# This is a dog of a brother of mine's wife.



## Ivan_I

I know this doesn't sound really idiomatic and not the best way to express the idea but still which one is technically correct?

1 This is a dog of a brother of mine's *wife*. 
2 This is a dog of a brother of mine's *wife's*.


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## entangledbank

I have no feeling for that. Neither of them would be said. I have to simplify it to think about it:

This is a dog of my brother.
This is a dog of my brother's.

Neither of those would be said, either, but at least now I can tell the second one is correct.


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## Ivan_I

But these mean a different thing.
*
This is a dog of my brother's wife('s).*

I think this is technically correct, though.* 
 2 This is a dog of a brother of mine's wife's. *

Here is a more real sentence. Suppose a friend of mine has drawn a horse and I am introducing (so to speak) the picture. I think this is possible:

This is a drawing of a horse of a friend of mine’s.


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## ewie

There's nothing remotely real about your new sentence, Ivan


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## Ivan_I

It's a real life situation, though, that's why I called it real. What do you not like about it? (The answer - *everything *won't be accepted).


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## Edinburgher

Ivan_I said:


> This is a drawing of a horse of a friend of mine’s.


The sentence, quite apart from being unidiomatic, is ambiguous.
It can mean what you said (a drawing drawn by your friend, and the drawing depicts a horse).
But it could also mean (and this would be the more likely interpretation) a drawing of your friend's horse (drawn by we don't know who -- it could be by your friend, or it could be by someone else).

In case 1 we could say "This is a friend of mine's drawing of a horse."
In case 2: "This is a drawing of a friend of mine's horse."

We'd usually do better than that and set the scene (prepare the context) by introducing the friend first, so that we can then say "my friend" instead of "a friend of mine".

Case 1: This is my friend's drawing of a horse.
Case 2: This is a drawing of my friend's horse.


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## ewie

Ivan_I said:


> What do you not like about it?


The concatenation of genitives, which we just don't do in real life.

_This is a drawing a friend of mine did of a horse.
Here's a drawing of a horse my friend did.
This drawing of a horse was done by a friend of mine._
etc. etc.


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## Myridon

Ivan_I said:


> It's a real life situation, though, that's why I called it real. What do you not like about it? (The answer - *everything *won't be accepted).


You don't think your brother's wife can own a dog?


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## elroy

By the way, nobody says "a brother of mine."


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## lingobingo

This is a dog of a brother of mine's wife.

I read this as a poor rendering of: This is the wife of my dog of a brother!


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## Keith Bradford

Because we know that these long strings of possessives are complicated and sound ridiculous, we don't use them.  Fortunately, English gives several alternatives.
_A friend of mine = one of my friends.  My brother's wife = my sister-in-law.  X's dog = a dog belonging to X, a dog owned by X._
So what a native speakers would really say might be "This is my sister-in-law's dog... This dog belongs to my sister-in-law... My brother's wife owns this dog... etc, etc."


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## Packard

_This is my wife's brother's dog.  _

Unless you mean, "My brother's wife is a dog."


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## heypresto

I was about to suggest 'This is my sister-in-law's dog' but you have beaten me to it.

Cross-posted, and agreeing with Keith Bradford.


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## Roxxxannne

lingobingo said:


> This is a dog of a brother of mine's wife.
> 
> I read this as a poor rendering of: This is the wife of my dog of a brother!


So did I.  In fact, I was confused about whether it meant 
This is the wife of my dog of a brother
or 
My wife is a bitch that belongs to my brother.


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## Ivan_I

lingobingo said:


> This is a dog of a brother of mine's wife.
> 
> I read this as a poor rendering of: This is the wife of my dog of a brother!


It's more a theoretical question than a practical. 

Do you have any objections to these?

This is a brother of mine's car.
This is a car of a brother of mine's. 
(If yes -  “_It's taken out a couple of sheds [and] a car of a friend of mine's_,” Jacob Dyck said. Shifting winds create challenging conditions for crews fighting grass fire)

Here is one more:
Also, I had it on good authority that she had told *the sister of a friend of a friend of mine's brother* that she kind of liked me. (written by  John S. Littell A writer and former publishing executive, John S. Littell lives in New York City. His mother, Mary W. Littell, was a successful journalist in the 1950s and 60s, regularly contributing to women’s magazines such as Parents and Woman’s Day.)
So, I suppose:  "*a dog of a brother of mine's wife's" *isn't impossible.


