Wiktionary:Requests for verification/English

Wiktionary Request pages (edit) see also: discussions
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{{attention}} • {{rfap}} • {{rfdate}} • {{rfquote}} • {{rfdef}} • {{rfeq}} • {{rfe}} • {{rfex}} • {{rfi}} • {{rfp}}

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

This page is for entries in English. For entries in other languages, see Wiktionary:Requests for verification/Non-English.

Scope of this request page:

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

Templates:

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

Shortcut:

• WT:RFV

See also:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Oldest tagged RFVs

• trema
  ↑
  ↓
  soothness
  superseminate
  poiuytrewq
  Hawai`ian
  pilk
  vorny
  failscade
  failcascade
  accordion
  abstorted
  pantaphobia
  special
  herbert
  atheist
  Satan
  I'dn't
  nuke
  blag
  born
  flower
  uvic
  Ames
  pal up
  chromatotron
  bigfootologist
  nonkilling
  royd
  proliferation
  morning-after
  civic activity
  BeReal
  MCCE
  boot
  code vector
  spade
  slaveboy
  pash
  abarcy
  oversit
  compilation behaviour
  underfong
  dominus vobiscum
  nuces vomicae
  oes
  ponderosa
  kaparrang
  malasapsap
  virtually
  kreyk
  Dniprova
  aquan
  structural
  pyment
  VIPer
  win one's spurs
  Adessenarian
  Ainur
  dihydrohydroxyfuran
  clitwad
  🄫
  ignorantia juris non excusat
  false venus comb
  demisemihemidemisemiquaver
  away
  Hispanic panic
  pick flowers
  rontosecond
  heartburn
  Meeteilogist
  Meiteilogist
  Meiteiologist
  allege
  Classical Meitei
  Classical Manipuri
  Ancient Meitei
  louk
  centimate
  Hu
  English vice
  German vice
  facingly
  concrete
  infin.
  in-line
  taptastic
  helang
  shis
  Odajyan
  palpebrate
  bête de scène
  feign
  underfriction
  wray
  Romaboo
  cyberethical
  snowman hole
  whorenalist
  

February 2020

gayelle

A lesbian. Term proposed on a Web site that never caught on; I see no uses in Google Books. Equinox ◑ 14:07, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

I found a couple of mentions (here and here), but no actual uses, except ones that are not durably archived, such as this and this. Kiwima (talk) 21:04, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 09:33, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

IMO the 2008 citation is not acceptable. It uses the word as a word: "choosing gayelle", like "saying strawberry aloud". Equinox ◑ 20:12, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Ok, I have added another one. It seems to be emerging as a word, but is still too new to have made most writing that is not targetted at the gay community. Kiwima (talk) 21:22, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Not cited. Two of the three non-mention cites are from autostraddle.com, which is not durably archived. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 00:17, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

There are still only two non-mention cites on the page. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 20:04, 21 December 2020 (UTC)

March 2020

macropicide

All mentions, no uses- even on regular Google search. Chuck Entz (talk) 04:54, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

I managed to find one use (on citations page). There is also this, but it doesn't count. Kiwima (talk) 22:32, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

May 2020

murbie

(It's short for "market urbanist".) I've found tweets ([1], [2], [3], [4]), but nothing in more permanent places. Note that it's apparently not that intuitive, as you can frequently see people asking "what's a murbie?" in the replies. grendel|khan 22:55, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

y'all

Rfv-sense: "To block discussion on an internet board to restrict dissent". If attestable, I'd be interested in knowing what the etymology is. —Mahāgaja · talk 08:15, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

Ety presumably a social justice thing: [5]. In such circles those who disagree are encouraged to "sit down and shut up", "educate themselves" etc. Equinox ◑ 13:20, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

On closer inspection this seems to be Reddit slang. Try googling "got y'alled". Equinox ◑ 18:31, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

Etymology from Know Your Meme: "Y'all can't behave." Vox Sciurorum (talk) 19:15, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

I do not think this will be citable. I assert that it is clearly in use. I do not assert that it is clearly in widespread use. Like the emoji crab, it lives in a corner of the internet that Wiktionary does not quote. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 18:18, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

metrostenosis

DTLHS (talk) 19:55, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

I found a single relevant cite. Another use seems to be a misconstruction of mitral stenosis. – 21:12, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Although it appears in a dictionary, I would consider this to be a use, which gives us two cites. Kiwima (talk) 20:56, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

litiatic

DTLHS (talk) 21:54, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

I created lithiatic, which this might have been an error for. Old Man Consequences (talk) 13:59, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

I have added two cites. Kiwima (talk) 21:55, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

June 2020

enneacontakaienneagon

99-sided polygon. Seen in word lists only? Equinox ◑ 00:22, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

July 2020

nigger killer

A vinegaroon or whip scorpion. I created this entry some years ago, can't remember where I saw the word, but it seems impossible to attest in use from Google Books, though there are a few mentions, e.g. (1976, Arthropods of Florida and Neighboring Land Areas, page 22) "This large, semi-chelate whip scorpion has several local colloquial common names. Marx (1886) listed nigger killer, mule killer, grampus, vinaigrier, and vinegar maker." I am not sure which Marx that was; the one you're thinking of died in 1883. Equinox ◑ 01:48, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

The Marx in question is George Marx. I'm not sure any of the texts mentioning this expression are independent of Marx's article. --Lvovmauro (talk) 06:49, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

The Marx I'm thinking of died in 1977. —Mahāgaja · talk 07:21, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

Lvovmauro has just extended the entry with a lot more entries, and some citations, which is nice (thanks!). We still have the use-mention problem. Equinox ◑ 09:59, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 22:16, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

Re-opened because one of the three citations is a dictionary, not a use, and another is of "people who call it Nigger Killer", which is probably a mention(?). The sweet potato sense also has a mention for one of its three citations, and the "rum" sense has mentions for two of its three citations, even if we tolerate the variation in hyphenation, etc. I'll try to see if I can find any more citations myself later. - -sche (discuss) 22:28, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

pimo

Listed as initialism, but shouldn't be capitalised? Also, the sense needs to be checked. --Robbie SWE (talk) 10:44, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

Same person seems to have created pomi; consider RFVing also. Equinox ◑ 23:07, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

I can confirm from personal experience that the term is in use in the x-Jehovah's Witness community, cf. also https://xjwfriends.com/2018/01/08/ex-jw-terms/

August 2020

Anitwitter

DTLHS (talk) 03:50, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

Because of the nature of the term, "Anitwitter" is not used much in news articles or books. Googling "anitwitter" (quotes included) brings up over 75,000 results. Searching the term on Twitter (Can't link) under latest Tweets shows it has "clearly widespread use". Is this valid evidence? If so, can I just remove the request for verification or do I need to put something on the page? AntisocialRyan (talk) 04:09, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

It does seem to be a thing people say on or about Twitter. Related to the RFV of the crab emoji, how much does something have to be said on Twitter before we waive the durable citation rule? Vox Sciurorum (talk) 22:22, 12 August 2020 (UTC)

philateliana

I could find two uses (Citations:philateliana), but even a Google search doesn't return any other results. @SemperBlotto – Einstein2 (talk) 15:15, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

No other results. I wonder how many more words have been added that are not attested but were not added to RFV (also considering that it is an administrator who created it, thus perhaps should know better than to add unattested words and rely on other users to check if they are actually attested). J3133 (talk) 11:18, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

@SemperBlotto J3133 (talk) 15:18, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

I know that SemperBlotto creates many entries but that would not be an excuse for creating entries for unattested terms. Should I post somewhere regarding administrators creating them? I do not know. Either way, it seems that SemperBlotto is avoiding to take responsibility. J3133 (talk) 16:29, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

@Einstein2 You added this entry to RFV; I would like to hear your thoughts regarding my reply. J3133 (talk) 16:37, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

@J3133 I don't know much about this matter, but if it is part of a larger pattern of adding unattested entries, it certainly is a problem – given that we don't have the capacity to search for attestation for every new entry. – Einstein2 (talk) 17:06, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

miranym

Interesting word, but one independent use shy of passing the RFV as far as I can find. — Ungoliant ^(falai) 23:48, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

I added the two books mentioned in the entry to the citations page, but one seems like a mention (it's a glossary-like list of words and their definitions). The other one contains a mention followed by what arguably is one use. The string also occurs as someone's twitter(?) handle in this magazine, which isn't really a citation; it's not in any other magazines nor in academic journals AFAICT. (It's also a multiple-choice option in this seemingly not durably exam.) - -sche (discuss) 07:02, 6 September 2020 (UTC)

September 2020

wind-break

Noun #2: flatulence/a fart. Used by WF's family, he claims! Equinox ◑ 20:58, 19 September 2020 (UTC)

WF also added a farty sense to windbreaker, blaming their family too. --Daleusher (talk) 23:50, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

I certainly see it, although mostly in non-durably archived text. I added two cites, and there are probably more out there. Kiwima (talk) 00:45, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

cited, but it seems more commonly spelled windbreak, so I have moved the definition there. Kiwima (talk) 21:43, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 09:03, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

Not cited. I just removed quotes that were from various blogs and digital-only news sources (i.e. not durably archived). The two quotes that remain are actually for wind break, not windbreak. If a third can be found, that's where this sense ought to go. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:58, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

October 2020

adrenokinetic

DTLHS (talk) 15:52, 1 October 2020 (UTC)

I see several mentions (in other dictionaries) but not uses. I also checked Google Scholar and Issuu. - -sche (discuss) 18:26, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

adrenokinesis

DTLHS (talk) 15:53, 1 October 2020 (UTC)

Spleef, spleef

Rfv-sense of the Minecraft verb. The noun for the game was already deleted at RFD. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 06:04, 4 October 2020 (UTC)

I have added two cites to the citations page, but could not find any more durably archived sources (there are plenty of versions of this verb on blogs and on promotional material). The deletion of the name of the game is not a clear reason to delete the verb. Kiwima (talk) 21:25, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

If the verb form is to stay then the noun form of "A game in which players must destroy the ground under other players to remove them from the game." must be on the page; they can't exist separately, otherwise I have to explain the noun on the verb. – Nixinova [‌T|C] 05:07, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

Explaining the noun at the verb is fine. Don't add a noun just to help you edit! Equinox ◑ 00:54, 14 November 2020 (UTC)

But the verb is literally mentioning a noun form of the word: "To play a game of Spleef". I dont think the RFV was for the definition of what I mentioned in my previous comment, right? So the noun should be added because the verb mentions that there is a noun form of "Spleef". – Nixinova [‌T|C] 23:08, 14 November 2020 (UTC)

bromopnean

I could find a single cite. – Einstein2 (talk) 10:09, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

I found a 2nd, which I added.

It also gets a G-hit with Mrs. Byrne's Dictionary of Unusual, Obscure, and Preposterous Words from 1974, but there's no preview to verify. Of course, the latter doesn't qualify in itself, unless it has a quote, but it suggests she found it somewhere prior to the date of either of our sources. kwami (talk) 04:25, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

disemelevator

Get out of an elevator. I think this has only ever been used in the single text cited. Equinox ◑ 05:55, 10 October 2020 (UTC)

• If so, the quote could be moved to illustrate disen- (which would need to be created). Ƿidsiþ 12:11, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Except that the "m" wouldn't be there if it were "disen-". Without looking at the context, it seems like a playful reference to disembark, with an elevator being compared to a ship. Using the phonologically correct form would make that less obvious. Chuck Entz (talk) 15:04, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
    • Given the otherwise odd m, I think this can indeed just as well be considered either a blend with disembark or (as our etymology currently considers it) dis- + em-. On the other hand, R. M. W Dixon, Making New Words: Morphological Derivation in English (2014), page 101, in the process of discussing the addition of dis- to en- ~ em- words "to indicate reversal", as in dis-em-bark, dis-en-throne and dis-en-tangle, adds that "There are some, rather uncommon, derivations with disen- ~ disem- where no verb with just en- ~ em- occurs; for example disem-burden." He is wrong there (I can find emburden), but it's possible disen- ~ disem- does exist on other words. This makes me think of Talk:-icity, because here too it could be argued that cases of disem- where no em- is attested are just happenstance and em- nonetheless could exist and shouldn't impede analysis as dis- + em-. (We do seem to have lately started avoiding "unnecessary" compound affixes; compare Wiktionary:Requests_for_deletion/Non-English#-aise,_-aises.) - -sche (discuss) 16:22, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

I managed to find a second and independent quote. There is also a use here, and another here, although I don't think those are durably archived, so we still need a third. Kiwima (talk) 20:51, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

crayon

Rfv-sense (rail transport) An informal map of a proposed rail route.

