DCHP-2

spit DCHP-2 (August 2016)

• n. — somewhat rare, Alberta, Saskatchewan

  a sunflower seed (see Image 1).

  Type: 3. Semantic Change — Spit may have originally been a proprietary name; "Spitz" is the brand name for salted unhulled sunflower seeds produced as a snack food by a company originally from Alberta. The earliest trademark for Spitz sunflower seeds was filed in 1987 (see Canadian Trade-marks Database reference). It remains unclear whether the brand took the name from a preexisting form, though this seems certainly possible if not likely. It is indeed probable that spit originated as a reference to the action of spitting out the hull of the sunflower seed while consuming the seed itself, so the term may be older than the trade name.
  See also COD-2, s.v. "spit" n.(4), which is marked "Cdn (West)."

  • Because of excessive noise, frequency chart are not possible at this point (SD 4 Aug. 2016).