged to avoid duplication. Pipoin (talk) 21:18, 2 March 2026 (UTC)

Both need citations that are uses, not mentions. DCDuring (talk) 00:02, 3 March 2026 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-West Germanic/garāfijō

The reconstruction with the prefix *ga- is solely based on the Old English attested 'descendant' gerēfa. However, it is clear that the Old English word cannot reflect descendant from the aforementioned PWGmc. term as we would expect a variation æ~e in its spelling based on dialect (with the West Saxon form in æ being predominant), as well as for the fact that the oldest form, attested in the Épinal glosses which were copied down at the turn of the 8th century, is giroefan (in an inflected form), which must reflect descent from a PWGmc. form with vocalism *ō. Thus, we must discount the Old English form from our considerations of the Proto-West Germanic reconstruction.

A reconstruction *grāfijō would not only fit better with our continental descendants (though, as has been mentioned by others, the simplification of *ga- to g- is not unprecedented), but also provide better grounds for a link with Gothic gagrēfts. Thus, I am requesting for a move of the Proto-West Germanic term to Reconstruction:Proto-West Germanic/*grāfijō. SériskaMarka-Lénínattijó (talk) 09:02, 6 March 2026 (UTC)

@Victar SériskaMarka-Lénínattijó (talk) 09:08, 6 March 2026 (UTC)

A reconstruction from *ga- is not based solely on Old English ġerēfa, but is also supported by OHG variant garāvo (per Lexer) and the Latin borrowing garāfiō (per Niemeyer). Gothic 𐌲𐌰𐌲𐍂𐌴𐍆𐍄𐍃 (gagrēfts) is also not the only possible etymology, another possibility being cognate with *rafjaną (“to seize, take”). --{{victar|talk}} 10:02, 6 March 2026 (UTC)

Is it possible that you could include the sources where the words are attested? That would be more helpful if we are to determine which form of the word is original. SériskaMarka-Lénínattijó (talk) 02:58, 7 March 2026 (UTC)

If you had went deeper into the references in Lexer, you would have found that this garavo is not actually attested. Though, I don't entirely blame you since Lexer presents it as an attested form.

I assume you were citing this part of Lexer's entry:

(»bezogen auf râvo sparren u. rêfa räuber: ahd. garâvo, ags. gerêfa«). WEIG. 1,452 nach KUHN 5,155 ff. u. GSP. 77

These are the parts of the inline citations that are relevant to the statement:

Graf, m. (-en, Pl. -en): Der Nächste in der Würde nach dem Fürsten. Unverkürzt noch 1673 bei Weise Erzn. 23 Graffe, bei Rückert 3, 60 Grafe. Mhd. grâve, grâf m. (Pl. grâven, auch græfen) urspr. «höhrer weltlicher Befehlshaber und Gerichtsvorsitzer», dann als «erbliche Würde», ahd. grâvo, grâvio, grâveo m., md. und mndrhein. grâbe und mit Umlaut grêve, grêbe m.; ... (Weigand, pp. 452)

.

Jakob Grimm (Rechtsalt. 753) weist die irrige ableitung aus grau zurück, und fährt dann fort: "Ich will eine andere vermuthung wagen. râvo hiess ahd. tignum, tectum (gramm. 1, 136 altn. raefr tectum), vielleicht auch domus, aula; garâvjo, girâvjo, girâvo würde dann comes, socius bedeuten, was gistallo und gisaljo, gisello (gramm. 2, 736). Die volle wortform lässt sich wohl aus den ältesten urkunden nachweisen; für sie streitet das ags. gerêfa, das in der bedeutung von socius, comes, praesul, tribunus vollkommen dem fränk. grafio entspricht, im engl. aber zu reefe, rif wird, so dass die verkürzung sherif in sciregerêfa aufgelöst werden muss. Der schwierigkeit, warum as ags. wort nicht geraefa lautet (vergl. raefter, tignum)? weiss ich nur durch die annahme zu begegnen, dass auch die Angelsachsen namen und würde von den Franken entlehnten und deshalb den vocal entstellten." (Meyer, pp. 156)

.

Note that the second citation is named as KUHN in Lexer as it was an article written in volume 5 of Kuhn's Zeitschrift für vergleichende Sprachforschung. The last citation is also by Meyer, so I will be omitting it.

.

The first article is standard in stating the forms gravo, gravio, graveo.

.

In the second article, there appear the forms garavjo, giravjo, giravo. However, if you read closely, you would know that these forms are reconstructed by Jakob Grimm as forms in the language that is now known as Proto-West Germanic (while West Germanic was collectively named "Deutsch" back then). He then proceeds to justify the reconstruction by claiming that the "full form" is attested in the "oldest" attestations, and names Old English gerefa. If forms with ga- or gi- in Old High German existed, he would have surely named them as evidence. Indeed, the only Old High German form stated is grafio.

.