I've seen it used in comments on Alon Levy's writings ([6],[7]) and on Twitter ([8], [9], [10], [11]); it may be a clipping of "crayon map", which we don't have an entry for yet. Seems hard to attest, as it's pretty slangy. See also a one-off coining of "crayonista" ([12]) by a writer playing off the tendency to draw fanciful maps. (See also [13], [14], [15].) grendel|khan 17:44, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

What are the odds that this is limited to rail transport? DCDuring (talk) 19:39, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

Indeed, isn't this covered by def. 3 "A crayon drawing."? DCDuring (talk) 19:47, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

@DCDuring: It's not literally a crayon drawing, though; this, for example, is obviously not a crayon drawing, but it is a crayon in the sense of an informally-drawn rail map. (There may well be non-rail uses, but I haven't found any.) grendel|khan 19:37, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

@Grendelkhan: it sounds like a revival of the figurative sense "[a] work not carried out in detail, a 'sketch'", marked as obsolete by the OED in an entry last updated in 1893. — SGconlaw (talk) 21:37, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

tetartosphere

Not many ghits. Some are mentions, not uses. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 22:24, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

I added two solid citations to the citations page, plus one reference to a twitter thread (which is probably not durably archived). Kiwima (talk) 21:06, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 00:23, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

• Not cited. Twitter doesn't count, and I am not inclined to give the benefit of the doubt when the two uses are from authors probably not writing in their native language (or even language family). Vox Sciurorum (talk) 14:27, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

November 2020

norminal

I believe we need a formal and durably-archived attestation conveying the meaning of the term norminal. It appears the word was added by an IP editor about two weeks ago.

As a deeply involved editor on the English Wikipedia as part of the Spaceflight WikiProject, and a follower of spaceflight technology, I can offer that I have heard the word used for some time now, but that's mere original research and does not count for a set of durably-archived attestations that demonstrate the word meets the Wiktionary criteria for inclusion. The word was used once today on the NASA livecast where the SpaceX Falcon 9 and Crew Dragon Resilence capsule is carrying four astronauts to the International Space Station over the next 27 hours via a NASA paid-for transport contract, so I would expect we may see some media repetition of the word in the next day or so which will likely support the Nov 2020 use of the term. So probably will just need attestation of older uses from a few years ago. N2e (talk) 01:14, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Plenty of Google Book Hits for "norminal", but I would imagine that most if not all all are typos/scannos/blunders for "nominal". Intentional use will be hard to prove, I think. Mihia (talk) 20:53, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

As an aerospace engineer, I can confirm the word norminal is in common usage within the field. Retired U.S. Air Force colonel John Insprucker first used the term during a recorded SpaceX launch narration of the Intelsat 35e launch streamed live on Jul 5, 2017. The Webcast was captured on video, and the use of term occurred at timestamp 11:37. Since then, the term has become an injoke within the aerospace community. There is a reasonable discussion of the term on StackExchange. It has become commonplace to see hats and t-shirts with the word, as promulgated by Tim Dodd, and others. There is a "norminal" tag on Instagram. You will see the term in the comments from Military.com's article on a SpaceX launch on May 25, 2020. — This unsigned comment was added by Prototypo (talk • contribs) at 23:34, 16 November 2020 (UTC).

Did it originate as a mistake for nominal or a blend of normal and nominal? DCDuring (talk) 17:28, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

cuntboy, sense 2

"A young man who has a vagina; a female-to-male transgender who has not had bottom surgery, or a character in speculative fiction." This is actually three senses for some reason listed as one; the first is oxymoronic, second and third are both cryptic (may also involve WT:FICTION). Are any attested? Ya hemos pasao (talk) 08:04, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

The first is not oxymoronic at all, and the second, which is not cryptic and doesn't involve WT:FICTION, is a specific instance of the first. But whether the word is attested with that meaning is of course the crucial question. Sense 1 is the only sense I'm familiar with myself. —Mahāgaja · talk 09:39, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

I have added two cites but we still need a third. Kiwima (talk) 02:14, 6 December 2020 (UTC)

December 2020

squiry

Not convinced La más guay (talk) 22:50, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

• It's a Middle English word that survived into the 16th century and we can keep it because there are about 8 uses if you combine the two eras. The quote you were looking to date appears in OED as "1525 Ld. Berners Froiss II clxxi. 505. It was nedefull for them within to make good defence, for against them was the floure of chyvalry and squyry." Vox Sciurorum (talk) 00:01, 14 December 2020 (UTC)
• Cited with a single modern English quotation as a continuation of its ancestor Middle English squierie. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 13:57, 14 December 2020 (UTC)

not cited. We still only have two cites in Modern English. Kiwima (talk) 22:00, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

Meganesia

Rfv-sense the proposed name for Australia, as in the modern country. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:15, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

I am unsure, but I did put a couple of cites on the citations page. Kiwima (talk) 01:39, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

January 2021

what

Tagged by 2003:de:3727:ff66:943c:e458:552c:9b20 today (using the RFC template; specifically the adverb section), not listed: “Chaucer and Malory aren't English but Middle English. (+ RfV for the English senses which have non-English cites?” J3133 (talk) 09:52, 21 January 2021 (UTC)

RFV-failed Kiwima (talk) 15:15, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

parkway

Rfv-sense: "A road; a thoroughfare"

Too general. All use I am aware of is included in the other, more specific definitions in the entry. DCDuring (talk) 16:25, 21 January 2021 (UTC)

I am not sure whether we need all of the other definitions, because of substantial overlap. DCDuring (talk) 21:45, 21 January 2021 (UTC)

RFV-failed Kiwima (talk) 09:43, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

autonowashing

Another hot word with few attestations. Few of the web results seem durable and I also doubt that they are independent. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 08:36, 23 January 2021 (UTC)

The word, a piece of argot, was coined in the autonomous technology literature, which is a rapidly growing area of research. What "results" fail independence and durability?

Here is the Google Scholar citation profile for the initial article: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?oi=bibs&hl=en&cites=11683217585197084451 QRep2020 (talk) 15:52, 30 January 2021 (UTC)

Added attestations. QRep2020 (talk) 19:38, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

The Google Scholar citation is fine, but the others are not permanently archived. Can we find anything else? Kiwima (talk) 22:10, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

Ok, I have different attestations to add in that case. Does this one not work though? https://doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93856 I would think so since it has a DOI and is said to be saved in all kinds of databases: https://www.intechopen.com/how-open-access-publishing-with-intechopen-works. QRep2020 (talk) 20:26, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

I added some different attestations. How is it looking now? QRep2020 (talk) 20:54, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

vincian

— surjection ⟨??⟩ 16:05, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

I can find mentions, but no uses, and those mentions capitalize the word (Vincian), so at best, this should be moved to that entry. Kiwima (talk) 00:59, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

The listed synonyms patroclian and wildean may well require capitals too (if they aren't altogether invented!). Equinox ◑ 04:59, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

RFV-failed Kiwima (talk) 22:09, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

oil driller

Sounds like something that came straight out of UD. — surjection ⟨??⟩ 09:39, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

It's real internet slang (there's also an adjective oil-drilling), but I doubt it is durably citable. At least it is accurately labelled. Some clickbait sites also use it for a sexual position, that may also be uncitable. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 12:13, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

RFV-failed Kiwima (talk) 22:13, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

golden ticket

Sense 2: "A philosophy that a quick fix can be achieved. He believes in the golden ticket." I find it hard to see a ticket as being a philosophy: if you say "he believes in the quick fix", it doesn't mean a fix is a philosophy, but that his philosophy is to use the quick fix. There are no Google Books hits for "believes in the golden ticket". Needs to be distinct from sense 1. Equinox ◑ 11:10, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

Not found as such, but I think sense 1 is too narrow in that that which is afforded by a “golden ticket” need not be something lucrative. The figurative sense seems to be essentially the same as that of passport. A use in this figurative sense from 1911: ‘Dr. Gregory pointed out the importance attached to the grade with which a student passes this examination at the end of his course. “The man with a Number 1 mark has a golden ticket for life,” the speaker said.’^[16] In a 1917 use, it represent an unattainable pardon for the “interviewer”, being a character placed in Dante’s Inferno.^[17] Most modern uses will be (possibly indirect) references to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, as when pursuing a career in medicine is thought to be “a golden ticket to the proud parents factory”.^[18]  --Lambiam 15:01, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

So it also seems we should change the etymology, which currently indicates that Chocolate Factory is the source (much later than 1911). Equinox ◑ 15:12, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

RFV-failed Kiwima (talk) 22:17, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

glownigger

DTLHS (talk) 02:52, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

Anti-Defamation League mentioning the form used in the Wiktionary entry; The Daily Stormer mentioning a hyphenated form; The Atlantic mentioning the alternate form "glowies". --benlisquare_T•C 03:18, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

We're looking for uses, not mentions. DTLHS (talk) 03:59, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

In that case, the Daily Stormer example is a use, not a mention: "Is Snowden infected with cat poo bacteria or is he some sort of glow-nigger PR agent for hire? You decide." The same website also uses a non-hyphenated variant: "The glownigger problem is now officially out of control. The list of people NOT on an FBI watchlist grows shorter and shorter every single day." --benlisquare_T•C 04:39, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

IP was definitely not lying, this is living language. This, and “CIA nigger” (which I deem SOP), I have consistently encountered on the internet since Terry Davis’s statement in 2017, and it has engendered some clippings or other combinations like glowie or glowtard, although short of glownigger and glowie most are in my opinion protologistic, as occasionalisms that have not caught on. But that clip of Terry Davis, that schizophrenic meme, did catch on as a whole, ideal to express the idea of a persecution complex. Then one can say that someone “glows in the dark”, “so much glowing” and similar to mean that your chat partner on Telegram appears to be a sinister agent or jokingly express that he should watch his legality. I also think the productivity of nigger as second part of compounds increased after that incident, so that it could even be viewed as a suffix -nigger. So ’twould be sad if we had to lose this, as this is a monument in the development of the English language, and it is really often encountered and not just used by a certain author and his friends. Fay Freak (talk) 15:19, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

We still need 3 durably archived citations of uses. DCDuring (talk) 17:07, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

Question here: I'm not too thoroughly familiar with what Wiktionary accepts as "durably archived", I spend most of my time on English Wikipedia and Chinese Wikipedia. Would a 4chan archiver based on the FoolFuuka open-source archiver be accepted as an archived citation of 4chan usage? Since, by design, 4chan automatically purges and erases old posts, various archivers based on FoolFuuka scrape thread content from 4chan using the asagi dumper and display them in searchable archives; examples of such websites include archived.moe, Desuarchive, Fireden, Warosu, among others. Also, would a Wayback Machine archive or archive.is capture of a 4chan thread also count as durably archived? --benlisquare_T•C 04:24, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

I've heard glowie (only) among 4chan types. Good luck with the CFI! Equinox ◑ 20:25, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

@Equinox There's also a verb, glow in the dark, as in "Not discord because that shit glows in the dark", "that version of events is so untrue it glows in the dark", "OP glows in the dark". If you or someone else will point me at an archive that's considered durable, citing this should be trivial.__Gamren (talk) 21:54, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

lessen

A new addition: "(nonstandard) in case". Equinox ◑ 06:45, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