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## Roxxxannne

Suppose my last name is Musk and someone asks me if I am related to Elon Musk.  I can easily imagine saying, "Yes, he's a cousin of mine."    It conveys the impression that we're not at all close but we do have a familial relationship that is typically defined as being cousins.


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## Edinburgher

Ivan_I said:


> Also, I had it on good authority that she had told *the sister of a friend of a friend of mine's brother* that she kind of liked me.


This is nonsense, probably deliberate nonsense on the writer's part.  After all, the sister of X's brother is just X's sister.
He could easily and less confusingly have written "...told the sister of a friend of a friend of mine's that..." or "told a friend of a friend of mine's sister that...".
Not that either of those are huge improvements.
When we say "a friend of a friend", it is usually understood that the second-named friend is *my* friend.
So at least it should have been "told a friend of a friend's sister" or "told the sister of a friend of a friend".


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## heypresto

Ivan_I said:


> Do you have any objections to these?


In your first quote it sounds strange to me. I don't know why the speaker didn't say " . . . and a friend's car." but then people speak in different ways in different contexts, so it may have sounded natural at the time.

In your second quote 'a friend of a friend' is a sort of fixed expression, and to extend it into "the sister of a friend of a friend of mine's brother" is, I'd say quite deliberate, and sort of humorous. 

Neither of these makes 'This is a brother of mine's car' or 'This is a car of a brother of mine's' natural or correct.


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## lingobingo

These are all idiomatic:

It belongs to an aunt of mine / an uncle of mine / a cousin of mine / a friend of mine / a colleague of mine / a former teacher of mine / an ex-partner of mine / a pet of a mine / an admirer of mine​
But… 
It belongs to a brother of mine  (unless maybe you mean a fellow-member of a brotherhood)
It belongs to one of my brothers


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## Ponyprof

Ivan_I said:


> It's more a theoretical question than a practical.
> 
> Do you have any objections to these?
> 
> This is a brother of mine's car.
> This is a car of a brother of mine's.
> (If yes -  “_It's taken out a couple of sheds [and] a car of a friend of mine's_,” Jacob Dyck said. Shifting winds create challenging conditions for crews fighting grass fire)
> 
> Here is one more:
> Also, I had it on good authority that she had told *the sister of a friend of a friend of mine's brother* that she kind of liked me. (written by  John S. Littell A writer and former publishing executive, John S. Littell lives in New York City. His mother, Mary W. Littell, was a successful journalist in the 1950s and 60s, regularly contributing to women’s magazines such as Parents and Woman’s Day.)
> So, I suppose:  "*a dog of a brother of mine's wife's" *isn't impossible.



This concatenation by Littell is so confusing that it's probably there just for humor or hyperbole. It's not there to actually communicate information. 

Of course we can say " a brother of mine" (and you are quoting poetic song lyrics above)   did something but in day to day speech we are more likely to say "my brother" or "one of my brother's."

For the original query, the natural thing would be "This dog belongs to my sister in law." But honestly except for registered show dogs, most dogs are understood to belong to the whole family. So unless your brother is living separately from his wife, we'd usually think of this as "my brother's dog."

Another related structure is "he's a friend of mine."  Obviously we can create any construction using this and may do so in unscripted spoken speech, which can go in clunky directions. 

But we are unlikely to put a possessive "s" on this phrase if we are speaking or writing thoughtfully.

Many things can be said in English that are not grammatically wrong, but lack clarity or are confusing. Hence what is possible and what is good style can be quite different. Good style is a smaller subset of the grammatically possible.


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## Ivan_I

heypresto said:


> Neither of these makes 'This is a brother of mine's car' or 'This is a car of a brother of mine's' natural or correct.


OK heypresto, how do you know that they are not correct? Maybe they are not natural, though.

Have a look at this:
http://guidetogrammar.org/grammar/possessives.htm
==
This is different from the problem we confront when creating possessives with compound constructions such as daughter-in-law and friend of mine. Generally, the apostrophe -s is simply added to the end of the compound structure: my daughter-in-law's car, *a friend of mine's car*. If this sounds clumsy, use the "of" construction to avoid the apostrophe: the car of a friend of mine, etc.
==
I can see *a friend of mine's car (*which equals* a brother of mine's car) *in the passage and it is not said that it's NOT CORRECT.
They say "If this sounds clumsy"... but being clumsy and being incorrect are not the same.... Or do you disagree with the passage?