Unless I've missed out some crucial parts of the references, I believe that Lexer's statement is a summary of the three sources that misunderstands the presence of reconstructed forms with the gi-, ga- prefix as attested Old High German. SériskaMarka-Lénínattijó (talk) 06:15, 7 March 2026 (UTC)

I'm not entirely sure what I think it should say about the etymology, but also of note is the fact that groef- spellings occur a very disproportionate 20+ times against 13 geroef-/giroef- in Aldred's Northumbrian, compared to only rare examples of vowelless ge-/gi- elsewhere, and in Owun's Northumbrian of the MacRegol Gospels only groef- appears out of 20 examples, again very out of place as Owun is even less likely than Aldred to drop the prefix vowel elsewhere. Yeldred Gengo (talk) 19:41, 7 March 2026 (UTC)

I think this is a welcome addition to the discussion, but tangentially related to the main matter at hand as one would have to show that the alteration between gi- and g- forms of the Old English and continental terms are related, not to mention the fact that the vocalisms are contradictory, even if the case could be made that the gr- forms are older than gir- in Old English (which would hinge on whether the centuries-older, but hapax attestation in the glossaries take precedence over the numerous later attestations). SériskaMarka-Lénínattijó (talk) 04:20, 8 March 2026 (UTC)

@SériskaMarka-Lénínattijó: Thank you for pointing out that Old High German *garāvo is in fact a reconstruction. I have updated the entry accordingly and added the Meyer source for PWG *garāfijō. The Latin borrowing garāfiō, however, remains attested, and Latin lacks any clear phonological motivation for such anaptyxis.

Interestingly, we find attested OHG girefo, girevo, gihrevo (“brother”), which Köbler derives from *ga- +‎ *hrefaz. For the semantics of “brother” <=> “lord”, compare, for example, Chinese 伯 (bó, “eldest brother; count, earl; chief official”), Turkish ağa (“lord; (elder) brother”), Hindi प्रभु (lord; brother).

--{{victar|talk}} 06:00, 10 March 2026 (UTC)

a) With regards to the citation, I think that the one that should be cited for the reconstruction *garāfijō is Grimm; Meyer indeed refutes the reconstruction and his article argues for *grāfijō, which he connects to Gothic gagrefts.

b) You might have missed my other comment, but could you provide the name and page of the article, or better the name of the work the word is found in, when you mention those words? I can't seem to find anything using the keywords "garafio" and "Niemeyer", for example.

c) So do you suggest a lengthened grade formation from *krep-? On a side note about the reconstruction, no matter which form of the word is correct the PWGmc. page should display grammatischer Wechsel given the b~f alteration in Old High German (I also see that the b-forms aren't listed on Wiktionary; for example Georgslied has "der mare crabo" and "burggrabo" appears in glosses, see Die althochdeutschen glossen, gesammelt und bearbeitet). As far as I know, grammatischer Wechsel would require an original paradigm sg. nom. *g(a)rāfō, sg. gen. g(a)rābin before splitting and being extended with -ij-. SériskaMarka-Lénínattijó (talk) 07:49, 10 March 2026 (UTC)

See here for the entry in Niermeyer, under the headword grafio.

For the word in question, the attestations show gr- nearly unanimously, with a single occurrence of gar-.

I leave to you the question of what probative value this has. Nicodene (talk) 09:32, 10 March 2026 (UTC)

In my opinion for the reason you stated and also the nature of it being a loan makes it rather weak as evidence; but a decision can only be made with some kind of majority consensus and I don't think that's going to happen anytime soon (since it's effectively just an argument between me and Victar). I guess for now I'll just add a few more references and details about the alternative reconstruction and its own history of different etymologies to the page. SériskaMarka-Lénínattijó (talk) 13:38, 10 March 2026 (UTC)

@Victar Any thoughts on a Verner alternating paradigm? And do you think there should be -ij-? SériskaMarka-Lénínattijó (talk) 00:44, 12 March 2026 (UTC)

Kroonen reconstructs PG an-stem *ga-rēfô, so suggesting *garāfijō is a secondary jan-stem isn't overly speculative. --{{victar|talk}} 19:18, 12 March 2026 (UTC)

Latin ”alvina” should be recorded as attested, not reconstructed

Discussion moved to WT:TEA#Reconstruction:Latin/alvina. — Polomo ⟨⁠ ⁠oi!⁠ ⁠⟩ · 15:24, 7 March 2026 (UTC)

Rhymes:German/ɔʏ̯.tə, Rhymes:German/ɔʏ̯.də

I noticed this due to diff. According to Appendix:German pronunciation, these rhymes pages (and the pronunciation sections of all the entries listed on them) should use ɔɪ̯ rather than either ɔʏ̯ or ɔj. There are probably other entries which also need to be similarly standardized. - -sche (discuss) 08:49, 7 March 2026 (UTC)

Also, I don't think Rhymes pages usually have syllable boundary dots; the first should be moved to Rhymes:German/ɔɪ̯tə and the second merged with the already-existing Rhymes:German/ɔɪ̯də. —Mahāgaja · talk 10:06, 7 March 2026 (UTC)

• -sche merged Rhymes:German/ɔʏ̯.də as Mahagaja suggested. — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 20:27, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Orphaned reconstruction talk pages in the Appendix talk namespace

For those who are unaware, we used to have all of our reconstruction pages in the form of Appendix pages. When the Reconstruction namespace was created, all of these reconstruction pages were moved to the corresponding Reconstruction: page names, and their talk pages to the Reconstruction talk: equivalents.