In the episode “Ourselves Alone” of Boardwalk Empire, a character (I think Chalky, a jailed black gangster) says: “Ain’t a one of them pikers got it in him to make a squeal lessen he be put up to it.”^[19] It could mean “in case” here, but “unless” seems more likely (“They won’t snitch unless forced”). In a rare use here in a text written in standard English – but possibly representing reported speech (“His daughter ... knows they never will be happy lessen he do”) of a character in what is billed as “the first all-Negro musical Western” – it seems to mean “unless”. That is also the case in the dialogue reported here, uttered by a black character. This index to a Gullah corpus shows some uses of lessen as a conjunction (at the end of the file). Although there is not enough context to be sure of the meaning in these phrases seen in isolation, all other terms and phrases in the file carry a sense of “unless”.  --Lambiam 13:52, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

Can it ever mean "lest"? I think of it sometimes being used that way, but have no supporting evidence yet. DCDuring (talk) 14:51, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

I see. So probably from "unless and" (see the regional etc. senses of and conjunction). Equinox ◑ 15:11, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

For the sake of clarity: the citations do not verify the challenged sense.  --Lambiam 15:31, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

DARE has the following definitions for lessen:

1. Unless [well attested]
2. Lest, for fear that [only one cite]
3. Except [only one cite]
4. Smaller of [only one cite]

Their extensive surveys did not encounter "in case". DCDuring (talk) 00:26, 30 January 2021 (UTC)

buzzsaw

"(slang) The MG 42 general-purpose machine gun." I see a few references (mentions, not uses) to "Hitler's buzzsaw", but not "buzzsaw" alone. Equinox ◑ 12:06, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

It's not durably archived, but on MG 42 and MG 34 — Battlefield Forums I found "Otherwise, the game would quickly devolve into packs of players roaming around with 100-150 round buzzsaws just chewing anything that moves to pieces.", but otherwise, like Equinox, I mostly find "Hitler's buzzsaw". I did manage to find a single durably archived cite. Kiwima (talk) 00:20, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

idolopeia

DTLHS (talk) 04:24, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

fease

Sense: “(obsolete) to execute (an action, condition, obligation, etc.)”. Tagged by 2a01:cb11:58d:2e00:d867:fe02:7663:ab0 on 30 January, not listed. J3133 (talk) 10:49, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

I managed to find and add two citations before Google locked me out for "unusual traffic". I will try again later. Kiwima (talk) 19:39, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

I have removed the first citation because the source has “ſease” with a long s, not “fease”. In the remaining citation the scare quotes make clear that this is a nonce back-formation from feasance.  --Lambiam 21:52, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

February 2021

Iulionov

I don't think this merits inclusion. There does not appear to be a Russian surname Иулионов (Iulionov) (it should be Иулиа́нов (Iuliánov) or Иулия́нов (Iulijánov)) and there appears to be only one person on the web with the English name Iulionov (a certain Nikolai Iulionov, a photographer who went to Harvard). The few other occurrences are misspellings. Benwing2 (talk) 00:48, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

marry

RFV sense:

(transitive, in passive) To be joined to (someone) as spouse according to law or custom. [from 14th c.]

She was not happily married.

His daughter was married some five years ago to a tailor's apprentice.

In any normal interpretation, "married" in "She was not happily married" is surely an adjective. I don't fully understand the intention of the second usex, but it seems that "married" there is either an adjective or the passive form of another sense, "To unite in wedlock or matrimony". Anyone see any distinct sense salvageable here? Mihia (talk) 14:50, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

Seems redundant to sense 3 to me. — SGconlaw (talk) 19:01, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

I stumbled across this just the other day and thought it was odd, but there might be a valid distinction here. It is worth noting that the OED has separate senses for all the ones we have (plus a few extra ones), with the same distinction in time of origin (14th vs. 15th century). I agree that the first usex represents an adjectival use, but it could theoretically be a verb (in which case, I would understand it to refer to an event rather than a state). I think "To unite in wedlock or matrimony" is a different sense. At least, it "feels" different to me. I think you could say "I was married last year" even if you were from a culture where there was no minister/judge presiding over the wedding. SGconlaw's suggestion seems the most likely to me, but I'm not sure it's exactly the same sense. If it were, I would expect "I was married by a doctor" rather than "I was married to a doctor." What would seem most likely to me is that the passive sense in question is derived from the "unite in wedlock or matrimony" sense ("I was married to a doctor by our parish priest"), and that the passive sense eventually took on a life of its own, with no connection to any minister. The only problem with this is that the passive sense seems to date back two centuries earlier than the "unite in wedlock" sense, according to the OED.

TL;DR: I am inclined to keep all the senses separate, as per the OED. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 20:02, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

@Mihia Out of curiosity, what sort of cites do you think would demonstrate the distinctness of the sense? It's easily citable, but do you think we need a use of the word where there is clearly no minister? Andrew Sheedy (talk) 20:05, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

First, on the issue of the RFV'd sense being a passive form of sense 3, "(transitive) To take as husband or wife", I'm not sure about that. E.g. if Jack and Jenny became husband and wife last year, and Jenny says "I was married last year", could this have the sense of "married by Jack"? It doesn't seem obvious to me. To me, the normal implication of examples such as "I was married last year" interpreted as passive verbal would be that "someone married me" in the sense of "united me (with someone) in wedlock". However, if a passive verbal interpretation definitely can exist without any "active" implication, then presumably that would establish a separate passive-only sense. So, to answer your question, I think that some kind of usage example that clearly precluded adjectival interpretation as well as any kind of "someone married me" implication would be very helpful, if such a thing exists. Mihia (talk) 21:48, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

What about sense 6, “to unite in wedlock”? In the passive voice, married then means, “united in wedlock”. Compare also such dictions as seen in “The pair were married in February 2015”.^[20]  --Lambiam 21:51, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

Could you possibly clarify a little how this is different to what I have suggested above? Mihia (talk) 21:55, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

I got an edit confict when posting; as my posting was in direct reaction to an earlier “Seems redundant to sense 3” and I was any moment expected to join a zoom call, I did not examine the conflicting posting. As to the absence of an active sense, it is fairly common that the passive voice is used without any connotation of an implied actor: “Passengers from Brisbane are reunited with loved ones as Western Australia’s hard border comes down”;^[21] “There a bond was formed between the two men”;^[22] “this station was established before the railroad went through there”.^[23]  --Lambiam 13:33, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

I see, thanks, well, in any case it seems clear that the validity of the RFV'd sense depends at least on its existing without any implication of a corresponding active idea (otherwise it would simply be the passive form of some other listed sense). So if we take an example such as "I was married last year", we're looking for an interpretation that does not entail any "someone/something married me"-type implication (e.g. "The vicar married me last year"), and of course also is not adjectival. I'm beginning to believe that such an interpretation may indeed exist, as Andrew Sheedy mentioned, with in fact similar meaning to "I got married last year". It would be nice, as I mentioned above, if we could find a usage example where only this interpretation, and no other, was feasible. Mihia (talk) 18:26, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

While I am at it, I have deleted the "She was not happily married" example. It seems adjectival in any normal interpretation, and there has not been support expressed for keeping it. Mihia (talk) 19:06, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

chosen aggression principle

It looks like this maybe originated from a self-published e-book, I am not seeing broad acceptance or really any usage at all. - TheDaveRoss 13:18, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

plasmavore

This terms seems to be in use exclusively in the Whoniverse Pious Eterino (talk) 13:45, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

poppers

Rfv-sense: "(informal, plural only) Drugs of the alkyl nitrate class used recreationally as a sexual stimulant, especially among gay men."

I haven't seen any sign that this is anything other than the plural of the corresponding sense of popper. DCDuring (talk) 05:50, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

• I've been bold and converted it to a plural form of the singular. SemperBlotto (talk) 07:31, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
• For starters, "bottle of poppers" has a huge number of hits on google and google books. Such a phrase wouldn't make sense if we gloss "poppers" as the plural of the sense "a capsule of amyl nitrite". See also, quotes like "Nicole Scherzinger ‘sniffed poppers’ at a gay bar". This does not carry the meaning that she inhaled from more than one bottle of poppers. Also worth noting that the Wikipedia article on the drug is titled Poppers. Their naming policy is to generally use the singular except in the case of plurale tantum (and a few other specific situations that don't apply here). Compare Blunt (cannabis), or Speedball (drug). Colin M (talk) 18:58, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
• On the basis of many examples such as "A woman has died after drinking an entire bottle of poppers", that apparently does not mean "bottle of capsules", which would be the implication if "poppers" were an ordinary plural of our existing singular "drug" sense, I believe that this RFV needs further consideration, and for now I have reinstated the entry as it was at the time of RFV, while the RFV runs its course. Mihia (talk) 23:26, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

A 'bottle of poppers' makes as much sense to me as a 'bottle of pills' or a 'bottle of ampules'.

• 1980, Leo Rosten, King Silky!, page 87:

  It's bottles with prescription labels I'm after ... I spot Valium (natch) and Benadryl. And there's a bottle of ampules.

Sniffed poppers is also ambiguous.

I have looked at a lot of Google Books hits for 'sniff poppers' and haven't found unambiguous support for the plural-only. Please, provide the evidence, quotes from durable media like books, magazines, etc on Citations:poppers. See WT:ATTEST. It's easy enough to restore your definition, just as it was easy to correct your mislabeling (without evidence) of popper as dated'.

I agree that the challenged definition should be restored. DCDuring (talk) 23:54, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

No one would deny that "bottle of ampules" is a thing that can exist, but I question whether e.g. "drinking an entire bottle of poppers" in my example actually means that, though I suppose it could be possible if all the ampules are individually opened. Probably more watertight examples can be found. However, I don't think this sense is "plural only", since uncountable uses such as "how much poppers" or "too much poppers" exist. The uncountable sense may in fact be easier to verify than the plural one. In fact, I wonder whether the uncountable sense is primarily what we are talking about here, as something distinct from the ordinary plural of "popper". Mihia (talk) 10:50, 7 February 2021 (UTC)

This isn't a debate forum. Let's get some citations. Does it take a singular verb? A plural one? Both? is it uncountable? Let the citations be unambiguous, so there is no doubt. There seems to be enough literature to find the citations. Who care if a noun is plural-only. A language learner would/should want to know how to use the term properly, which includes verb agreement. DCDuring (talk) 05:34, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

That's a good point, but I don't think it's uncommon for a plurale tantum to occasionally be used like an uncountable noun. e.g. (found on gbooks): "Depending on the value of the shoot and the chances of being able to actually see our Phat Farm logo would determine how much clothes would be given." "How much poppers" only gets 22 google results, and some of those are false positives ("I realized how much poppers had become a mental crutch for me."), so it's a very rare construction. Generally the word follows a plural verb agreement. I just added a quote at poppers demonstrating this. Colin M (talk) 00:57, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

Nevertheless, if "poppers" is like "clothes" then it should be correct to say "how many poppers", rather than "how much poppers", when referring to a quantity of the substance as opposed to individual countable items such as doses/ampoules/containers. This sounds odd to my ear, like "how many vodka". However, instances of e.g. "poppers are a drug", apparently not referring to countable items, do exist, in addition to instances of e.g. "poppers is a drug". Where verb agreement is concerned there may be some uncertainty or difference of view about whether it refers to a plural thing or uncountable thing. Perhaps it is "properly" uncountable, but people forget this when they see the "s", and think they need a plural verb agreement. Mihia (talk) 10:50, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

What Mihia said. DCDuring (talk) 16:34, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

I'm confused by your first sentence. "How many clothes" is, to my ear, unacceptable, in the same way that I would find it bizarre to say "I packed three clothes". It would require a measure word, as in "How many bags of clothes". Similarly, one would generally say "How many bottles of poppers". There are some words, like scissors or pants that resist being modified by either much or many (without a measure word). Colin M (talk) 07:38, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Poppers are not sold in bottles of glass ampoules. I cannot find a source that positively states this, in the same way that I can't find a source that positively states that French women don't wear colanders on their heads. But for anyone with a passing familiarity with the subject, "bottle of poppers" and "sniffed poppers" are not ambiguous in the way you're imagining. Here's a site with a general overview of poppers that may help. The second paragraph of the "Overview" section says that poppers used to be sold in capsules that would be cracked open. The first paragraph of the "drug use" section says that poppers are "typically taken as fumes inhaled directly from small bottles". That's what a "bottle of poppers" refers to. It's a bottle containing a volatile liquid. If you take the lid off and inhale from the bottle, you are "sniffing poppers". If you don't like that site, just do a google image search, or read the wikipedia article, or track down a gay friend or coworker and ask them to explain. Colin M (talk) 01:15, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

Focus on the word poppers, not the chemical. Any knowledge you might have about the product can just help you create better hypotheses about the word. As a dictionary, we gather evidence about the meaning of each word and how it is used syntactically. DCDuring (talk) 16:38, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

Poppers have been sold in ampules. Now they may be sold in some other form. Poppers in ampules is a countable noun. Poppers in a bottle should be an uncountable noun. Further, it might be used with either a singular or plural verb. An uncountable is used with certain determiners, like much, that are not used with countable nouns. If poppers is used with a singular form of a verb that would indicate unambiguously that the uncountable form is in use. Examples of common singular verb forms are is, was, has, and does. There may be other verbs commonly used with poppers that could also be included in search terms used to search Google Books and UseNet, possibly also, Google News and Google Scholar. DCDuring (talk) 05:42, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

As I wrote above to Mihia, not every noun falls neatly into the mass vs. count noun dichotomy. I can't say "how much trousers" nor can I say "how many trousers". Colin M (talk) 08:05, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

@Colin M:

1915, Official Reports of the Debates of the House of Commons of the Dominion of Canada, page 770, column 2:

[…] how many trousers, breeches and pantaloons have been ordered from each firm;

J3133 (talk) 08:30, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Noted. But based on this, would you say it would be appropriate to add (countable) to trousers? Colin M (talk) 09:12, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Just noting for possible comparison as a tricky plural-only-and/or-uncountable case the word spirits in the drinks sense. (Possibly slightly different in certain uses as there is more than one type, unlike "poppers", of which I imagine there is only one type.) Mihia (talk) 18:01, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

According to the pedia article, all poppers have been alkyl nitrites, but there are several kinds: isoamyl nitrite, isopentyl nitrite, and isopropyl nitrite. There is also isobutyl nitrite, which may not be an alkyl nitrite. Our definition, which limits the word to amyl nitrite. may not be scientifically accurate. DCDuring (talk) 00:01, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

Yes, this is a good comparison. It seems to be a recurring pattern with illicit substances. Another good example is drugs. Right now we just define it as the plural of drug, but consider this headline: He brought drugs to the London courthouse. It didn't end well for him. In the article, we learn the man in the headline "was caught with four grams of ketamine". So drugs here does not refer to more than one psychoactive substance, but rather some quantity of a substance. I believe someone mentioned steroids at one point as well, and it follows the same pattern. If I say "Bob took steroids before the game", he cannot refute my statement by saying "That's not true, I only took tetrahydrogestrinone!". Colin M (talk) 08:00, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

This isn't all that hard. All you need is to have citations to unambiguously support the syntax you advocate. I am sure you could find them. I dispute the utility of the label plural only. What users might want to know about a given definition of a noun is whether it is used with a singular or plural verb. That is something that citations can show. DCDuring (talk) 23:35, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

ingowe

J3133 (talk) 14:26, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

A Wonderfool misunderstanding for ingo perhaps. I don't see how ingot makes sense in the citation. Equinox ◑ 14:33, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

NED says "ingowe in Spenser is either a misprint or a mistaken archaism."

James A. H. Murray [et al.], editors (1884–1928), “Ingot”, in A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (Oxford English Dictionary), volume V (H–K), London: Clarendon Press, →OCLC, page 287, column 1.

Vox Sciurorum (talk) 17:41, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

• OK, that was a semi-blind entry, we can probably safely delete it MM0898 (talk) 20:03, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

FBS

Internet slang for "fucking bullshit". Can be seen in some online abbreviation lists of dubious value. Equinox ◑ 15:08, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

combo deck

Current definition:

1. In trading card games, two or more decks combined into one, usually a starter or structure deck combined with an old deck of the same type.

There are lots of hits for "combo deck" on google and gbooks, but they all seem to relate to a very different meaning, described on Wikipedia at Magic: The Gathering deck types#Combo. I think these instances of "combo deck" are SOP under a sense of combo which I just added ("A strategy aiming to win by playing a specific combination of cards (or similar), often in a single turn."). That sense of "combo" is not limited to modifying "deck" (see quotations). Colin M (talk) 01:52, 7 February 2021 (UTC)

Hj

I find only hj and HJ. 2001:8000:1588:B800:285A:B9EE:A50F:8970 07:54, 7 February 2021 (UTC)

eyethirl

Compare Google Books. --幽霊四 (talk) 19:53, 7 February 2021 (UTC)

folability

Obsolete word meaning "folly". The given citation (Skelton) is actually folabilite (and might even be Middle English, but probably not quite). Equinox ◑ 18:46, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

bergh

Senses:

• (transitive, obsolete) To give shelter; protect; preserve; deliver; save.
• (obsolete) Protection; shelter.

Deleted by Citrarta (“Neither of these are attestable”); I restored them. J3133 (talk) 19:13, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

Sorry about that - I got a bit impatient (manually updating a whole bunch of ME verb inflections can do that to you), and there's a whole bunch of these pseudo-ModE entries that are obviously unattestable (I'll eat a hat if anyone finds ModE attestations of bergh - even if the word's attested in ModE, one'd probably expect barrow, berrow, etc.) Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 22:35, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

woodpeckerology

Equinox ◑ 03:39, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

I could only find one (on citations page). Kiwima (talk) 22:22, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

Does "eg there is no 'Journal of Woodpeckerology'" definitely count? It seems to me that the writer may be using a deliberately made-up word (or non-word). Mihia (talk) 23:02, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

woodpeckerologist

Equinox ◑ 03:39, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

I added one cite to the citations page. Kiwima (talk) 22:27, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

measelry

"R. of Brunne" was presumably Robert de Brunne, who died in 1338. OED doesn't have this spelling, only measlery, which apparently relates specifically to measly swine, not leprosy. This, that and the other (talk) 02:10, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

cited Kiwima (talk) 22:34, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 05:18, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

Not cited. @Kiwima, all three of your cites are from reprints of the same book, which was someone's modernisation of Caxton's Golden Legend. If we treat it as a translation from Middle English, I suppose it counts for one (although it should be attributed correctly), but not three. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:51, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

onfang

Probably Middle English, but I am bringing it here to verify. If this fails, it should be kept as a Middle English entry. This, that and the other (talk) 02:36, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

replay

"(video games) saved video footage of the gameplay of a computer game". This has to be distinct from sense 1, which means playing something back. In other words, "I enjoyed watching that replay of your Mario speedrun" is ambiguous, because it might mean that I enjoyed the playback experience; we would need something like "there are 20 replays saved on this server for download". @PseudoSkull Equinox ◑ 02:57, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

cited Kiwima (talk) 23:28, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

I am not personally au fait with video game terminology, but to me it is unclear that these citations demonstrate any separate video-game sense, as opposed to the usual sense simply used in a video game context, albeit the existing general sense may need improving so as to include the content as well as the action of replaying. Mihia (talk) 01:57, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, I think this needs to be broadened because it doesn't seem video-game-specific. It might be a separate sense from "the replaying of (something), for example of televised footage", because I can see how "the option of instant replay" = "the option of instantly replaying footage" might(?) be different from "replays of memorable shots", although I'm not sure, but you could certainly use the exact same phrase to refer to replays of memorable shots made by real-life players in a televised basketball game, etc; and "when you watch a replay" of those, ... - -sche (discuss) 22:06, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-passed. You may be right about the actual meaning being more general, but that is very difficult to unambiguously cite, since just about anything that talks about a replay for television, e.g., could also be sense 1. If someone can find cites about having a replay on tape or editing a replay, I will happily broaden the definition. Kiwima (talk) 09:10, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

The same ambiguity applies to most of these citations too, though, which is why I think it comes down to whether we subjectively think certain phrases (which can be used with regard to either video games or televised sports, etc) are more sensibly viewed as using a different sense, since the citations don't seem to unambiguously require one. The 2004 Buchanan cite could just as well be sense 1 ("replaying of (something)"): "When you watch a replay[ing of something], a time meter appears at the bottom of the screen to show you how far you are into your replay[ing]." If we do take "watch a replay", "how far into a replay" to require the sense "footage", I see no reason that a ref "watching a replay" of a "real" football match, and being interrupted "halfway into that replay", would be a different sense from watching a replay of a video game football match. Perhaps context would clarify otherwise, but on the face of it the 2004 Hodgson citation, "Before you work on a replay", would seem to make more sense as sense 1 (before you replay the game, before you work on a new playthrough, ...) than sense 2 (before you... what, edit footage of your game character?), although neither makes a lot of sense. - -sche (discuss) 09:58, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

Indeed, the overall division and definitions of senses here is (and was since before this RFV) a bit odd, and some are written in a way that makes them overlap with other senses and doesn't reflect their own true scope/focus (especially sense 1). I just tried a way of reorganizing the entry that seems both more in line with the division of senses in (most of) the cites and more in line with other dictionaries: what does anyone think of this (contrasted with the old set of senses)? I think I improved sense 1 (and moved the quote which was under it to somewhere it fit); on the other hand, senses 2-3 are wordy and may even miss some things the old arrangement captured, so further changes are needed. - -sche (discuss) 10:48, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

tasswage

A nonce contraction of to assuage in The Faerie Queene (book 4 canto 9) — every edition I can find inserts an apostrophe here, and we're not in the business of documenting every verb some poet has elided with t’ as a separate entry. 86.145.58.10 09:36, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

We used to include such nonces, back then, but I think we changed our rules so that now we don't. Equinox ◑ 11:48, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

Apparently removed in Wiktionary:Votes/pl-2014-03/CFI: Removing usage in a well-known work 3. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 20:08, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Mostly I find this form (without an apostrophe) in middle English, but I managed to find two more examples besides Spencer in early modern English. Kiwima (talk) 23:47, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 09:11, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

H2

Sense: “The second half of a financial year.” Tagged by 2A00:23C5:3C01:6301:4CAC:4A3E:DC3F:CDFF on 10 February, not listed. J3133 (talk) 09:24, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

FWIW, this terminology seems prevalent in India, where one finds expressions like "H2 2018-19" or "H2:2018-19" to refer to the period from October 2018 to March 2019. This, that and the other (talk) 10:02, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

They don't look interesting enough to add to the entry, but this is cited with this (definition appears on link, uses are further on in the work), this, and this. — This unsigned comment was added by Kiwima (talk • contribs) at 00:00, 13 February 2021 (UTC).

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 05:19, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

scrip

Rfv-sense: "A document signifying a power to purchase a specified acreage of public land typically granted by the U.S. government to veterans as partial award for service." Not contesting the sense itself, however, an anon restricted it to the US. Is that true? --Robbie SWE (talk) 17:03, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

The definition seems absurdly narrow, but two of the other definitions seem narrow as well:

3. A voucher or token coin used in payrolls under the truck system.

Synonym: chit

4. Any substitute for legal tender that is produced by a natural person or private legal person and is often a form of credit.

Def. 4 seems to exclude scrip issued by a government, eg a US state or municipality, which AFAICR historically was the most common kind. A broadening of that definition would include the challenged definition and might include def. 3. This seems more a case for cleanup than RfV, because citing the challenged definition is likely just to lead to an RfD. DCDuring (talk) 19:47, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

cited Kiwima (talk) 04:26, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 05:21, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

grawlices

I have sought but I cannot find. This, that and the other (talk) 07:20, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

@Koavf We do not accept arbitrary websites for the purposes of verification, as they are not considered "permanently recorded media". Please see WT:CFI#Attestation. This, that and the other (talk) 12:31, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, sorry I got distracted while editing. I thought that I had a durable attestation in a comic but I can't seem to find it. Evidently, the Honeycutt article is reproduced in →ISBN and there is another mention in →ISBN (but it's a mention, not a proper use). —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 13:05, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

This is the plural of grawlix. Generally, we do not require three examples of an inflected form, especially when it is a standard inflection, which this is. Kiwima (talk) 04:34, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

@Kiwima Since this is not a direct Latin borrowing, the standard plural grawlixes would be expected (see for instance, crucifix → crucifixes, not *crucifices). The word grawlix, itself a fanciful coinage, lends itself well to whimsical wordplay - it's completely understandable that someone should have invented an equally fanciful pseudo-Latin plural grawlices. But it seems to me that this form has not caught on and only survives in mentions. This, that and the other (talk) 00:15, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

catpuss

Seems reasonable, but I can't find evidence outside of "Bagpuss" mentions. SemperBlotto (talk) 07:47, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

I speedied this but they must have recreated it. I could find nothing much. Yes, it occurs in the introduction to the old children's TV series Bagpuss ("old fat furry catpuss") but kids' TV is full of nonstandard wordplay. Equinox ◑ 20:34, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

cited Kiwima (talk) 04:40, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 05:22, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

Not cited. @Kiwima, Google's OCR is not reliable, so you have to click through and take a look at the book you're citing. Two of them did not actually have this word, and the 2014 cite was a (misremembered?) attempt at recalling the line from the TV series, and therefore is not independent. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:29, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

samplet

A small sample. Equinox ◑ 20:32, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

cited Kiwima (talk) 04:55, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

"She pores o'er ancient pamphlets, Makes Greek and Latin samplets". Does this actually mean "a small sample"? Could it be a sampler (embroidery thing with text)? Equinox ◑ 05:04, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

It certainly doesn't unambiguously support the definition. Being from poetry, it may reflect the author's prosodic concerns more than concern for ordinary meaning. DCDuring (talk) 05:23, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 05:23, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

Scottie

Common noun: "A nickname for something or someone Scottish." How would this be used in a sentence? If real, is it in fact a proper noun? Equinox ◑ 21:05, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

cited. Kiwima (talk) 05:11, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 05:24, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

maxi

Noun: abbreviation of maximum (with plural maxis). Must be distinct from the other senses referring to specific maxi things, such as a maxi single in music, or a long dress. Equinox ◑ 22:13, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

• The definition could move to an etymology section. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 22:20, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

cited. The definition could be changed - it really seems to mean the largest version of something. Kiwima (talk) 05:29, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

The 1979 citation is talking about absorbent material so I'd guess that is short for maxi-pad, not for "maximum" (which makes no sense there). In the other cases it seems more adjectival, i.e. just short for maximum as adjective? Equinox ◑ 01:28, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

I think in most of these cases maxi is best understood as an invented opposite of mini. For example, a maxi dress or maxi skirt stands in contrast to a minidress or miniskirt. The 1980 quotation also makes the connection clear ("a maxi and mini package"). Another case where the contrast is clear is the TV show "RuPaul's Drag Race", where each episode has a "mini challenge" (a short contest between contestants mostly for fun) followed by what they call a "maxi challenge" (the main trial on which the contestants are judged that episode). Colin M (talk) 02:01, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

Also, I agree with Equinox that it should be analyzed as an adjective (like mini). Colin M (talk) 02:03, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-resolved Moved to adjective. Kiwima (talk) 21:52, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

flat

RFV adv. sense

(with units of time, distance, etc) Not exceeding.

1996, Jon Byrell, Lairs, Urgers and Coat-Tuggers, Sydney: Ironbark, page 186:

Dan Patch clocked a scorching 1:55.5 flat.

He can run a mile in four minutes flat.

Not to be confused with other timing-related senses that are believed to exist. See Wiktionary:Tea_room/2021/February#flat_(2). Because of the possible difficulty of finding citations that incontrovertibly express this meaning as opposed to others, I would personally be happy if people just said that they knew this sense. Any better (least ambiguous possible) examples would also be useful. Mihia (talk) 01:48, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

If someone promises to teach me how to do something “in X minutes flat”,^[24][25][26] I take that as meaning that afterwards I’ll be able to pull it off in “just X minutes”. Such a promise is not a binding contract; it is used loosely, but, like the adverb just modifying a measure, it implies that the amount is close to, but not over, the specified measure. I suppose that in many cases “X miles flat”^[27] likewise means “just X miles” or “a mere X miles”, but I did not find three unambiguous attestations.  --Lambiam 13:07, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

I'm actually more sceptical of the "Used to express impressiveness of performance." "I got to work in 20 minutes flat!" sense, which I've added an RFV tag to. I don't think that's a separate sense from the other two; I don't think "[did X in] twenty minutes flat" and "[did X in] four minutes flat" are using 2-3 different senses of "flat". It seems to me that, as the context label admits, "twenty minutes flat" is simply using one of the other 1-2 time senses 'to fewer decimal places'. Probably the "not exceeding" sense is the same thing: "exactly" but with greater tolerance for what constitutes "exactly" X. - -sche (discuss) 21:21, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Looking at YouTube results for "in 5 minutes flat" I see videos (some under 5 minutes, some over, some almost exactly 5) offering to teach me how to do makeup, revive bread, etc, "in 5 minutes flat", which I would interpret similarly to Lambiam, as meaning I'll be able to do the makeup/etc "in about (or at least no more than approximately) 5 minutes". I wouldn't interpret it as saying it will have to take me all five minutes and be impossible I'll get my own time down to something quicker, but I'm not sure I'd put "not exceeding" as a separate definition-line, since I also see videos on how to do makeup, clean a room, etc "in exactly 15 minutes" which are in practice surely similarly inexact. I'm not sure how to word the one sense I suspect the entry's three current senses may be. "Exactly (to some contextually determined level of precision or imprecision)."? Or just "exactly" and consider that variation in level of precision with which people use words is extralexical?
Chuck's example in the Tea Room that "When I heard that, I was downstairs in 10 seconds flat doesn't literally mean the speaker was downstairs in 10.000 seconds" is true but illustrates, I think, that the phenomenon is not that "flat" means "impressively" or "not exceeding" per se, but that people are imprecise, since you can say you were downstairs google books:"in ten seconds straight", or "I was downstairs a second later" or "in an instant" (which you did not, in fact, teleport instantaneously), etc. - -sche (discuss) 21:43, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Searching Google Books, I find someone threatening someone else google books:"if you aren't out of that bed and downstairs in exactly five minutes", where I doubt the threatener would be angry that the person is early if they come downstairs after only four minutes and fifty-one seconds rather than "exactly" five: five is the limit not to be exceeded, but going under is OK, similar to what 2A02 was saying in the Tea Room. But I'm not convinced that this means "exactly" needs to be defined as "not exceeding, but potentially less than", I think it may just be a phenomenon of how senses are used. I'm not sure, though... - -sche (discuss) 21:55, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

I am sure that there is an "exact" sense in sports (to within any reasonable measurement accuracy; obviously nothing is "exact" if you go to arbitrary d.p.). For example, in the context where timings are measured to one-hundredth of a second, "four minutes flat" really does mean 4:00.00, and does not in itself carry any connotation that it is a fast time. The other senses if any, and how many overall there are, are hazier to me, but "I got to work in 20 minutes flat" to me does typically carry a connotation that it is a fast time, and does not typically mean 20:00.00 as opposed to 20:00.01. Is there any instance of a non-sports-type-exact sense where the speaker is not expressing that it was a fast or good time? Mihia (talk) 21:59, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Hmm, let me turn the question around: is there any instance where "twenty minutes flat" is not expressing that "twenty minutes" is how much time they took, relative to whatever (often low!) level of exactness is needed in context? In sports, that level of precision may be centiseconds (and yet, not attoseconds), but in water-cooler conversations with accounting-office colleagues about how fast I got to work, I think it may be that the required level of exactness is less, rather than that the sense of the word "flat" is different. People may not regularly see a need to specify that they did something in "X minutes flat" or "X minutes exactly" or "X minutes straight" unless they're emphasizing that it was a "fast or good time", but they use all those words, and I'm not sure that means also those words need an imprecise meaning, does it? Indeed, can't we use bare measurements the same way, like "I got up, threw on my clothes, scarfed down a protein shake and got out the door and down to work in twenty minutes" even when it was actually 19:16 or 20:08 or something, especially if you're contrasting it with how it might normally take an hour? - -sche (discuss) 22:48, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

I think it is useful to look at the difference between "I got to work in 20 minutes" and "I got to work in 20 minutes flat". What is the word "flat" actually adding? To me, it is less about exactness and more about emphasising that it is a fast time, possibly in combination with the idea of "not exceeding". Now compare with the sporting sense of "four minutes flat", where "flat" has nothing to do with its being a fast time (it might even be a slow time), and everything to do with exactness. On this basis I feel there is a distinction, but I couldn't say definitely that all this could not be rolled into one sense with appropriate wording. Mihia (talk) 22:58, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Hmm, fair points. I'm not sure whether combining the 3 senses into 1 or into 2 ("exact" and the 'emphasizing fastness' sense + explanation that the stated time would be approximate) would be best, though looking at other dictionaries it's noticeable that none seem to have sports-precision-"exactly" and emphasis-"exactly" as different senses: Dictionary.com, Cambridge, Collins and The Free Dictionary have "exactly" as their only specifically time-related definition (though they also have senses like "completely, or to the greatest degree possible" for things like "turned him down flat") with examples like "She ran around the track in two minutes flat" and "We managed to get to the station in five minutes flat" which suggest they think "exactly" covers both sports use and non-sports use. (Merriam-Webster does not have any specifically time-related adverb sense, although they have "in a flat manner" and have "exact" as a sense of the adjective.) Lexico has only the "emphasis" sense: "After a phrase expressing a period of time to emphasize how quickly something can be done or has been done." MacMillan combines them in a way that broadly matches what I might expect, though it would fail to cover cases of a runner's "four minutes flat" being a slow time: "exactly: used for emphasizing how quickly something is done: I fell asleep in five seconds flat!" I do think "not exceeding" isn't a separate sense, in any case, but just an implication. - -sche (discuss) 18:49, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

The emphatic sense is also present in N seconds no less,^[28][29][30] in which no less literally means “not exceeding”, but clearly serves to signal awe.  --Lambiam 08:51, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-resolved. After thinking about this discussion, I have combined the two challenged senses into one with a non-gloss definition of "emphasizing the smallness of the measurement". Kiwima (talk) 19:22, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

@Kiwima: A couple of comments. I am mostly (I would say pretty much only) familiar with "flat" used with times. Presently the labels imply that the "exactly" sense is used only with times, while the "emphasize the smallness of the measurement" sense can be used with other dimensions, such as distance. Is this definitely right? If we take @Lambiam's "eight miles flat" example, is this expressing exactness or is it for emphasis? And, if the emphasis sense can exist for e.g. distance, then does it always emphasise smallness? E.g., can I say "I ran a mile flat" to express that a mile is an impressively long distance? (I don't know the answers.) Mihia (talk) 19:44, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

AFAIK, it emphasizes smallness. "I ran a mile flat" would only sound right to me if you were attempting a marathon. Kiwima (talk) 00:17, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

A

Rfv-sense: "Ammunition examiner". This, that and the other (talk) 02:24, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

cardinal

Rfv-sense: mulled red wine. Apparently there's a quote out there for Hotten, who may be a guy who wrote a slang dictionary. Oxlade2000 (talk) 21:54, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Hotten's Slang Dictionary (1873) says: "Cardinal, a lady's red cloak. A cloak with this name was in fashion in the year 1760. It received its title from its similarity in shape to one of the vestments of a cardinal. Also mulled red wine." He didn't usually do citations, unfortunately, so it's only a reference. Equinox ◑ 01:39, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

I'm assuming Hotten's Slang Dictionary was the 1873 version of Urbandictionary Oxlade2000 (talk) 01:47, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

cited. In addition to the uses I added to the entry, I found a number of recipes for the stuff, such as this and this, and a large number of mentions. Kiwima (talk) 22:37, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Impressive! (And searching in or for recipes or cookbooks when searching for food/drink terms that have other homographic meanings is a good idea.) - -sche (discuss) 18:39, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 17:11, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

hellbrewed

Claimed to be a nonce word by Milton. Not in any of his works Oxlade2000 (talk) 23:29, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

The spelling is different in Milton: "Hence with thy hel-brew'd opiate". Equinox ◑ 23:30, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

@Equinox Oxlade2000 changed the spelling in your comment.__Gamren (talk) 16:40, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Perhaps we should move this to a hyphenated version. In addition to the Milton quote given by Equinox, I found two uses that have the word at a line break, so it is not clear whether it is "hellbrewed" or "hell-brewed":

1914, The Red Man - Volume 6, page 164:

What have we done with thee? Taken from thee this great continent by trickery and fraud, taught thee that a promise broken is better than a promise kept, given thee hellbrewed firewater to steal from thee thy manhood, and make thee what thou never wert — savage.