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## heypresto

As we've said before, there are _many _things that may be grammatically correct but we would rarely or never say, and there are _many _things that are natural and that we say all the time but are _strictly speaking_ 'incorrect'. _Usage trumps everything_. 

So, again, it may not be grammatically wrong, but we'd never say it. We have better, shorter, simpler, or just different ways of saying it. 

If you want to learn fluent English, you will have to accept this, and concentrate on what we _say _rather than what you think we _should _say.


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## Ivan_I

heypresto said:


> As we've said before, there are _many _things that may be grammatically correct but we would rarely or never say,


I agree with that but I also think you shouldn't be so generous in distributing the word "incorrect" as it may often be the case that it doesn't correspond with the real state of affairs, all the more in this case, the article clearly states that it's correct but... maybe clumsy. 
As far as I understand you are not in disagreement with the passage.


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## Edinburgher

Ivan_I said:


> you shouldn't be so generous in distributing the word "incorrect"


Why not?
When we have something which, despite being technically correct grammatically, no-one actually says, then *that fact makes it incorrect.*


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## Ivan_I

Edinburgher said:


> Why not?
> When we have something which, despite being technically correct grammatically, no-one actually says, then *that fact makes it incorrect.*


Who says that no-one says? The article doesn't say that it's incorrect. It was written by a native speaker.


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## heypresto

As I said, it may not be _grammatically _wrong, but that doesn't mean that anybody would say it. 

Note that 'a friend of mine' is a zillion times more likely than 'a brother of mine', so although they may look like identical constructions, they are by no means equal in usage or 'naturalness'. You can't take what might sound OK with one to somehow prove or insist that that it sounds OK with the other.


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## Edinburgher

Ivan_I said:


> The article doesn't say that it's incorrect.


The trouble is that, contrary to your assumption in #22, "a friend of mine's car" *is not* the same as "a brother of mine's car". It is the same structurally, but not idiomatically.
This is because "a friend of mine" is a phrase we use very often (when we mean "one of my friends"), while "a brother of mine" is not.  We would always say "one of my brothers" instead.

In case it's not clear to you, the article "a" in the above expressions is for the friend or brother, not for the car.  We assume the friend or brother has only one car.  If they have more than one, and we mean one of the cars of my only brother, we'd say "one of my brother's cars".  If we mean the only car of one of my several brothers, we would say "the car of one of my brothers".

(crossposted)


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## Ponyprof

Ivan_I said:


> Who says that no-one says? The article doesn't say that it's incorrect. It was written by a native speaker.



I will repeat myself.

There are infinite possible sentences that, strictly speaking, are grammatically correct. But a significant per centage of such sentences are rarely or never used because (a) they are clunky, confusing, or ambiguous or (b) they are archaic, outmoded, or in the wrong register for modern speech.

Thus merely arguing whether a sentence is technically possible under the rules of grammar is only half the question. The other half is whether a native English speaker would produce that sentence in thoughtful prepared speech or writing.

Learners are always coming to this forum with phrases from 19th century classic novels that are grammatically correct but that no one today would say or write. Indeed honestly it is very hard for even skilled modern novelists to convincingly produce invented 19th century texts.

Learners also come on here with very interesting constructions from audio transcripts, especially off PBS interview programs that feature "regular folks" speaking unscripted. Sometimes they come up with convoluted and redundant constructions that they might blush at later  but that's what they said in the heat of the moment.

Grammar rules shift with time but fairly slowly.

Usage conventions are more mutable, but they are equally important to being fluent in a language. Imagine an English learner who had only a complete set of Charles Dickens to study. Even if that learner ended up quite fluent, no one in the modern world would understand him speaking like that.

Or even worse, learned English from the late works of Henry James. I love James. He is always scrupulously grammatically correct. But he takes his sentences to the breaking point of complexity and embedded clauses. Just because he made it possible doesn't mean anyone else ever spoke or wrote like that, even in 1885.


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## Ivan_I

Edinburgher said:


> In case it's not clear to you, the article "a" in the above expressions is for the friend or brother, not for the car.


I didn't think "a" referred to "car".


