means A small, plump, brownish songbird of the family Passeridae, common in towns and gardens worldwide and famous for its boldness around people.

from From Old English 'spearwa,' the name this little bird has carried for over a thousand years. It traces back to a Proto-Germanic root (cousin to Old Norse 'spörr' and Gothic 'sparwa'), and scholars suspect a deeper Indo-European ancestor possibly tied to words for 'flutter' or simply 'small bird' — fitting, since the sparrow has always been the default tiny bird against which others are measured.