Okay, I've read it now. It's a good article, actually, and full of new material germane to this discussion. For example, he is able to push the "wing" reading back a little further than Johnson, to 1744, and in passing to suggest an etymology for it (ME "scherdes", meaning scales). It also turns out there's another, equally ambiguous version of the crux in Cymbeline:
And often, to our comfort, shall we finde The sharded-Beetle, in a safer hold Then is the full-wing'd Eagle.
Billings is a dung man, as you might be able to guess from his title, and he's certainly able to provide plenty of contemporary references associating beetles and dungy shards; but no one denies that connection, and I don't think he delivers a knock-out blow (or even blow fly).
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Date: 2013-10-06 07:19 am (UTC)Billings is a dung man, as you might be able to guess from his title, and he's certainly able to provide plenty of contemporary references associating beetles and dungy shards; but no one denies that connection, and I don't think he delivers a knock-out blow (or even blow fly).