1921, Louis Untermeyer, Modern American Poetry, page 289:

A thought of madness, frenzy, agony and despair, a hellbrewed thought, for it is a natural thought.

Plus many clearly hyphenated uses (of which the following is only a sampling):

1990, John Heath-Stubbs, Selected Poems, page 48:

The apple-blossom and the pear-blossom Are shivered from the spray, While the hell-brewed frosts of Jankynmass Deflower the English May.

1995, John Bunker, Heroes in Dungarees, page 186:

Plodding, rust-streaked, squatty tankers Decks awash on lonely way; Filled deep with hell-brewed lightning, Lifeblood of the battle fray.

1995, Israel Shipman Pelton Lord, ‎Necia Dixon Liles, At the Extremity of Civilization, page 254:

Yet a feeling has since arisen, and is raplidly extending, which before another session of Congress will erase from the broad folds of our country's flag two embryo stars, and " the United States of the Pacific" will quietly take her place among the nations of the earth, without the hell-brewed stain of slavery upon her almost spotless escutcheon.

1998, Aurobindo Ghose, Collected Plays and Stories - Volume 4, page 754:

She is most potent and her science plucks The ruby nightshade, Hecate's deadly plum, Soul-killing meadow-sweet, the hemlock starred And berries brown crushed in the vats of death, Her mother's hell-brewed legacy of arts.

Kiwima (talk) 23:07, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

My inclination is to assume that line-break hyphens are actual hyphens in the absence of other evidence. There's too much potential for "inventing" new mashup compounds otherwise. Equinox ◑ 01:08, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-resolved. Moved to hell-brewed. Kiwima (talk) 09:13, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

Lolita

Common noun: "A situation resembling the plot of the novel Lolita...(etc.)". However, the two given citations are for "Lolita syndrome" and "Lolita complex". Can this really be used alone: that situation was a total Lolita? Equinox ◑ 01:38, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

I doubt it; it's probably better to define it some other way: but how? {{n-g|In compounds, referring to the novel Lolita in which [...]}}? Or I suppose it depends on whether there are enough spaced compounds or phrases where "Lolita" functions as a word (another is google books:"a Lolita situation") that we want to cover it at Lolita in some way... - -sche (discuss) 21:04, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

It is about as nonsensical as defining a sense for Oedipus of “A situation resembling that of the protagonist of the tragedy Oedipus Rex” in order to explain the term “Oedipus complex”. I think that in Lolita syndrome and Lolita complex we see the attributive use of sense 2, although I think it is unnecessary specific to relate this to sexual pursuit by adults; it suffices that to them the girl has sexual allure, as in other attributive uses: “a Lolita figure”; “a Lolita smile”.  --Lambiam 22:14, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Clearly, this is not a question for verification. I think it is probably best handled by removing this definition and adding a usage note about the attributive use of the noun. Kiwima (talk) 23:10, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

It is an RFV question because there is a sense that I think isn't correct. I don't think we even need a usage note necessarily, just the usual list of "derived terms" (~ syndrome, ~ complex). I can find a few other less common phrases (e.g. "a reversal of the Lolita situation") but these could probably be interpreted as references to the title of the novel, along the lines of "a kind of Beatles quartet". Equinox ◑ 00:47, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

To work as an attestation of the challenged sense, we need uses similar to “He found himself in a difficult Lolita”, or “How was he going to extricate himself from this Lolita?”  --Lambiam 14:16, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

• See MWOnline's long note, with supporting citations, about this. DCDuring (talk) 14:47, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ This seems to raise the wider issue of whether such noun senses should be captured, as I suspect many nouns can be informally used in this way: “She didn’t want to find herself in a Lewinsky”, “he’s gone and done a Weinstein”, “Whatever you do, don’t put your company in an Enron”, and so on. I suppose one way of analysing such uses is that they are merely attributive uses of the noun with the word situation implied. — SGconlaw (talk) 18:00, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

That may be a question for many terms, but I think Lolita/lolita is not one of them:

• The defense argued that Betty was a “Lolita,” the teenage seductress of the much older ... to rely on alleged seductive demeanor and dress to prove his point: “There are some girls who are Lolitas,” he said.
• The Lolitas of today are spoilt, but as in any case they are allowed everything they want, they have no desire to seem older than they are.
• “Yeah, they're little Lolitas,” she'd said. “Thirty-eight little Lolitas. One of these days, you're going to come home, and I'm going to have them all out on the table, all waiting to be admired and petted.”
• One of the defense attorneys described the victim as a “ Lolita ” who wanted to have sex with her attackers.

There are a lot of examples. I'll add these to the entry after I get vaccinated (today). DCDuring (talk) 19:01, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

In your examples Lolita refers to a young woman, not to a "situation". Equinox ◑ 22:36, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

Of course, the existing definition stinks. I thought I was responding to sgconlaw's point, but I read it too hastily. I think we should have a definition along the lines of MWOnline's, which also fits the citations above. I think we could rely on metonymy to cover what the existing definition has. DCDuring (talk) 22:44, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

lithotome

Rfv-sense "mineral resembling a cut gem". This looks like a dictionary-only sense. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 20:17, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

cited Kiwima (talk) 23:38, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 09:14, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

lennow

The OED and EDD lemmatize this spelling rather than linnow (though perhaps only because it comes first alphabetically), but have only a few cites, only one of which uses this spelling: see Citations:lennow. I can only cite the word as linnow and with a somewhat different meaning. However, I can find several mentions, so it may exist; it's apparently also a name (or scanno for one) so it's hard to search for. - -sche (discuss) 21:02, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

From what I can see, this is just an alt form of linnow. For example, in Bye-gones (1904) the author states that "a person whose joints are lennow is naturally nimble and agile" in order to argue that "lennow" means flexible rather than nimble. Kiwima (talk) 23:53, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

RFV-resolved Changed to be an alt form of linnow. Kiwima (talk) 09:17, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

meedfully

I have a feeling that this might not be attestable in proper Modern English (rather than in overly-literal "translations" of Middle English).Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 04:01, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

Oh look it's a word nobody has used for centuries, with no gloss on it! Oh hi Leasnam, fancy meeting you here! Equinox ◑ 04:42, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

Do you remember what you were doing 9 1/2 years ago? Chuck Entz (talk) 04:59, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

Yes and I have detailed notes and journals. And what I wasn't doing was using the word "meedfully". Equinox ◑ 03:21, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

cited. Most of what I found was Middle English, but it seems to have persisted into the early 17th century. Kiwima (talk) 01:09, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

@Kiwima: From [31] it is clear that the Krapp citation is quoting the Arnold edition of John Wyclif. The spelling has clearly been regularised from the original Middle English (apparently by Krapp, since this copy of Arnold has old spelling); even so, I'm not sure if we can call this Modern English. This, that and the other (talk) 02:23, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

The Julian of Norwich quote is also of dubious ModE status; it's a pretty literal translation/transcription of a Middle English work:

1670, Julian (of Norwich), Revelations of Divine Love, shewed to a devout servant of our Lord, called Mother Juliana, an Anchorete of Norwich:

This light is charity, and the measuring of this light is done to us profitably by the wisdom of God: for neither the light is so large that we may see clearly our blessedful day: ne it is all speered from us; but it is such a light in which we may live meedfully with travel, reserving the worshipful thanks of God.

1373, Julian (of Norwich), chapter LXXXIV, in The Shewings of Julian of Norwich‎^[32], lines 3365-3368:

The light is charite, and the mesuring of this light is don to us profitably by the wisdam of God. For neyther the light is so large that we may seen our blisfull day, ne it is sperid fro us, but it is suich a light in which we may liven medefully with travel deservand the endless worship of God.

This light is love, and the distribution of this light is beneficially done though the wisdom of God. Because the light is neither so great that we can see our blessed day or concealed from us, it's a light that lets us live commendably through deeds deserving of God's endless glory.

That leaves us with only one solid attestation. Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 03:04, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

balines

First discussed at Wiktionary:Requests for cleanup#balines before conversation stalled. Being listed here mostly as a formality with an expectation that the term will fail to be verified. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 18:34, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

I put what I could find on the citations page. Al Jazeera does not italicize the term, but everybody else does. It looks like code switching to me. Kiwima (talk) 01:36, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

Zhuxian

@Tooironic I found an example of this word here: [33], but I would like to see some more cites on this word if at all possible. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 02:04, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

boo-boo

Rfv-sense Outside of my experience as a native English speaker --Geographyinitiative (talk) 21:04, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

cited. One quote from a book and two from Reddit. The book quote is a tiny bit ambiguous since Google Books only gives a limited preview of a little over two sentences, but I think it's pretty clear. Interestingly, when I searched for 'boo-booed', only a minority of results were for the defecation sense. More common were the senses "to make a mistake", and "to experience a minor injury", which we don't currently document. Colin M (talk) 01:50, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

Well I have learned something today I guess. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 02:31, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

Is this regional? --Geographyinitiative (talk) 02:32, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

I believe that most of the time it's "made a boo-boo" or "did a boo-boo" rather than using it as a verb. The quotes are adults alluding to childish usage and are probably completely unrepresentative. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:43, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

Sure, I mean it's going to be hard to get much representative data on the language of young children because their use of language is rarely recorded in durable media. Though here's an article I stumbled on that seems to quote a young child using verbal boo-boo:

Another 3-year-old boy in foster care told Swanson that Bennett "whipped" the alleged beating victim because he "boo-booed" in his pants in the tree house.

