Meanings
plural spadgers
- colloquialdialectalA sparrow.
The broadcasting blokes are twittering away like spadgers over there.
1961, Margery Allingham, Three cases for Mr. Campion, page 822 more examples
Genuine cockney ‘spadgers’ have appeared at Bulli. The little hoppers are spreading rapidly all over the colony.
1884 September 24, The Newcastle Morning Herald, Newcastle, NSW, page 3, column 7'If you think spadgers is easy,' the father said, 'go get yourself a jenny wren. Jenny wrens is 'alf the size of spadgers and they never sit still for one second. Get yourself a jenny wren before you start shootin' yer mouth off about 'ow clever you is.'
1977, Roald Dahl, The Swan - colloquialA boy.
He laughs and says, “My, you sure talk brash, for such a little spadger.”
1970, Donald Harington, Lightning Bug
Synonyms & antonyms
Origin
- Old Norsespǫrr“sparrow”
- Scotsspurg“sparrow”
- Englishspadger
Originally British dialect (1850s), from spadge (fronted variant of northern dialect spag) + -er. The northern dialect term spag is a derhoticised form of Scots spurg (“sparrow”), from spur (from Old Norse spǫrr (“sparrow”), suffixless cognate of Old English spearwa) + diminutive suffix -ock, with loss of vowel and voicing of -k to -g after r.
More words from Scots, Old Norse
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
spadger. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/spadger
“spadger.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/spadger. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “spadger,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/spadger.
Source: spadger on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.