Edinburgher said:


> We assume the friend or brother has only one car.  If they have more than one, and we mean one of the cars of my only brother, we'd say "one of my brother's cars".


What if there is more than one brother or one friend and more than one car?

This is a car of a friend of mine's.
This is one of a friend of mine's cars.


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## Ponyprof

Ivan_I said:


> I didn't think "a" referred to "car".
> 
> What if there is more than one brother or one friend and more than one car?
> 
> This is a car of a friend of mine's.
> This is one of a friend of mine's cars.



What you are saying here is that this car belongs to one of your friends.


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## Edinburgher

Ivan_I said:


> I didn't think "a" referred to "car".


 Good. I didn't think you did, and just wanted to make sure.


> What if there is more than one brother or one friend and more than one car?


_This is a car of a friend of mine's_.  Sounds OK, but doesn't make 100% clear that the friend has more than one car.
_This is one of a friend of mine's cars_.  This one is clearer, but sounds awful.

_This is one of the cars of a friend of mine._

It's more complicated with the brothers, and I can't think of anything simpler than:
_This is one of the cars of one of my brothers._
It may be better to change the second "of" to "that belongs to".


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## Ivan_I

Edinburgher said:


> This is because "a friend of mine" is a phrase we use very often (when we mean "one of my friends"), while "a brother of mine" is not.  We would always say "one of my brothers" instead.


"Trust but verify" - as the Reagan used to say. So, I decided to go on a search for "a brother/sister of mine".

Here is a current modest collection:
1) A little poetry from a Brother of mine – Michael Gallagher
*A little poetry from a Brother of mine*
The following poem is from Brother Anthony, a monk of the Taize order, who also happens to be Professor at Sogang University in Seoul. He is *British*, but has lived in Seoul for since 1980.
2) *Lebron James Calls Carmelo Anthony A "Brother Of Mine" After Friday’s Matchup
https://www.streetstalkin.com/lebro...hony-a-brother-of-mine-after-fridays-matchup/
3)  A sister of mine, who taught school for many years prior to her entry into the Convent in England, told me that she once had a very bright boy in ... ( Dr. Joseph Murphy )*(it's about a sister, though)
4) Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe - Brother Of Mine Lyrics | MetroLyrics
*Brother of Mine *(Anderson / Bruford / Wakeman / Howe) 
5) *A sister of mine* had a ‘big’ birthday last week and I wanted to make a special card for her 
Fancy Fold Card with Bouquet Blooms ( Annette Sullivan: Independent Stampin' Up!® Demonstrator, Australia – )
6) *Can a sister of mine, who is a lawyer, go to jail for filing a false police report about me in March of 2019?*
https://www.avvo.com/legal-answers/can-a-sister-of-mine--who-is-a-lawyer--go-to-jail--4442448.html (Highland Park, IL)
7)  *a sister of mine came down with polio *
https://www.parliament.wa.gov.au/Ha...3D6351C7D048256602000FB1A7/$file/C1125008.PDF (australia)


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## Ponyprof

Yes, these are all fine. But they aren't being used with possessive "s."


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## Ivan_I

Ponyprof said:


> Yes, these are all fine. But they aren't being used with possessive "s."


But some members refute the very possibility of such a usage even without the apostrophe and "s."



elroy said:


> By the way, nobody says "a brother of mine."





Edinburgher said:


> This is because "a friend of mine" is a phrase we use very often (when we mean "one of my friends"), while "a brother of mine" is not.  *We would always say "one of my brothers" instead.*


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## Ponyprof

Ivan_I said:


> But some members refute the very possibility of such a usage even without the apostrophe and "s."



No one is totally refuting it. They are just saying it isn't the most common usage. In general though discount poems and song lyrics as sources of modern spoken English.


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## Ivan_I

Ponyprof said:


> No one is totally refuting it. They are just saying it isn't the most common usage. In general though discount poems and song lyrics as sources of modern spoken English.


To me "nobody" and "always" sound as totally.


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## Edinburgher

I know, I know.  Never say "never".  "Nobody" and "always" are of course exaggerations, and need to be interpreted in the context of speakers/writers who choose their words carefully.
Remember that not everyone follows best practice.  *Don't trust Google searches.*  They will find the good and the bad, and as a result, they cannot be a reliable guide to you for what is good.