Colin M (talk) 05:30, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

Not cited: Reddit is not durably archived. J3133 (talk) 05:56, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

IMO we need to start looking at how to allow Internet content, even if not "durably archived", per recent BP discussion, while avoiding extreme ephemera or the sort of random made-up crap that plagues the likes of UD. Mihia (talk) 23:42, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

@J3133: says who? How is it any different from quoting a newsgroup or mailing list? Colin M (talk) 03:01, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

@Colin M: If you have been here since June 2020 you should know we do not accept quotations from Reddit (and Tumblr, Twitter, etc.; e.g., see Talk:dorkface (@Equinox), Wiktionary:Requests for verification/Non-English#🦀). J3133 (talk) 09:15, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

I think that's kinda harsh - Colin M doesn't seem to've been continually active since joining, but even if they were, it's possible to do a quite a bit of editing here without needing to have much awareness of the rules as long as you're working within the right areas. A approach like yours isn't conducive to keeping Wiktionary thriving. Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 10:49, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

I did not mean it to be harsh—it was surprising—and I do not see how my message is “a^[sic] approach”—also there are too many people here who do not comprehend Wiktionary’s practices—nor are you contributing to the thriving by begrumbling (to use a recently discussed term). J3133 (talk) 11:19, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

My view is that as long as contributors do good work and aren't disruptive, it doesn't matter if they aren't aware of every little aspect of the rules; Matthew 7:16 and all that. If we castigate people too much for not being aware of the rules, then we end up coming off as a cruel, forbidding bureaucracy - hardly what will attract new users. I do think me saying this is indirectly helping Wiktionary thrive: having "too many people who do not comprehend Wiktionary's practices" has resulted in Wiktionary growing year after year while other Wikimedia projects are stagnating. That stagnation, IMHO, is in part due to the aforementioned overly puritanical approach. Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 03:05, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

I don't see anything in WT:ATTEST that would preclude Reddit from being considered "durably archived"; citing Reddit seems entirely within the letter and the spirit of CFI. It seems like you're saying that there's a longstanding community consensus against quoting (post-usenet) social media even though it's not codified in policy, and I can accept that that seems to be mostly true, though your second link features impassioned support for quoting Twitter/Reddit, and this recent BP thread also demonstrates a wide spectrum of opinions in the community around quoting social media, so it hardly seems like a closed issue. Also, we apparently currently have 89 entries that cite or otherwise link to twitter. af#English is a nice example in that it quotes and links to a Tweet while also linking to an archive.org backup of the tweet, so that even if the author deletes it in the future, it will remain accessible. Colin M (talk) 22:20, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

I added two more book cites. – Einstein2 (talk) 15:16, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

death against

Supposed rare synonym of dead against. No citations. From User:Doremitzwr. DCDuring (talk) 14:25, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

cited. I am surprised this was so easy to find, as I have never heard it. Kiwima (talk) 22:07, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

dupe scrub

— surjection ⟨??⟩ 09:56, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

pole dance

Rfv-sense "The pole around which a pole dance is performed". Really? I've searched several collocations and found nothing. Ultimateria (talk) 20:29, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

• That could possibly be a "dance pole". SemperBlotto (talk) 07:40, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

Adream

Girl's name? Equinox ◑ 14:22, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

Cited. Einstein2 (talk) 14:48, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

handicraft

"A man who earns his living by handicraft; a handicraftsman. Dryden: the Handicrafts-Shops begin to open." The Dryden quotation does not look very convincing since a "handicrafts shop" may be one that sells handicrafts (compare "toy shop"). If it does refer to the shopkeeper, then why no apostrophe ("butcher's shop") and why the hyphen? Equinox ◑ 05:20, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

@Equinox, the Oxford English Dictionary has seven quotations for this definition (from 1547 to 1828). I have added a Walter Scotts quotation from the OED, but I'm not sure if we're allowed to take all our quotations from the OED. I was unable to find non-OED quotations.--Tibidibi (talk) 05:34, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

@Equinox, cited with two none-OED quotes. "Rare" seems wrong (couldn't find any modern results), probably obsolete or archaic; please check.--Tibidibi (talk) 05:51, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

@Tibidibi: Thanks. I felt the one citation might have just been an error, but it seems not. Good job! Equinox ◑ 09:30, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

Adragon

Girl's name. Equinox ◑ 05:23, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

I have cited it as a boy's name, but can find no evidence that it is a girl's name. Kiwima (talk) 19:48, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

orangeade

Sense 3: orange juice (with nothing added to it!). Equinox ◑ 16:33, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

felon factory

Is it attested? Imetsia (talk) 20:06, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

Seems to be a slur used in Stormfront-like online communities. Two relevant UseNet posts from 2017, but both are by the same author ("Rick Mathers"), so they would only count as 1 for attestation purposes. One Google Books result but for an unrelated figurative use. A handful of results on Google News: one is an unrelated figurative use, and the rest appear in user-generated comments on articles. Some results in a Google web search for some very unsavory looking forums. Seems like this will only pass WT:ATTEST if we count posts from non-Usenet online forums as "durably archived". (I happen to think we should, provided a backup can be created on archive.org, but my understanding is that this is not a view that enjoys a consensus here. Given that this appears to be a very uncommon term - only 104 results indexed by Google, at least half of which are unrelated uses - I'm not going to be too sad if it ends up deleted.) Colin M (talk) 21:05, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

mald

J3133 (talk) 06:51, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

• Doesn't make much sense to me. SemperBlotto (talk) 06:53, 24 February 2021 (UTC)
• Ditto that -- seems nonsensical. Also, both purported etyma are adjectives, so it's not clear how this would be a verb. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 00:37, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

Documented as "malding" on KnowYourMeme: [34]. Equinox ◑ 07:20, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

stroke

Rfv-sense: appetite. Apparently there's a Jonathan Swift quote with this in, but I looked at every instance of "stroke" and "strokes" in his works, and nothing was even vaguely matched Oxlade2000 (talk) 22:30, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

• Here's the Swift quote. The term is discussed in this article, which seems to suggest there are only two known appearances in English literature (Dampier 1699 and Swift, which are the two quotes OED uses). I suppose this would technically mean that WT:CFI can't be satisfied. It does appear in some old reference works, such as in this French-English phrasebook, apparently published a couple years before the Swift quote. Colin M (talk) 02:11, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

low as a verb

Apparently has a Jonathan Swift quote in there somewhere - the last remaining one... I searched for it but got frustrated by the false positive. Oxlade2000 (talk) 09:15, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

Finding the Swift cite looks like a job for the OED. But we need two more. DCDuring (talk) 23:44, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

The OED doesn't have a quote from Swift, but it has many others (and 2 definitions, broken into 7 subsenses, 5 of which they attest according to our standards). Here's some cites I found with their help:

• 1900, Sir John Lauder (bart., lord Fountainhall), Lord John Lauder Fountainhall, Journals of Sir John Lauder, Lord Fountainhall, with His Observations on Public Affairs and Other Memoranda, 1665-1676:

  The design was to low him, that he might never be the head of a Protestant party, and to annex his jurisdiction to the Crown, and to parcel out his lands  […].

Note, the original is dated a.1722 by the OED, and uses more archaic spellings (like "designe"), but I couldn't find it on Google Books.

• 1998, The Gentleman's Magazine:

  In the lion, (which fec) is more clearly known, physicians have conclusion of the second commandment, god lows himself  […]

I suspect this one is also lower than the date given by Google Books...

• 1767, Robert Vansittart, Certain Ancient Tracts Concerning the Management of Landed Property Reprinted, page 41:

  I ſhall truely aſſere this courte, and high no man for no hate, ne lowe no man for noo love, but to ſet every man truly after the quantite of his treſpaſſe to my knowlege […]

The OED dates the original quote to 1523.

Hope that helps. I would add the other senses, but I don't have time. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 02:45, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

The Gentleman's Magazine passage is definitely not from 1998 (maybe 1798), the text has been scrambled by the splicing of two columns into single lines of text, and long "ſ"es aren't all being recognized by the OCR. Here's my best attempt at rendering what's really there:

 

 

[...]In the

conclusion of the ſecond commandment, god ſhows himself,

ſay they, in the former part, as a powerful and jealous god,

but ſince the diſcovery of the Circulation,

by which the doctrine of Evacuation, Derivation, and Revul-

ſion (which ſee), is more clearly known, phyſiscians have

rarely order'd it in any other part than the arm, foot, neck,

and tongue [...]

Chuck Entz (talk) 05:14, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

As for the Vansittart text: he's quoting from sources that were already centuries old in his day, so 1523 sounds right- just barely modern English. This particular passage is an oath to be said by an affeerer, which seems to be someone with the authority to set the amounts of fines. It looks to me like the oath is to not [set the fine] high out of hate, nor [low] out of love. In other words, the high and low refers to the fine, not the person. Chuck Entz (talk) 06:03, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

I added some more citations tracked down through pointers in either the EDD or the (out-of-copyright) NED. Shirrefs may actually be Scots (it is often hard to tell from just a sentence). - -sche (discuss) 05:56, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

Anyway, this is cited (though Shirrefs and perhaps the Shetland cite might be better in a Scots section). - -sche (discuss) 04:15, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

faggot

Rfv-sense "A fascist". — surjection ⟨??⟩ 18:31, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

If it's stated and it makes sense, then some community is apparently saying it. This is being used in the Antifa community to refer to fascists, so it is important to distinguish this usage to avoid misinterpretations. — This unsigned comment was added by MotherNamma (talk • contribs) at 04:09, 26 February 2021.

Can its use in this sense be attested in durably archived media? I find only uses as a slur uttered against Antifa protesters.  --Lambiam 12:17, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

jackman

Rfv-sense: meaning cream cheese. Apparently it was used by T. Elyot, but I find no evidence Oxlade2000 (talk) 23:27, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

Different spelling. "Chease made uppon russhes, called a fresshe cheese, or jackeman". Equinox ◑ 00:01, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

katsaridaphobia

— surjection ⟨??⟩ 23:44, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

Only a few mentions in the usual books. There seem to be uses on Google Scholar, but I don't know how independent they are. The fact that this is based on a modern Greek word certainly suggests someone made it up recently to fill a perceived hole. For what it's worth, the earliest Google hit I can find is "the Phobia List", which was posted online in 1994. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:15, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

hermeology

@Pizza0614 This cannot be found in durably archived sources either. — surjection ⟨??⟩ 10:33, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

E

Rfv-sense abbreviation of Hubei and abbreviation of Europe --Geographyinitiative (talk) 18:14, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Just now, I did find three cites for the historical state of E, but I don't know how to look for "E" as an English language abbreviation for Hubei and find quotations that could be used on Wiktionary to substantiate this usage in English. How does Wiktionary under CFI show that E is an abbreviation for Europe or Hubei? Thanks. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 19:28, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

It's a matter of search fu. A trick is to find collocations of the form "Hubei [X]" and then search for "H [X]". You would need to apply judgment to find [X]s that were not likely to yield too many spurious results. There may be other tricks known to people with better search fu than mine. DCDuring (talk) 00:07, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. I do not have a clue how to do this. I have never done a citation for an abbreviation. To help me learn how to do citations/quotes for abbreviations, would this qualify as a cite for TPE? "Using its Boeing 787-9 ‘Dreamliner’ aircraft, Air Canada offers a direct transpacific service to Taipei Taoyuan International Airport (TPE) in northern Taiwan." [35]

Wiktionary:Quotations#Abbreviations did not help me; Wiktionary:Criteria_for_inclusion#Given_and_family_names just told me that I need to do the same thing for abbreviations that I would do for any word. I think E is a protologism with reference to Hubei. Idk about E as an abbreviation for Europe. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 02:10, 1 March 2021 (UTC) (modified)

Two other suggestions: try searching for cities in the province + the abbreviation, like "Wuhan, E", or search together with other province abbreviations (e.g. if searching for "NY", search for "NY"+"IL"+"CA"). E as an abbreviation of Europe might be something to discuss whether we want at all, depending on how the citations look if any can be found; on one hand, I've tended to favor inclusion (even of things like "Talk:ylw"), on the other hand, I concede that I wouldn't want to add every name starting with M to "M": "Abbreviation of Michael", "Abbreviation of Marcus", "Abbreviation of Miguel", etc. - -sche (discuss) 04:12, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Golden Triangle

Rfv-sense. The Yangtze River Delta sense was added by an IP in 2020: [36] I am vaguely familiar with it in Mandarin, but I don't think it applies in English. It would be universally misinterpreted as the drug trafficking area. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 18:15, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

inasmuch

We need citations of this spelled solid, without following as to establish that it once had a separate existence. We have an entry for inasmuch as. DCDuring (talk) 22:48, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

