spang

• Rhymes: -æŋ

From Middle English spang (“a small piece of ornamental metal; spangle; small ornament; a bowl or cup”), likely from Middle Dutch spange (“buckle, clasp”) or Old English spang (“buckle, clasp”).

This etymology is incomplete. You can help Wiktionary by elaborating on the origins of this term.

spang (plural spangs)

1. (obsolete) A shiny ornament or object; a spangle
   • Edmund Spenser

     With glittering spangs that did like stars appear.

• spangle

spang (third-person singular simple present spangs, present participle spanging, simple past and past participle spanged)

1. To set with bright points: star or spangle.
2. To hitch; fasten.

Onomatopoeic.

spang (third-person singular simple present spangs, present participle spanging, simple past and past participle spanged)

1. (intransitive, of a flying object such as a bullet) To strike or ricochet with a loud report
   • 1895 October 1, Stephen Crane, chapter 18, in The Red Badge of Courage, 1st US edition, New York: D. Appleton and Company, page 173:

     Occasional bullets buzzed in the air and spanged into tree trunks.

   • 1918, Zane Grey, The U.P. Trail

     How clear, sweet, spanging the hammer blows!

spang (not comparable)

1. (dated) Suddenly; slap, smack.
   • 1936, Djuna Barnes, Nightwood, Faber & Faber 2007, p. 22:

     And I didn't stop until I found myself spang in the middle of the Musée de Cluny, clutching the rack.

Probably from spring (verb) or spank (verb) (Can this⁽⁺⁾ etymology be sourced?)

spang (third-person singular simple present spangs, present participle spanging, simple past and past participle spanged)

1. (intransitive, dialectal, Britain, Scotland) To leap; spring.
   • Ramsay

     But when they spang o'er reason's fence, / We smart for't at our own expense.

2. (transitive, dialectal, Britain, Scotland) To cause to spring; set forcibly in motion; throw with violence.

spang (plural spangs)

1. (Scotland) A bound or spring; a leap.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Sir Walter Scott to this entry?)

See span

spang (plural spangs)

1. (Scotland) A span.

• spang in The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1911
• spang in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

• Pangs, pangs

From Old Norse spǫng, cf. Swedish spång. See also German Spange (clasp). Probably related to span from Proto-Germanic *spannaną.

• IPA^(key): [spɑ́ŋː], [spɒ́ŋː] (example of pronunciation)

  Rhymes: -áŋɡ

spang f (definite singular spanga, plural spinger, definite plural spingren)

1. a simple one-man bridge, log bridge, footbridge[1]