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## Keith Bradford

heypresto said:


> ... it may not be _grammatically _wrong, but that doesn't mean that anybody would say it.
> 
> Note that 'a friend of mine' is a zillion times more likely than 'a brother of mine'...


Well, zillion...  It's actually just 100 times more likely (see Google Ngram Viewer) but that still rules out 'a brother of mine' for all useful purposes.


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## velisarius

If someone said "a brother of mine", rather than "one of my brothers" I'd imagine that the speaker had an unusually large number of brothers: the son of a sheikh with many wives, perhaps.


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## Ivan_I

Clear?

This is a bike of the father’s of one of my friends.


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## boozer

Threads like this remind me of an ad I once saw here: 'For sale. The Ambassador of Italy's wife car'


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## Ivan_I

boozer said:


> Threads like this remind me of an ad I once saw here: 'For sale. The Ambassador of Italy's wife car'


I think this is better "For sale. The Ambassador of Italy's wife's car'

Nevertheless, what about this  *This is a bike of the father’s of one of my friends. *


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## boozer

Ivan_I said:


> Nevertheless, what about this  *This is a bike of the father’s of one of my friends. *


Seeing it written down: you seem to have many friends. The father of one of them has many bikes. This bike is one of them. 

Hearing it: You have many friends. One of them has several fathers. Those fathers collectively own any number of bikes. This bike is one of them.

In all cases I would be utterly confused, Ivan.


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## Ivan_I

boozer said:


> In all cases I would be utterly confused, Ivan.


Of course, I am confused not less than you are.
But I am asking to verify a technical correctness. Is *'s *ok with father? *This is a bike of the father’S of one of my friends.* 

Here is another way to say the same.
This is one of my friends’ father’s bike


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## ewie

boozer said:


> In all cases I would be utterly confused, Ivan.


Ditto.


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## boozer

Ivan_I said:


> Of course, I am confused not less than you are.
> But I am asking to verify a technical correctness. Is *'s *ok with father? *This is a bike of the father’S of one of my friends.*
> 
> Here is another way to say the same.
> This is one of my friends’ father’s bike


Technical correctness cannot be evaluated in the absence of logical clarity, Ivan. Not in this case anyway. I am clueless. 

In your revised version, it should be 'bikes', plural.


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## heypresto

Ivan_I said:


> Is *'s *ok with father? *This is a bike of the father’S of one of my friends.*


No. What is it doing there?

This is one of my friends’ father’s bike. 
This is one of my friends’ father’s bike*s*.


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## Ivan_I

heypresto said:


> No. What is it doing there?


Do you agree that this is correct?

*This is a bike of my father’S.  *

So, here *"This is a bike of the father’S of one of my friends." *it does the same as as here "*This is a bike of my father’S." in my view. *



heypresto said:


> This is one of my friends’ father’s bike.
> This is one of my friends’ father’s bike*s*.


Why? How come?
*These are *one of my friends’ father’s bike*s*.


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## heypresto

Ivan_I said:


> Do you agree that this is correct?
> 
> *This is a bike of my father’S.*


Yes, but as we've repeatedly said 'This is my father's bike' is how we'd say it.



Ivan_I said:


> So, here *"This is a bike of the father’S of one of my friends." *it does the same as as here "*This is a bike of my father’S." in my view.*


Sorry, I'm afraid your view is wrong. You could, if you really want to, say 'This is a bike of the father of one of my friends', but again it's not how we'd say it. 



Ivan_I said:


> *These are *one of my friends’ father’s bike*s*.


Ah, I think I see what you're thinking. You are applying 'one' to 'one of my friends', but that's not how we read it. We read one as referring to the number of bikes.

*This* is *one *of his bike*s*.  

*These *are *two/three/some* of his bike*s*. 

So this potential ambiguity might be another reason we don't construct these complicated sentences.


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## Andygc

I suggest that much of the problem here is an attempt to take an illogical but idiomatic form of words and then to extend it. The double possessive is entirely illogical, but it is well-entrenched in English and is, therefore, grammatically and idiomatically correct.
"This is a bike of my father's."
It is only used with the indefinite article, and it's probably used only with people and, perhaps, animals. (This is a toy of my dog's.  ? This is one of my dog's toys. )
"This is the bike of my father's."  
"This is the bike of my father." - not idiomatic, but just as grammatical as "This is the corner of my bedroom."  
"This is my father's bike." 

