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Prescriptivist or not, MW lists both mantle and mantel. What are you prescriptivists gonna do? Dismantle MW?
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you'd be hard pressed to find a modern dictionary that's prescriptivist--although the AHD usage notes are prescriptivist in nature.
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Carpal Tunnel
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just for the record
"That was the week that was" (TV show)
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Thank you, Missus Anna. 
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OP
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SWTWTWTWW = So that's what TWTW was
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AHD3 has separate entries for mantel, the fireplace adjunct and mantle, the covering of whatever sort. Mantel is derived from manteltree which is derived from mantle + tre, beam. As if that weren't enough, we note from Dr Bill's post above, that an older spelling of mantle was, in OE, mentel and, in OF, mantel, both from Latin mantellum.
I have a slip of paper in my Junk Drawer Memory® with an almost legible scribble on it that seems to say something about a bird called a nickle, but I can't find anything a-googling.
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nickle
<zoology> The European woodpecker, or yaffle.
Synonym: nicker pecker.
Source: Websters Dictionary
Now this was an interesting quick search, Faldage. I entered 'nickle' into Onelook.com's search engine. There were about ten or so dictionaries listed. I chose the medical dictionary shown. The medical dictionary, as quoted above, referenced Webster. Ya' gotta love yaffle, but ya' 'specially gotta love, bein' the man you are, nicker pecker!!
I ask you: Was this a matter of coincidence--or destiny? You've finally found your kindred spirit, Close Brother, among the avians.
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Ya know? I never think of looking in Onelook. Thanks for the lesson, Dub' Dub.
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Both names "nickel" and "cobalt" came from German words for evil spirits, because the ores that contained them were a nuisance. The early miners had no use for the ores as they did not know that valuable metals could be gotten from them, and many years would go by before that became p;ossible.
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I notice the USn's all said mantle/mantel. I would always use mantlepiece.
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