Definition, CEFR level B1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
nounThe house sparrow, Passer domesticus; a small bird with a short bill, and brown, white and gray feathers.
nounA member of the family Passeridae, comprising small Old World songbirds.
Sentence Examples
The boy can't tell a swallow from a sparrow.
Not a single sparrow was to be heard.
CEFR Practice Quiz
A tiny ____ landed on the bird feeder and ate some seeds.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
A tiny brown ____ landed on the bird feeder and quickly picked up a few sunflower seeds to eat.
Word Origin & History
From Middle English sparwe, sparowe, from Old English spearwa, from Proto-West Germanic *sparwō, from Proto-Germanic *sparwô, from Proto-Indo-European *spḗr (“sparrow”).
Cognate with Dutch spreeuw (“starling”), Alemannic German Spar (“sparrow”), German Sperling (“sparrow”), Danish and Norwegian Bokmål spurv (“sparrow”), Norwegian Nynorsk sporv (“sparrow”), Swedish sparv (“sparrow”), Breton frao (“crow”), Tocharian A ṣpārāñ, Ancient Greek ψάρ (psár, “starling”), as well as Italian sparviero and Italian sparviere (“hawk”).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"Man progresses generally, not both legs at once like a sparrow, but by putting one leg forward first, and then the other."
— 1920, Edward Carpenter, Pagan and Christian Creeds, New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., published 1921, page 192:
"In a poem by Sappho, Aphrodite is represented as riding in a car drawn by sparrows."
— 1961, Harry E. Wedeck, Dictionary of Aphrodisiacs, New York: The Citadel Press, page 87:
"I take it there 's scarcely a happier fellow alive than your honest town-bred smoke-dried cockney sparrow."
— 1878, Charles Henry Ross, Ally Sloper's guide to the Paris exhibition, page 54:
"Professional cockney sparrow Martine has acted since childhood."
— 2005, Drama Faces: Martine McCutcheon, BBC: