![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
spanghew (SPAHNG-hyoo) - v., to throw (a frog or toad) violently into the air.
Either at the end of a stick, or by striking it into jumping. Obsolete and rare before it went out of business, used exclusively in N. England and Scotland. I do not like what this word expresses, but I love that the word exists to express it. I mean seriously -- a verb for throwing a frog in the air. Well, there's a few instances known where something else is thrown, such as the rider of a horse, but still. Etymology is partly obscure: spang is a Scots dialect (and so also northernmost England) form of spring, but no one has a clue about the -hew.
---L.
Either at the end of a stick, or by striking it into jumping. Obsolete and rare before it went out of business, used exclusively in N. England and Scotland. I do not like what this word expresses, but I love that the word exists to express it. I mean seriously -- a verb for throwing a frog in the air. Well, there's a few instances known where something else is thrown, such as the rider of a horse, but still. Etymology is partly obscure: spang is a Scots dialect (and so also northernmost England) form of spring, but no one has a clue about the -hew.
---L.