As soon as the sentence gets more complicated, the double possessive disappears. "This is a bike of the boy who lives at number 7." But we tend to shun that and use a completely different sentence to express that meaning: "This is one of the bikes that belong to the boy who lives at number 7". The same applies to (a) "This is a bike of the father’s of one of my friends." If we wanted to say that we would say (b) "This is a bike of the father of one of my friends." (a) is ungrammatical because it is not the idiomatic form. (b) is grammatical because it conforms to the normal use of the "of" possessive, but it is not, as others have said, idiomatic when talking about people's possessions.


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## L'irlandais

Ivan_I said:


> Who says that no-one says? The article doesn't say that it's incorrect. It was written by a native speaker.


That’s inaccurate.  A journalist didn’t write that sentence.  It is, in fact, a transcript of what one of those interviewed said, after a stressful event I might add.  Oral language is prone to errors.  Many native speakers have made perfectly valid suggestions, eg.  This is my sister-in-law’s dog.  or This is my brother’s car.  I understand, as a learner you want to try out new ways of saying stuff.  However copying the mistakes of others isn’t going to help you improve your English.


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## lingobingo

Ivan_I said:


> Clear?
> 
> This is a bike of the father’s of one of my friends.


It’s wrong, as everyone has said.

Whose bike is it? Who does it belong to?
The father’s of one of my friends. 

This is one of my friends’ father’s bike.
Whose bike is it?
[It’s] One of my friends’ father’s.
It belongs to the father of one of my friends.


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## Ivan_I

heypresto said:


> Ah, I think I see what you're thinking. You are applying 'one' to 'one of my friends', but that's not how we read it. We read one as referring to the number of bikes.
> *This* is *one *of his bike*s*.
> *These *are *two/three/some* of his bike*s*.


How would you interpret this? 
*One of my uncle's friends came.*


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## Barque

Ivan_I said:


> How would you interpret this?
> *One of my uncle's friends came.*


My uncle has multiple friends and one of those friends came somewhere.

If you mean that the friends of one of your uncles came somewhere, you'd need "My uncle's friends came". Or if you want to specify he's one of multiple uncles: _The friends of one of my uncles came._


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## Andygc

Ivan_I said:


> How would you interpret this?
> *One of my uncle's friends came.*


Why should that cause any difficulty? It bears no relationship to the structure "a friend of mine's". It's just a normal possessive.


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## Ivan_I

Barque said:


> My uncle has multiple friends and one of those friends came somewhere.
> 
> If you mean that the friends of one of your uncles came somewhere, you'd need "My uncle's friends came". Or if you want to specify he's one of multiple uncles: _The friends of one of my uncles came._


Based on what do you draw this conclusion? The sentence is ambiguous.
PS: I think this is more correct
_The friends of one of my uncle*s'* came._


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## Andygc

Ivan_I said:


> The sentence is ambiguous.


Which sentence is ambiguous?


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## Barque

Ivan_I said:


> Based on what do you draw this conclusion? The sentence is ambiguous.


I understood it that way because that's how that structure's used. It might technically be ambiguous, but it's normally understood in a particular way and that removes the ambiguity.


Ivan_I said:


> PS: I think this is more correct
> _The friends of one of my uncle*s'* came._


It's grammatical (except for the apostrophe) but awkward (Yes, I know I suggested it, without the apostrophe, but that's how it is). The apostrophe shouldn't be there since you have "of".


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## Ivan_I

Barque said:


> I understood it that way because that's how it's used. It might technically be ambiguous, but it's normally understood in a particular way and that removes the ambiguity.


I heard an opinion of a Scott. He said it was ambiguous.


Barque said:


> It's grammatical but awkward, and the apostrophe shouldn't be there, since you have "of".


What does the presence of "of" have to do with the presence of apostrophe in the same sentence?

This is a picture of Frank's. - 100% correct even though we have "of" and " *'s* "


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## Barque

Ivan_I said:


> What does the presence of "of" have to do with the presence of apostrophe in the same sentence?


"Of" connotes "belonging" - that they were your uncle's friends. You don't need an apostrophe when you have "of" already.



Ivan_I said:


> This is a picture of Frank's. - 100% correct even though we have "of" and " *'s* "


That's a different sentence. As you were told above, usage trumps logic.