After seeing a number of the redirects left behind by the moves showing up in Special:BrokenRedirects and Special:DoubleRedirects, I started looking through the results of a search for pages starting with "Appendix:proto" and deleting redirects with no incoming links.

That's when I found talk pages for deleted reconstructions still in the Appendix namespace. They haven't been edited since the move to the Reconstruction namespace, so at least one is linking to one of the redirects instead of the Reconstruction page it links to. I suspect no one (including me) thought to look for Appendix talk pages without a corresponding Appendix page, so they were left untouched.

I'm pretty sure there won't be a problem with moving them to the Reconstruction talk namespace, but I thought I would bring it up here, just in case. The main issue is that these are the archives for deletion discussions. In at least one case, a reconstruction page has been created where the deleted reconstruction would have been moved to (see Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/-u and Appendix talk:Proto-Germanic/-u). Because the deleted Appendix wasn't moved, a history merge will probably be needed to make sure the Reconstruction namespace page has all the pre-deletion revisions.

In fact, it would probably be a good idea to undelete all the deleted Appendix pages, move them to the Reconstruction namespace, then redelete them- with all the information about the deleted pages off in the Appendix and Appendix talk namespaces where most wouldn't think to look, no one will realize when they're recreating a deleted reconstruction.

So, what I'm suggesting is:

1. Find all the talk pages in the Appendix talk namespace for non-existent reconstruction pages
2. Move these Appendix talk pages to the Reconstruction talk namespace
   1. If a Reconstruction talk page already exists, merge the Appendix talk page (including its history) with the Reconstruction talk page.
3. Move the revision histories of any deleted reconstructions in the Appendix namespace to the Reconstruction namespace.
   1. Where there isn't a corresponding Reconstruction namespace page:
      1. Undelete the Appendix page
      2. Move it to the Reconstruction namespace
      3. Redelete it
   2. Where there already is a page in the corresponding Reconstruction namespace location, do a regular history merge from the Appendix into the Reconstruction page.
4. Where there's a Reconstruction namespace page that was created after the deletion of the Appendix namespace page, consider whether to nominate the Reconstruction page for deletion.

I think that covers it, but some of the details are tricky. I would appreciate additons or corrections. Thanks, Chuck Entz (talk) 21:26, 13 March 2026 (UTC)

• @Chuck Entz  Support Steps 1 and 2. Steps 3 and 4 seem less necessary to me, and sound labor-intensive (even if it's semiautomated). Do you have a way of knowing how many Appendix talk and how many Appendix pages we're talking about? — excarnateSojourner (ta·co) 20:38, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Matricaria recutita to Matricaria chamomilla

Our page for camomile previously said that the scientific name of German chamomile was "Matricaria recutita (fomerly knownn as Matricaria chamomilla)". To reiterate and elaborate on what I said in my edit comment on that entry: Wikipedia, Wikispecies, World Flora Online and Plants of the World Online all use Matricaria chamomilla. That last link also cites a dozen different botanical papers all of which use Matricaria chamomilla.

None of the three working links in the References section of this entry actually lead to an article or item named M. recutita. The first two both automatically redirect to M. chamomilla, and the third sends you to a page that says, in essence, "There's nothing here because this is the wrong name. Go to Category:Matricaria chamomilla". (The last link, to a USDA site, seems nonfunctional and never finishes loading.) ~2026-12648-22 (talk) 23:48, 17 March 2026 (UTC)

The USDA Plants database sometimes has valuable info. It was functional when I last used it this year. I hope it will be better maintained in the future.

I agree that Plants of the World Online is a nearly definitive source for plants. Also, Open Tree of Life, Catalogue of Life, and iNaturalist more generally.

In this case, your conclusion is certainly correct. I have updated [[Matricaria recutita]] (which IMO does not require an RFM or other permission) and not moved it, as someone may search for the old name and we may have links from other entries, such as recutita/recutitus. It would be highly desirable to have a new separate entry for Matricaria chamomilla. We may come up with an automated way to relink entries from old names to current ones to save users the extra read time and clicking/downloading. DCDuring (talk) 14:58, 18 March 2026 (UTC)

Splitting English "cum" into "cum" and "-cum-"

The page for the English word "cum" should probably split into cum and -cum-. There are several reasons for this. Firstly, -cum-, as in one word-cum-another is an interfix (with the alternate spelling of cum in some instances; the existing definition for what is currently etymology one on the page should probably be some form of an alternate spelling/form of -cum-, as -cum- seems more popular [see -fucking- and fucking for a potential analogue]). Secondly, the other definitions of cum are linguistically unrelated (e.g., ejaculation, eye dialect spelling of come). 𝕷𝖚𝖓𝖆𝖗𝖑𝖚𝖕𝖎𝖞𝖊☾𝕿☽⚸ 13:21, 26 March 2026 (UTC)

