An archaic or dialectal term for a young animal, especially a young goat or a child of unknown parentage.
From 'get' (an archaic/dialectal word for offspring or begetting, from Old English 'gitan') plus the diminutive suffix '-ling,' creating a term for a young creature.
This word shows how '-ling' (like in duckling, gosling, sapling) was once a productive way English speakers created words for young things—but 'getling' lost the competition to other terms and nearly vanished.
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