gosling

See also: Gosling

English

Two geese with four goslings.

Etymology

From Late Middle English gosling, goselyng (“gosling”), alteration (due to Middle English goos, gose (“goose”)) of earlier gesling (“gosling”), of North Germanic origin, from Old Norse gæsling, géslingr (“gosling”), from gás (“goose”) + -lingr (“-ling”), equivalent to goose +‎ -ling. Cognate with Danish gæsling (“gosling”), Swedish gässling (“gosling”). Compare also Low German gossel, gössel (“gosling”), German Gänslein (“gosling”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ɡɒzlɪŋ/
• (US, Canada) IPA^(key): /ɡɑzlɪŋ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Noun

gosling (plural goslings)

1. A young goose.
2. A callow (immature, inexperienced) / foolish, naive, young person.
3. (dated) A catkin on nut trees and pines.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Bailey to this entry?)

Synonyms

• gooseling

Related terms

• goose
• duckling
• swanling

Translations

young goose

• Bulgarian: гъсе n (gǎse)
• Cornish: godhik m
• Czech: house (cs) n
• Dutch: gansje (nl) n, ganzenjong n
• Erzya: люляка (ljuljaka)
• Esperanto: anserido
• Estonian: please add this translation if you can
• Finnish: hanhenpoikanen, hanhenpoika
• French: oison (fr) m, oiselet (fr) m (literary)
• German: Gänseküken n, Gänslein n, Gänschen n, (North German) Gössel (de) n, junge Gans f
• Hebrew: אווזון‎
• Hungarian: kisliba (hu)
• Irish: góislín m, éan gé m
• Italian: ochetto m, ochetta f, papero (it) m, papera (it) f, (diminutive) paperino m, (diminutive) paperina f
• Korean: 새끼거위 (saekkigeowi)
• Lithuanian: žąsiukas (lt) m

• Manx: eean guiy m
• Mi'kmaq: tagali'ji'j anim (domestic)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: gåsunge m

  Nynorsk: gåsunge m

• Polish: gąsię (pl) n, gęsię (pl) n
• Portuguese: gansinho m
• Romanian: boboc (ro) m
• Russian: гусёнок (ru) m (gusjónok)
• Scottish Gaelic: isean geòidh m
• Slovak: húsa n, húsatko n (diminutive)
• Spanish: ansarino m
• Swedish: gässling (sv) c
• Turkish: (dialectal) badi (tr)
• Welsh: cyw gŵydd m
• Yiddish: גענדזל‎ n (gendzl)

callow (immature, inexperienced) / foolish, naive young person

• Dutch: domme gans f
• German: Grünschnabel (de) m

• Italian: (female) ochetta f
• Russian: глупы́ш (ru) m (glupýš)

Anagrams

• golgins, logings, oglings

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Middle English

Noun

gosling

1. Alternative form of goselyng