There are plenty for "inasmuch that". Mihia (talk) 22:53, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Plugging inasmuch, inasmuch as, and inasmuch that into Google NGrams we get this. Inasmuch as represents about 90% or more of the usage of inasmuch and inasmuch that is generally less than 0.1% as frequent as inasmuch as. The usage of inasmuch without as seems to be relatively high in the 19th century, declining in the 20th century. I haven't inspected the usage for the validity of the as-less usage. DCDuring (talk) 00:19, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

I'm not finding very many legitimate uses of inasmuch without as that convey to me unambiguous meaning other than "inasmuch as". I find some mentions. I also find instances in which an expression intervenes before the as, which is evidence that inasmuch as was not a fossilized idiom then. In fact, the usage seems to just show as being used as a subordinating conjunction. I'd be tempted to consider it an error or, more charitably, an ellipsis of inasmuch as. DCDuring (talk) 00:40, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

insofar

We have an entry for insofar as. We do not have any evidence for the existence of insofar, spelled solid, outside of that idiom. If it exists it would be nice to know when it was in use. The OED may provide clues. DCDuring (talk) 22:56, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Plenty of results on google/google books for "insofar there is", which seems to be an ellipsis of "insofar as there is". If you search for "insofar *" on the ngram viewer, it will show you a few of the most frequent tokens that follow it in the corpus. Colin M (talk) 23:58, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

A large number of the usages are spurious due to insertion of adverbials and other phrases, eg, "insofar, at least, as", "insofar, that is, as", "insofar only as", "If I am only insofar a moral person as I am a Kantian or Aristotelian", "insofar (and only insofar) as", etc. Of the balance, many seem to be by non-native speakers, or scannos, speaking errors, typesetting errors, etc. DCDuring (talk) 14:45, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

From all of this I conclude that the most likely outcome of this RfV is that the only definition of insofar is "insofar as". The question remains whether the as-less use is {{alternative form of}} or error. BTW, that would make the PoS "Conjunction". DCDuring (talk) 15:06, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

OED's 3 earliest quotations for insofar are all without "as", the latest being:

(1849, G.Grote) Insofar the latter had good reason to complain.

Colin M (talk) 20:57, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

It would still be nice if we had our own evidence. From the one cite we have the OED's cite, the definition would seem to be "insofar as" in current English. We have to make sure we've broken circularity at [[insofar as]]. DCDuring (talk) 18:16, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

March 2021

pirogue

Rfv-sense "style of pasta shaped as a miniature canoe folded over". Guessing someone mixed this up creatively with pierogi. – Jberkel 00:21, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

procraltruism

No hits that aren't traceable back to us Chuck Entz (talk) 07:55, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

measle

mesel

Rfv-sense: a leper. The OED has this sense under the headword mesel, with only a single post-1500 cite ("mad men and mesels" in John Bale's King Johan). This, that and the other (talk) 02:00, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

Note to closer, this can be moved to Middle English under mesel if it fails. This, that and the other (talk) 05:19, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

Wright's English Dialect Dictionary has a number of senses and citations but not this. - -sche (discuss) 04:04, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

narrative link

Google books results all seem to be SoP (and unrelated to gaming). Adding "game" to the search query turns up a few video game results, but again they don't seem to be using it with any specialized, idiomatic meaning. (Also, the current definition is pretty impenetrable.) Colin M (talk) 03:13, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

South Sea

Rfv-sense 'the Southern Ocean'. As far as I know this term has always historcially meant the Pacific Ocean (and later more specifically the South Pacific island areas, but not so limited originally). — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 17:10, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

Cited. I was careful to include only cites which specifically referenced non-Pacific regions. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 17:39, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

squally

Rfv-sense: unproductive field. OED has a single cite attributed to Marshall ("A crop of turneps, or of corn, which is broken by vacant unproductive patches, is said to be squally"), and our entry mentions Halliwell (don't know who or what this refers to). The Google Books results are consistent with a dictionary-only term. I suspect this is a figurative use of the weaving term that some farmers in Norfolk were in the habit of using many centuries ago, in which case it should be unciteable, but I'll bring it here anyway for completeness. This, that and the other (talk) 04:25, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

@This, that and the other: probably {{R:Halliwell Dictionary}}. — SGconlaw (talk) 15:13, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for that. The Halliwell quote is identical to the Marshall quote above. This, that and the other (talk) 23:23, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

@This, that and the other: references to Halliwell are likely to be mere mentions. You might have a look at the {{R:English Dialect Dictionary}}; it often has brief quotations like the OED, which you may then be able to hunt down at Google Books, the HathiTrust Digital Library, or the Internet Archive. — SGconlaw (talk) 03:47, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

EDD has the same "vacant unproductive patches" definition, and references only Marshall. This, that and the other (talk) 07:34, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

@This, that and the other: looks like this will be hard to verify from written sources. — SGconlaw (talk) 09:44, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Indeed; I expect this will be deleted in a month or so. This, that and the other (talk) 11:25, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

forward

Adv. sense:

1. Towards the front or from the front.

RFV "from the front" only. I could be overlooking something obvious, but at the moment I don't see it. If this meaning exists in an obvious way, a made-up usex would be fine to demonstrate it, as far as I'm concerned. Mihia (talk) 18:46, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Originally, there was no adverbial sense, and the adjectival sense was “Toward the front or from the front onwards; in the usual direction of travel.” The adverbial sense was created in an edit by moving most of the Adjective section to a new Adverb section, while at the same time changing the primary adjectival sense to “Toward the front or at the front.” In the process, the word “onwards” disappeared; the adverbial sense was defined as “Towards the front or from the front; in the usual direction of travel.” The second part was removed in a later edit. This history shows, I think, that the intention always was “from the front in a forward direction” – obviously not usable because of a circularity, even though one might argue that this defines the meaning of the adverb in terms of the adjective, so that there is no real circularity. However, this periphrasis reveals an issue with the definition of the adjective, assuming that the term forward in “forward direction” is an adjective. Does “forward direction” mean “direction toward the front or at the front”? I think that “direction toward the front” works for someone in an oriented vehicle, but not for someone standing in front of a vehicle. The definition does not make clear that this is a body relative direction – specifically, relative to the same body whose front is referred to. The term front implies an orientation of that body.

Now that I’m here: in the ritual of moving the clock forward to celebrate the advent of daylight saving time, which sense of forward is this? Do we move the clock into the future?  --Lambiam 03:27, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for that research. On that basis, I have reworded a couple of the senses. I put the "clock" example under one of them. I think this is an entry that could bear further tinkering and finessing, so anyone please make any further changes if you see fit. Anyway, I will mark the RFV itself as Resolved. (One of my favourite usexes: "From this day forward, there will be no more brussels sprouts at the cafeteria"!). Mihia (talk) 15:09, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

country

Rfv-sense "female genitalia", added by User:Akeosnhaoe, who left a comment on Talk:country#False Etymology. – Jberkel 09:20, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

To be clear, the disputed sense was added by a different user. Akeosnhaoe’s role was to question it, writing that it “sounds like a joke”. The lyrics of “Hey Bobby” contain phrases such as “four-wheeled beauty” (as the text makes clear, the first car owned by the speaker), “ride a little ways down 299”, and “park in the shade”. Thus, the cited snippet “Would you like to go for a ride in the country with me?” clearly refers to an invitation to join the speaker on a literal car ride. In no way does it attest this euphemistic sense.  --Lambiam 15:07, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

During the obligatory Shakespeare phase of English classes, a classmate remarked on what in modern English would be a pun when Hamlet asks Ophelia "Do you think I meant country matters?" Vox Sciurorum (talk) 15:29, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

It was a pun in Shakespeare's time, and he did it deliberately. But that doesn't mean that country means "cunt". —Mahāgaja · talk 18:34, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

racialism

Rfv-sense: "The categorization of humans in different races (not necessarily for superiority ranking)." A can of worms quite frankly. --Robbie SWE (talk) 18:01, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Compare also the definitions which were present before (vs after) these changes. (The "British, dated" label got moved to an entirely different sense, but this was probably correct, because there are contemporary and American instances of "racialism" where what's meant is "racism".) As you say, a can of worms. The entry needs more attention than I have time to give it right now. - -sche (discuss) 03:58, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Kwame Anthony Appia made a distinction between his uses of the terms racism and racialism in his 1993 book In My Father's House: Africa in the Philosophy of Culture. Racialism is “the view ... that there are heritable characteristics, possessed by members of our species, that allow us to divide them into a small set of races, in such a way that all the members of these races share certain traits and tendencies with each other that they do not share with members of any other race.”^[37] I do not know if he was the first to give such a clear definition, but many authors that use the term cite his book. As defined, it does not imply a notion of superiority of one race over another. A similar distinction that, however, implies such a notion was made by Bulgarian-French philosopher Tzvetan Todorov in the 1993 book On Human Diversity: Nationalism, Racism and Exoticism in French Thought. (This is a translation from of Nous et les autres: La réflexion française sur la diversité humaine from 1989.) Todorov explains racialism as the belief in typological essences, called “races”, which can be rated hierarchically, while racism is not a belief but the use of racialism to promote social or political ends. This distinction is also used and cited in the literature. Used in this sense, it is a synonym of the oxymoronic term “scientific racism” – not overtly racist, but nevertheless serving to promote a racist agenda. I think we see a less charged – although opprobrious – use here, in the sentence “Yet such racialism was built upon the data of philology, inferring discrete racial groups from different speech varieties.” This is in the context of a Victorian mediaevalist view of mediaeval English as pure and indigenous.  --Lambiam 14:47, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

I have attempted to give a better definition. Is the {{rfv-sense}} tag still needed?  --Lambiam 14:44, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

Wu-Tanger and Wu-Tangers

Is this term really in use? To be honest, I'm a big fan of the Wu-Tang Clan and I never heard anyone using a term "Wu-Tanger". I checked the NOW Corpus which contains over 12 billion words shows no evidence of this term. Google hardly mentnions it. I think it is a ephemeral term that was used once nad stop being used. Tashi (talk) 22:15, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

That corpus isn't the right place to look. Try Google Books, which is full of music magazines etc. We now have 4 citations for sense 1 (member or fan). I don't know about sense 2 (Australian slang for a kind of youth). Equinox ◑ 14:44, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Struldbrug

Needs usage that meets WT:FICTION. Chuck Entz (talk) 04:46, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Such usage exists: [38], [39], [40]. The definition needs some loosening, though; it is good enough for similes, as in the last of these uses, but not for metaphorical use as when addressing an obelisk as “forlorn Struldbrug”. So we need a change that results in the extension of the loosened concept overlapping with but not including all of the denotations of the pre-loosened concept.  --Lambiam 15:49, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

built like a shit brickhouse

Needs quotations. DonnanZ (talk) 10:02, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

Cited IMHO. DCDuring (talk) 18:34, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

holograph

RFV-sense of "hologram". Present in M-W and AHD, but its existence is contested by an IP user on my talk page, who argues that it should not be the first definition and mentions a risk of what some call citogenesis. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 16:38, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

These all seem valid attestations to me: [41] [42] [43] [44] However, this usage has apparently invited disapproving comment and it might be more common in the United States than elsewhere. In any event, this meaning seems less common than the other meaning of holograph. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 16:46, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

Added 3 cites. Equinox ◑ 20:26, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

wave

Rfv-sense: To move like a wave, or by floating; to waft. Supposedly there's a Thomas Browne quote around, but I couldn't track it down. Oxlade2000 (talk) 19:23, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

I took a run at it. DCDuring (talk) 23:28, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

RFV passed with flying colours Oxlade2000 (talk) 23:28, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

mouth

Rfv-sense: To form or cleanse with the mouth; to lick, as a bear licks her cub. Supposedly there's a Thomas Browne quote around, but I couldn't track it down. Oxlade2000 (talk) 19:22, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

dumble

"(slang) A stupid person". Looking at the entry history, the creator claimed this appears in several dictionaries, but did not name them. I wonder if dumbledore is related; see its etymology. In that case this might be old UK dialect rather than slang. Equinox ◑ 11:45, 8 March 2021 (UTC)