Hmm. I'm not yet convinced that cum in one word-cum-another is an interfix. Given that it also occurs without hyphens sometimes (as you acknowledge), it seems comparable to on or upon or at, which AFAIK are not interfixes even when hyphenated like Burton-on-Trent, Berwick-upon-Tweed, or man-at-arms. (Similarly, if in fiction I encounter a wolf-bear, or some other hybrid creature, this is not using wolf- as a prefix, nor -bear as a suffix: merely being preceded or followed by a hyphen doesn't make something an affix.)
There does seem to be a little uncertainty in some literature as to its part of speech: this paper says "I will avoid using the terms interfix and conjunction and will refer non-committally to cum as a linking element", and I see that the Oxford Companion to the English Language (Tom McArthur, Jacqueline Lam-McArthur, Lise Fontaine) says "INTERFIX. An element used to unite words and bases: the THEMATIC VOWELS -i- in agriculture, -o- in biography, and -a- in Strip-a-gram are interfixed vowels; the middle words in editor-in-chief, writer-cum-publisher, Rent-a-Car, and Sun 'n Sand are interfixed words", but they seem to view things very differently than we do, since we do not treat the -in- of editor-in-chief as an interfix (our entry -in- is for the -in- that occurs in e.g. altitudinal), nor do we treat 'n as an interfix (nor should we). Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage (2015), page 198, details the use of "the Latin preposition meaning 'with, together with' [...] in English" without AFAICT taking a stance on what part of speech it is in English. Among other dictionaries, the OED, Cambridge, Dictionary.com and the Oxford Learner's dictionary have cum as a preposition, Merriam-Webster has cum as a conjunction, and Collins has -cum- as a combining form. My inclination, when there are questions about what part of speech something is, is to take an Occam's razor approach and only posit that a word has acquired new parts of speech if there are uses that cannot be explained by the old part of speech. In this case, it seems like cum started as a preposition (back in Latin) and uses still seem to be explicable as prepositional...? - -sche (discuss) 15:46, 26 March 2026 (UTC)

I imagine that someone might use cum instead of with to avoid ambiguity associated with the various senses with has, despite cum#Latin being highly polysemic in Latin, much more than is shown by our, erm, spare entry. It is hard for me to read the uses of cum#English as unambiguously "and" rather than "accompanied by". DCDuring (talk) 19:07, 28 March 2026 (UTC)

Unlike in or upon, the cum in question, the one with this specific meaning, only seems to occur between two noun(-phrase)s or adjective(-phrase)s. It would appear to be a sort of conjunction, possibly a coordinator. Nicodene (talk) 21:59, 3 April 2026 (UTC)

Does cum ever occur truly interfixed into (or between) words, unspaced, like he was a writercumeditor, the way our other examples of interfixes do? If not, that speaks against the idea of it being an interfix and/or -cum-, IMO. The fact that it occurs without hyphens (with spaces) sometimes means we have to have some entry about it at cum in any case, and while we could define that cum as an alt form of -cum-, it seems like (again taking up Occam's razor) the not hyphen-encircled word cum can also explain the hyphenated examples without the need to posit *-cum- (like upon explains Berwick-upon-Tweed without the need to posit a word *-upon-), whereas if we had -cum- we'd have to have two entries (-cum- and cum). - -sche (discuss) 07:20, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

One of the reasons I suggested for -cum- as an interfix was because of -fucking- and fucking, which (when treated as a single word/variations of one word) occurs in three forms: with spaces ("Jesus fucking Christ"), with hyphens ("abso-fucking-lutely"), and without either ("unbefuckinglievable"). Cum or -cum- has the former two of those three forms; as far as I can tell, the latter form is unattested. Some other infixes and interfixes have similar hyphenated forms (see -a- and -o-, for example [coincidentally, -a- can be a conjunction, too, as can a]).

Irregardless of whether or not it actually is an interfix, we probably should have an entry for -cum-, as it seems (based on what I've personally come across in literature and on the interwebs) to be the most common form.

It very well may be that -cum- is a form of hyphenated <insert whatever part of speech -cum- or cum is (see below)>, like how -a- is a hyphenated conjunction; I would argue that if there are separate entries for a and -a-, then we should either follow its example with -cum- and cum or get rid of either a or -a-, for consistency reasons.

Oh, and another part of this debate: the part of speech of -cum- or cum. Let's take the example of singer-cum-songwriter. I originally suggested an interfix as the part of speech; let's start with that. Most interfixes don't really mean anything; they're just there. Singer-cum-songwriter could be construed as singer-songwriter, so we can't rule that out. A preposition also links two words, but so does a conjunction.

An example of a preposition would be upon (thank you, @-sche for giving me a good example). It's used in phrases like "chance upon (a noun)", in which it connects a verb and a noun, and "city upon a hill", in which it connects a noun and a noun preceded by an indefinite article. It seems to link verbs and nouns, nouns and nouns preceded by articles, or (proper) nouns and proper nouns (especially in place names). Cum and -cum- appear to link nouns and nouns or adjectives and adjectives. To me, based on the usage patterns of various prepositions, -cum- and cum is used in a manner inconsistent with prepositions. Funnily enough, this provides rationale for why, if we have an entry for -cum-, we shouldn't have an entry for -upon- (although, if someone can provide a good reason why we should have -upon-, I wouldn't be opposed to it; it's just that currently we have no such reasoning) ; -cum- isn't a conjunction.

Let's look at conjunctions, then. Cum or -cum- actually does seem to reflect the usage of and in certain scenarios, as one possible interpretation of our example, "singer-cum-songwriter", is "singer and songwriter". That's only for certain usages, though, and -cum- doesn't do well as a substitute for some other conjunctions. Even so, it's probably closer to a conjunction than a preposition.

That means that it's either an interfix or a conjunction, depending on how you interpret it. 𝕷𝖚𝖓𝖆𝖗𝖑𝖚𝖕𝖎𝖞𝖊☾𝕿☽⚸ 23:56, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

Move Suffrajitsu to suffrajitsu

The term "suffrajitsu" is not capitalized in any of the cites or on Wikipedia. ~2026-73884-3 (talk) 17:54, 28 March 2026 (UTC)

Moved. It should not be controversial, but let it sit here for a while. DCDuring (talk) 18:46, 28 March 2026 (UTC)

April 2026

Whasian

English. Tagged, but not listed. I'm not sure how we can tell which is more commonly used: NGram viewer is unreliable for this since there is a river named Wasian in Indonesia. A search for Wasians vs. Whasians also doesn't yield much of a reliable result either. Leasnam (talk) 04:24, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

Module:R:NLW

I request moving this module to Module:R:la:NLW; as its template {{R:la:NLW}} was moved from {{R:NLW}}, it makes sense to do the same to the module as well. Nota bene that the template (and its docs) will need to be corrected after the move. ~2026-19565-13 (talk) 00:45, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

Should -stan be moved to -istan?

The latter has more derived terms. J3133 (talk) 09:55, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

ein Schelm, der Böses dabei denkt

Should be moved to ein Schelm, wer Böses dabei denkt. DWDS considers the wer-form to be the primary form, and it's more common in this Uni Leipzig corpus. .viviwords (talk) 14:06, 8 April 2026 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₂éh₃mr̥

Should be moved to *h₁éh₂mr̥ or *Héh₂mr̥. The reconstruction with *h₃ is a fabrication that originated on Wiktionary and seems to have no basis in any academic literature. Moreover, it actively contradicts known IE sounds laws and also other pages on Wiktionary itself. Currently, we also have the page *h₂eh₃mós, according to which the sequence *h₂eh₃- yielded Old Armenian au- and Ancient Greek ὠ- (ō-), whereas the page *h₁éh₂mr̥ records the same PIE sequence yielding Old Armenian a- and Ancient Greek ἦ- (ê-). Beekes himself argues that the term must be reconstructed with initial *h₁eh₂- because a sequence beginning with *h₂- supposedly should yield initial h- in Armenian. However, most other Armenologists reconstruct the form with initial *Heh₂-. Beekes himself also seemingly recants his position in the EDG, where he also provides a form with initial *Heh₂-. Graearms (talk) 16:57, 10 April 2026 (UTC)

A move to *Héh₂mr̥ is fine for me, but just saying that the statement "according to Beekes—the second laryngeal must have been *h₂ to yield the initial ἦ- (ê-) in Ancient Greek" is inaccurate: the reason for *h₂ are the variants with α in Doric (and apparently Mycenaean). Exarchus (talk) 20:20, 10 April 2026 (UTC)

Oh yes, my mistake. Graearms (talk) 20:50, 10 April 2026 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and performed the move. Graearms (talk) 22:48, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

dickens, the dickens

Should these be merged? - -sche (discuss) 17:46, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

[[dickens]] seems much better. (Adverb PoS???) Also, I don't think there are very many terms with the that should be full entries. A label (usually with the) should work for an particular definition that warrants it. A dickens is not rare; very sometimes intrudes after the. BTW: odds dickens is some kind of interjection expression, possibly related to the minced oath odds bodkins. DCDuring (talk) 20:21, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

"the dickens" is defined as the devil (euphemistic); what are the contexts where you saw "a dickens"? I bet it means something else, perhaps an iota or jot (I don't give a dickens). ~2026-24212-34 (talk) 15:45, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

get someone at it, get something over with and have something over with

Would be more consistent with other pages to move them to get at it, get over with and have over with. ~2026-11487-24 (talk) ~2026-11487-24 (talk) 20:09, 16 April 2026 (UTC)

nachos and nacho

In English, the plural is clearly more common, but the singular occurs too. Can these English entries be merged? McYeee (talk) 04:22, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

japow

Always capital J in Google Books search results, and makes sense due to capital J on Japan. ~2026-24212-34 (talk) 15:40, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

Merge Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/-seti and Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/-(h₁)seti

Though Ringe and Fortson do mention a class of PIE s-presents, most other authors treat the adduced examples of this type as merely lexicalized desideratives. For instance, Ringe cites the verb ἀλέξω (aléxō) as an example of an s-present, but Kölligan just considers this term an original desiderative. The LIV actually considers the term to reflect a simple thematic present of a root *h₂leks-, which itself—according to the LIV—emerged via the schwebeablaut of a desiderative from a root *h₂elk-. Likewise, the examples Fortson cites, which include ἀέξω (aéxō) and its direct cognates, all are also explained as desideratives by Kolligan and Jasanoff. I would like to note that it is, at least in the cases of *h₂wég-se-ti and *h₂lékseti, it is completely impossible to tell the difference between a desiderative and an s-present, as the laryngeal was deleted between stops and the *-s-. We do have entries for other potentially non-existent verbal suffixes in PIE, such as the *(Ø)-éyeti suffix, so maybe we can keep the page for *-seti. However, at the very least, we do not necessarily need to treat any PIE terms as actually marked by this s-suffix, at least not without mention of the alternative possibility that they are desideratives.

