diff --git a/CHANGELOG-rust.md b/CHANGELOG-rust.md
index c27a2ea..90263f6 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG-rust.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG-rust.md
@@ -5,6 +5,8 @@ This changelog tracks the Rust `svdtools` project. See
 
 ## [Unreleased]
 
+* Sugar for simple `_split` and `_merge` 
+
 ## [v0.3.18] 2024-08-10
 
 * Replace `yaml-rust` with `yaml-rust2`. Check for duplicate keys and other YAML parse errors
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 8c187d8..562cc29 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -255,7 +255,6 @@ _rebase:
         ARRAY*:
             name: NEW_NAME%s
             _modify:
-                FIELD: [MINIMUM, MAXIMUM]
                 FIELD:
                   description: NEWDESC
         OTHER_ARRAY*: {}
diff --git a/src/patch/register.rs b/src/patch/register.rs
index 21dfd3e..a288348 100644
--- a/src/patch/register.rs
+++ b/src/patch/register.rs
@@ -203,6 +203,10 @@ impl RegisterExt for Register {
                         .with_context(|| format!("Merging fields matched to `{fspec}`"))?;
                 }
             }
+            Some(Yaml::String(fspec)) => {
+                self.merge_fields(fspec, None, &rpath)
+                    .with_context(|| format!("Merging fields matched to `{fspec}`"))?;
+            }
             _ => {}
         }
 
@@ -222,6 +226,10 @@ impl RegisterExt for Register {
                         .with_context(|| format!("Splitting fields matched to `{fspec}`"))?;
                 }
             }
+            Some(Yaml::String(fspec)) => {
+                self.split_fields(fspec, &Hash::new(), &rpath)
+                    .with_context(|| format!("Splitting fields matched to `{fspec}`"))?;
+            }
             _ => {}
         }