Word.ws English Dictionary

spang

/ˈspæŋ/

spang noun: a shiny ornament or object; a spangle.

Noun (1)

spang (plural spangs)

  1. (obsolete) A shiny ornament or object; a spangle
    • With glittering spangs that did like starres appeare.1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book IV, Canto IX”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 45

Verb (1)

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.

Verb (2)

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.
    • Occasional bullets buzzed in the air and spanged into tree trunks.1895 October, Stephen Crane, chapter XVIII, in The Red Badge of Courage: An Episode of the American Civil War, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC, page 173
    • How clear, sweet, spanging the hammer blows!1918, Zane Grey, The U.P. Trail

Adverb

spang (not comparable)

  1. (dated) Suddenly; slap, smack.
    • And I didn't stop until I found myself spang in the middle of the Musée de Cluny, clutching the rack.1936, Djuna Barnes, Nightwood, Faber & Faber, published 2007, page 22

Verb (3)

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

  1. (Scotland, UK, dialectal, intransitive) To leap; spring.
    • a. 1758, Allan Ramsay, epistle to Robert Yarde
      But when they spang o'er reason's fence, / We smart for't at our own expense.
  2. (Scotland, UK, dialectal, transitive) To cause to spring; set forcibly in motion; throw with violence.

Noun (2)

spang (plural spangs)

  1. (Scotland) A bound or spring; a leap.
    • Set roast-beef and pudding on the opposite side o' the pit o' Tophet, and an Englishman will mak a spang at it—[…]1817 December 31 (indicated as 1818), [Walter Scott], chapter I, in Rob Roy. […], volume III, Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co. […]; London: Longman, Hurst...

Noun (3)

spang (plural spangs)

  1. (Scotland) A span.

Proper noun capitalized: Spang

Spang (plural Spangs)

  1. A surname.

Forms of spang

Noun
pluralspangs
Verb
third-person singular presentspangs
present participlespanging
past participlespanged
pastspanged
Proper noun
pluralSpangs

Origin of spang

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”).

Onomatopoeic.

Uncertain. Cognate with Scots spang, and possibly related to English spank.

Words formed from spang

Words that rhyme with spang

38 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about spang

What does spang mean?
Spang means a shiny ornament or object; a spangle.
What part of speech is spang?
Spang can be a noun, a verb, an adverb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce spang?
Spang is pronounced /ˈspæŋ/.
What is the plural of spang?
The plural of spang is spangs.

Words near spang in the dictionary

  1. spanemic
  2. spaneria
  3. spanes
  4. Spanevello
  5. Spanevellos
  6. spang
  7. spang-new
  8. spange
  9. spanged
  10. Spangel
  11. Spangenberg

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: spang (page history and authors); Spang (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-spang.wav, LL-Q1860_(eng)-AlexLesniewski-spang.wav.

Cite this entry: “spang.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/spang. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.