Pinging relevant PIE editors: @Victar, @Exarchus, @ElkandAcquerne, @Mellohi! Graearms (talk) 19:03, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

Move LYMPHOPLETHOS to lymphoplethos

A user created this in all caps for some reason. ~2026-73884-3 (talk) 19:20, 25 April 2026 (UTC) @~2026-73884-3 the user created a bunch of entries for words they made up, which have all been speedily deleted- if they want to create entries, they will have to meet the requirements of our Criteria for inclusion. Case closed. Chuck Entz (talk) 20:55, 25 April 2026 (UTC)

komenic acid to comenic acid.

More common ~2026-21060-09 (talk) 06:33, 27 April 2026 (UTC)

May 2026

Proto-Indo-European *ḱréddʰeh₁ti (“to believe”) and *dʰédʰoh₁ti (“to put”)

@Victar, @Graearms, @Mellohi!, @Mahagaja This lemma form is not reconstructed by any of the references. Where De Vaan mentions *ḱred-dʰeh₁- it denotes a root, not a stem. He actually reconstructs *ḱred-dʰh₁-e-ti. LIV makes clear that this is the result of thematization of the weak stem of present *dʰé-dʰoh₁-ti. That this was the PIE present is also obvious from the Indo-Iranian descendants, while the Proto-Celtic *-dī- represents a continuation of the root aorist *dʰéh₁t. This would also remove the need to reconstruct another PIE present stem.

Accordingly, *dʰé-dʰeh₁-ti should be moved to *dʰé-dʰoh₁-ti. LIV should clearly receive precedence over Ringe here, as they consider the PIE verbal system as a whole. Ringe (2006, p. 148) justifies the pre-form *dʰé-dʰeh₁-ti with a sound change *ę­̄ > *ą̄ in Proto-Germanic which is without clear parallel. *dʰé-dʰoh₁-ti would obviate this. (It is a mystery to me why Ringe hardly references LIV, even in his 2017 2nd edition.) —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 23:51, 2 May 2026 (UTC)

There's so many points to your request to process here.

• Ancient Greek τίθημι (títhēmi) clearly speaks against a root o-grade. Is there any other actual evidence of o-grade in the root of reduplicated presents other than allegedly the Germanic present stem?
• "a sound change *ę­̄ > *ą̄ in Proto-Germanic which is without clear parallel" Do any counterexamples where *ę­̄ turned into anything else exist in Germanic? And there's a clear parallel in French en > /ɑ̃/, which is near-exactly this very change.
• How do you even derive the preterite *dedē without a stem *dʰe-dʰeh₁-? It cannot be from a stative (the usual source of Germanic strong preterites) since those would demand an o-grade root, which clearly is not present here.

— mellohi! (Goodbye!) 02:38, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

• Graearms talked about τίθημι (títhēmi) below. Hittite 3sg dāi “puts” exhibits a clear o-grade.
• Parallel was a poorly chosen word of me. What I meant was that is that this is an ad hoc solution to explain *dedǭ. There is no other clear example in PG of this sound change.
• I don't know. I think either way Proto-Germanic *dōną is a difficult paradigm to fully explain. —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 15:16, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

  Kloekhorst provides an alternative etymology for Hittite 𒁕𒀀𒄿 (da-a-i), connecting it to *deh₃-. Also, it is a hi-conjugation verb. The exact prehistory of this class is one of the most controversial issues in Indo-European studies. Graearms (talk) 15:39, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

  @Caoimhin ceallach@Mellohi!, the linguist Andreas Willi actually does derive the Germanic forms from a reduplicated present with an o-grade root. Graearms (talk) 19:42, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

I wasn't fair to Ringe (2017). He does address the point of reduplicating o-grade presents in LIV on p. 33, ft. 23. —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 15:20, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

@Exarchus, Theknightwho as well, who may also have insights on this matter. — mellohi! (Goodbye!) 02:45, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