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## Barque

Andygc said:


> Which sentence is ambiguous?


I believe he's referring to #53.


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## Andygc

What, this?


Ivan_I said:


> One of my uncle's friends came.


That's not in the least ambiguous in *written* English.
One of my uncle's friends came. One uncle has at least two friends and one came.

This is potentially ambiguous
One of my uncles' friends came. 
More than one uncle. The friends of one of them came.
More than one uncle. One of their shared friends came.

The possessive forms of the noun phrase "one of my uncles" are _of one of my uncles_ and _one of my uncles'._

There's no apostrophes in speech, which is why we don't say the second one unless we have some rock solid context to make the meaning clear.


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## lingobingo

Ivan_I said:


> How would you interpret this?
> *One of my uncle's friends came.*


It’s _potentially_ ambiguous, in that it could conceivably be used/taken to mean:
The friends of one of my uncles came.​
But in practice, the natural way for a native English-speaker to read it (or use it) is:
A friend of my uncle’s came.​= Among the guests was [someone who’s] a friend of my uncle’s (rather than a friend of mine)​


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## L'irlandais

Definitely ambiguous.  I agree with #62 & #63. It is not clear from the sentence, whether you have more than one uncle, or not.  One can relate to the word uncle, or to the word friends.


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## Andygc

lingobingo said:


> It’s _potentially_ ambiguous, in that it could conceivably be used/taken to mean:
> The friends of one of my uncles came.


Sorry, but I have to disagree. It's written, it has an apostrophe, so it allows of only one meaning. It's only ambiguous in speech.


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## lingobingo

You’re right. For it to make sense written, uncles would have to be plural, since you can’t have one of an uncle.


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## Ivan_I

I still don't understand these. I can't see how "is" can correspond with "bikes"


heypresto said:


> This is one of my friends’ father’s bike.
> This is one of my friends’ father’s bike*s*.


point 2


heypresto said:


> Yes, but as we've repeatedly said 'This is my father's bike' is how we'd say it.


But it would be wrong to say this:
*This is my father's bike.*
instead of this
*This is a bike of my father's.*

Because they don't mean the same.


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## L'irlandais

Yet the model being proposed is This is one of my father’s bikes.
Your suggestion is not frequently used.


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## Ivan_I

L'irlandais said:


> Yet the model being proposed is This is one of my father’s bikes.
> Your suggestion is not frequently used.


This *is *one of my father’s *bikes*.

This is ____ bikes.


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## L'irlandais

Okay I understand your question, I hadn’t earlier.  The expression « one of » is always followed by a plural noun.
Is the use of "one of the" correct in the following context?


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## Ivan_I

Ah... I see now. Then the last one:

Do you agree that?

it would be wrong to say this:
*This is my father's bike.*
instead of this
*This is a bike of my father's.*

Because they don't mean the same.


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## Andygc

Ivan_I said:


> This is ____ bikes.


No. This is *one* of ...
He is one of my brothers.
One of the candles is missing.
One of the people in the crowd is unusually tall.
One is singular.

Cross-posted with Ivan. Correct, they don't mean the same. The first, he has only one bike. The second, he has more than one bike.


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## L'irlandais

Yes, one is singular, but the plural noun at the end was what was confusing the issue.  It’s a common enough mistake for non-native speakers.


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## Barque

Ivan_I said:


> But it would be wrong to say this:
> *This is my father's bike.*
> instead of this
> *This is a bike of my father's.*


It should be the other way round. The first sounds natural. The second doesn't sound as natural.



Ivan_I said:


> Because they don't mean the same.


I'd understand them as meaning much the same. The only difference is that the second, the one that doesn't sound as natural to me, suggests the father may have more than one bike. For that, I'd expect "This is one of my father's bikes". (That doesn't mean the speaker has more than one father. It means the father has more than one bike.)

Edit: The first doesn't necessarily mean the father has only one bike. It just doesn't talk of whether he has one or many.


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## Forero

Ivan_I said:


> I still don't understand these. I can't see how "is" can correspond with "bikes"


"One" is always singular.





> point 2
> 
> But it would be wrong to say this:
> *This is my father's bike.*
> instead of this
> *This is a bike of my father's.*
> 
> Because they don't mean the same.


The second sounds strange without supporting context, but they do mean the same thing unless context suggests otherwise.


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