The reconstruction of reduplicated presents in PIE is extremely complicated and the notion that the LIV purports a widely accepted or unproblematic view of this verbal formation in PIE is erroneous. See Hill & Frotscher (2012), p. 106, for a discussion of the various different approaches to reconstructing this class in PIE. Regarding the reconstruction of specifically *dʰédʰeh₁ti, the Greek form τίθημι (títhēmi) does point to e-grade vocalism in the PIE form, though Hill and Frotscher (page, 112) suggest that it could be analogical to δίδωμι (dídōmi), which could be explained from either an e- or o-grade pre-form. I do know of one linguist who explicitly argues against the existence of o-grade reduplicated presents: Ryan Sandell, who in his discussion of this type in PIE and Vedic, writes "that the reduplicated present took *o-grade of the root in its strong stem seems improbable, insofar as a stem *bʰé-bʰor- would then be very similar to the stem of the PIE perfect." He was actually discussing a different example here, that being bíbharti, which—as noted by Sandell—does not showcase the operation of Brugmann's Law in the 3sg.pres.subj form bíbharati, further contradicting the existence of an original o-grade in this form. Of course, this is not the same word as dádhāti, but it still showcases that presents of this type did not necessarily possess the o-grade in PIE. The LIV actually does address this issue; it actually reconstructs different root vocalism for the i- and e-reduplicated presents. But also, the issue of the reduplicant in these formations and the accentuation of the type is itself an extraordinarily complicated issue. Once again, see Hill & Frotscher for more detail. Graearms (talk) 03:00, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

I looked at this some time ago and my impression was that o-grade in reduplicated presents seems to have been abandoned since LIV. Exarchus (talk) 10:01, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

---

xo

Gun xo specifically, to xó and xò respectively. it's how the terms are spelled, don't know why they're in the xo page. Zonedbaser (talk) 05:40, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

Technical move: へだてる to 隔てる

• Current page: へだてる
• Target page: 隔てる
• Reason: The target page is currently a redirect with a short edit history (including a bot-added reference), which is blocking a standard move. This is a technical request to move the full history of the current article over the existing redirect. ElipsaPsipa (talk) 18:48, 7 May 2026 (UTC)

Edit history merge ranceo and Reconstruction:Latin/ranceo

The latter was turned into a redirect for the former, but the request in the archived RRD discussion for a history merge was not carried out. Can a mod do that so that the contribution history at Reconstruction:Latin/ranceo is preserved even if the redirect page is later deleted? Urszag (talk) 06:36, 8 May 2026 (UTC)

Move Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/oḱtṓw to Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/Hoḱtṓw or *(H)oḱtṓw

It is often thought that PIE avoided word-initial vowels, which is the only reason *h₁éḱwos is reconstructed and not *éḱwos. If we are going to provide an initial laryngeal for *h₁éḱwos, presumably we should do the same for *oḱtṓw *oḱtṓwos, and *oḱtódḱomt. Given that the existence of an initial laryngeal is not provable in this particularly case, perhaps we should actually provide *(H)o- to remain neutral on the subject. However, if we are going to accept that solution, we should also move *h₁éḱwos to *(h₁)éḱwos}} as the same logic applies. Graearms (talk) 23:10, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

that's saying something

This also often formulated which is saying something (and maybe other wordings too), so I think it should be moved to saying something. HootenannyHoller (talk) 04:57, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

trumptanic

Please move to Trumptanic. The creating user did capitalisation wrongly (in the usage example too, writing "i might" instead of "I might") so this is clearly what was intended. Citations:Trumptanic has the capital-T citations. ~2026-28839-12 (talk) 10:19, 13 May 2026 (UTC)

Done. Stationspatiale (talk) 20:09, 13 May 2026 (UTC)

English-speaking, Russian-speaking, Spanish-speaking

these are translation hubs, but they seem unnecessary given that we have Anglophone, Russophone and Hispanophone. Content can simply be moved there. HootenannyHoller (talk) HootenannyHoller (talk) 11:54, 13 May 2026 (UTC)

Indeed. Redirect them. - -sche (discuss) 07:22, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

Redirect the nominated ones whenever we have "-phone" entries. However, there's no "-phone" equivalent of Hindi-speaking and Hindi speaker. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 14:48, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

@Sbb1413: I have deleted the translation hubs you created: Bengali speaker and Bengali-speaking as we already had Banglaphone, and Hindi speaker and Hindi-speaking as I have created Hindiphone. J3133 (talk) 10:39, 1 June 2026 (UTC)

Thank you. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 10:40, 1 June 2026 (UTC)

Per WT:THUB, "The existence of a rare single-word English synonym of the considered English term does not disqualify the considered English term." Anglophone is a common enough word, but Russophone and Hispanophone are considerably rarer. jlwoodwa (talk) 23:03, 1 June 2026 (UTC)

I think rare words should be explicitly labelled as {{lb|en|rare}}, which is not the case for the entries Russophone and Hispanophone. However, I do understand the rarity of Banglaphone, Hindiphone and Urduphone compared to "Bengali-speaking", "Hindi-speaking" and "Urdu-speaking" respectively. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 09:34, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

In lots of languages Anglophone and English-speaking are different concepts: German: anglophon / englischsprachig, Spanish: anglófono / angloparlante. Not exactly the same thing. Mixing all this in one page makes it harder to navigate from one language to another (whole purpose of translation hubs). "Anglophone" is still kinda rare compared to "English-speaking". Nyuhn (talk) 08:45, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

But the English entry Anglophone has only one adjective meaning: "English-speaking". If you can pinpoint the distinction between anglophon and englischsprachig in German, I would be more than happy to update the Anglophone entry to cover both meanings. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 09:30, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Maybe some native speakers can confirm or deny, but my nonnative intuition is that people can be called anglophon but not englischsprachig, which is reserved for things spoken or written in English, like movies or newspapers. —Mahāgaja · talk 10:58, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Anglophone adj = (one of the meaning) related to the US and other anglophone countries (Longman Dictionary, 2009), related to countries with majority of native English speaker. Sweden is not Anglophone country, but an English-speaking country. englischsprachig & anglojęzyczny = (one of the meaning) written in the English language. "English-language book" (anglojęzyczna książka) - ok, "Anglophone book" - obscure & rare. Nyuhn (talk) 11:00, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

not enough to hang a dog on

English. Move to enough to hang a dog on (keeping redirect?). More inclusive without not: about as many cases without not as with it. It is at least possible that the target form is SoP. Also should be adjective PoS, IMO. DCDuring (talk) 16:33, 13 May 2026 (UTC)

Kentucky wonder bean

Capital W, i.e. Kentucky Wonder bean. ~2026-28839-12 (talk) 20:48, 13 May 2026 (UTC)

nakht

Should be moved to Nakht, since it's a proper noun.

It should be deleted per WT:NSE, as it has been under both uppercase and lowercase forms. There's an extremely stubborn anonymous editor who keeps recreating it along with tons of other edits. Of those, they range from okay, to lame, to ungrammatical, to just plain wrong, to obvious vandalism. @Surjection. Chuck Entz (talk) 17:58, 16 May 2026 (UTC)

See Talk:Nakht. - -sche (discuss) 07:23, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

'Droid

Page should be deleted with the contents moving to 'droid. Frog x Lover (talk) 15:15, 22 May 2026 (UTC)

dumaresq

To Dumaresq: comes from a surname and always written with capital D. Similar to the car "a Ford" having capital F. ~2026-30763-90 (talk) 16:30, 23 May 2026 (UTC)

Category:Bangalore

The English Wikipedia article Bangalore was recently renamed to Bengaluru as per Talk:Bengaluru#Requesting move from Bangalore to Bengaluru. Most recent media outlets are using the name "Bengaluru", especially in India. So, I propose to rename this category to Bengaluru as well. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 14:35, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

June 2026

English Bluebell

Please move to English bluebell. Was mis-entered as a proper noun with inappropriate capitals. ~2026-32651-88 (talk) 16:41, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/krumô

Shouldn't this be Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/krumǭ? Also, this entry and the closely related *krūmô both need to be sourced and cleaned up. Probably various forms of an Early Proto-Germanic n-stem along the lines of *kreumô which split up (or had already done so in Pre-Proto-Germanic); the Nordic descendants of the latter point to an a-stem, and note *kraumaz also mentioned on that entry (a separate PIE *grow(H)-mo-s would be unusual, so more likely it is thematicized ⇐ *kraumô; cf. *manna(n)-, *felma(n)-). The Icelandic descendant krumur should probably be separated as well. — ~2026-29736-44 (talk) 02:48, 11 June 2026 (UTC)

anglo concertina

Always capitalised i.e. Anglo concertina: please fix plural too. ~2026-34218-01 (talk) 13:33, 11 June 2026 (UTC)

lick someone's boots

Should it be renamed as "lick one's boots"? AB4093 [ Talk | Contributions ] 01:38, 21 June 2026 (UTC)

@ArsenalBastion4093: No, because that would imply licking one's own boots. This action is always directed at another person, so your formulation would only work if one were talking about someone else licking one's boots. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:45, 21 June 2026 (UTC)

Merge Template:pa-personal pronouns and Template:pa pronoun table

Scope is mirrored between the two RajanD100 (talk) 23:41, 21 June 2026 (UTC)

Thesaurus:con artist

Thesaurus:confidence trickster

Can these thesauri be merged? Also, there seems to be overlap with Thesaurus:deceiver (though the latter is broader in scope). — Sgconlaw (talk) 17:20, 22 June 2026 (UTC)

Gaulish sessa

Should be treated as a reconstruction if it's only indirectly attested. Graearms (talk) 00:45, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

Loonix and Lunix

Both are popular derogatory terms for Linux on social media, mainly on Reddit but also elsewhere. I guess both entries should be merged since the pronunciation and definition are similar, thus being alternative spellings. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 06:23, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

I created the Lunix page from memories of critics of Linux (on all sides) using that name for it in the early 2000s and i think even the late 1990s. funnily enough there was an actual OS called Lunix too, so it's a bit hard ot search for right now, but i believe that either theese are two unrelated coinages or Loonix is derived from Lunix. —Soap— 16:07, 16 July 2026 (UTC)

I created LUnix for the OS, which recently got deleted per Talk:LUnix. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 18:22, 16 July 2026 (UTC)

तिरश्च

@Dragonoid76 I propose to move the adjective with descendants to the reconstruction namespace as the adjective is only a reconstruction by Turner. The noun is a hapax and Mayrhofer and others prefer the alternative reading ति॒र॒श्च्ये॑ (tiraścyè) (from ति॒र॒श्च्य॑ (tiraścyà)). Exarchus (talk) 14:18, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

Correction: the adjective stem तिरश्च is apparently attested in the Jaina version of the Pañcatantra, see Wackernagel's Altindische Grammatik, volume III, page 230. Exarchus (talk) 21:31, 11 July 2026 (UTC)