# Making plural



## Poland91pl

Hello. How is it ? 

Wife - wives 
Potato - potatoes 

So fe changes into ves 
THe Ending O takes ES 

SO WHY 

hippos not hippoes 
And 
Giraffes not girraves?


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## se16teddy

There are only a few nouns that change f to v when forming the plural.
Some nouns ending in o add an e before the s. Typically the ones that feel more English and less foreign; but this rule is not infallible, or easy for learners to follow!
Fuller details here: Forming Plurals in English
(Take comfort from the fact that, compared to Polish, English declension is a synch.)
(Take comfort also from the fact that *no-one *will misunderstand you if you get these wrong. There are *much* more important aspects of English to worry about; unfortunately many of those are much more difficult to teach, understand and learn. Which I suppose is why you are focusing on this!)


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## lingobingo

Yet more comprehensive information here: English plurals - Wikipedia


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## Welsh_Sion

'Wife' and 'Knife' are the only two words which have plurals in -ves. (Edit: I have been reminded that 'life' becomes 'lives' in the plural, so despite what my source says, there may well be more than two words which have plurals in -ves.)

About ten words ending in -f have plurals in -ves

Dwarf, hoof, scarf, wharf and roof can have plurals in -fs or -ves. The latter is the most common. Other words in -f(e) are regular.

__________

Some nouns add -es in the plural if the end in -o: echo, hero, potato, tomato.

Nouns ending in vowel + o have plurals in -s: radios, zoos, as do most new words coming from other languages: commandos, kilos, logos, solos

Buffalo, mosquito, tornado, volcano can have plurals in -s ot -es. -es is the most common.

After Swan, 2005: 514-515


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## london calling

What about Tolkien? Are you saying he was wrong to write of 'dwarves'? 😎


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## Andygc

Welsh_Sion said:


> The latter is the most common.


  I think that might be a sweeping statement: Google Books Ngram Viewer


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## Welsh_Sion

I'm only quoting from Swan. Obviously, things may have moved on since 2005. And I thought the statement that 'dwarves' was more common than 'dwarfs'. ("Dwarf, hoof, scarf, wharf and roof can have plurals in -fs or -ves. The latter is the most common.")


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## Andygc

It was "rooves" that caught my eye. Used by Orwell, but not many other writers.


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## berndf

Welsh_Sion said:


> 'Wife' and 'Knife' are the only two words which have plurals in -ves. (Edit: I have been reminded that 'life' becomes 'lives' in the plural, so despite what my source says, there may well be more than two words which have plurals in -ves.)
> 
> About ten words ending in -f have plurals in -ves
> 
> Dwarf, hoof, scarf, wharf and roof can have plurals in -fs or -ves. The latter is the most common. Other words in -f(e) are regular.


Those are words inherited from Old English. Old English did not distinguish between the sounds of f and v. They were considered variants od the same sound.


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## kentix

london calling said:


> What about Tolkien? Are you saying he was wrong to write of 'dwarves'? 😎


It was a creative literary decision.

Errors & Omissions: A plural question that Disney answers better



> In a foreword to The Hobbit, published in 1937, J R R Tolkien writes: "In English, the only correct plural of 'dwarf' is 'dwarfs' and the adjective is 'dwarfish'. In this story 'dwarves' and 'dwarvish' are used, but only when speaking of the ancient people to whom Thorin Oakenshield and his companions belonged."





> In appendix F to The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien gives a further explanation: "But in the Third Age something of their old character and power is still glimpsed... these are the descendants of the Naugrim of the Elder Days... in whose hands still lives the skill in work of stone that none have surpassed. It is to mark this that I have ventured to use the form 'dwarves', and remove them a little, perhaps, from the sillier tales of these latter days."


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## Catagrapha

bravadoes, bravoes, salvoes
Words of Greco-Latin origin often have more than one plural form, e.g., musea museums, dramata dramas.
Hippopotamus has four, according to wiktionary, "hippopotamuses or hippopotamusses or hippopotami or hippopotamus".


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## AndrasBP

Welsh_Sion said:


> 'Wife' and 'Knife' are the only two words which have plurals in -ves. (Edit: I have been reminded that 'life' becomes 'lives' in the plural, so despite what my source says, there may well be more than two words which have plurals in -ves.)


Off the top of my head: _elves, wolves, calves, halves and shelves_.


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## Olaszinhok

AndrasBP said:


> Off the top of my head: _elves, wolves, calves, halves and shelves_.


I would add _loaf - loaves _and _thief thieves.   _


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## Awwal12

Basically most words that were present in Old English have that -f/-ves (/-f/ > /-vz/) pattern as the only possibility or as an alternative (hooves, calves, halves, thieves etc.); if I remember correctly, it originated in early Middle English. However, by now it's a purely historical alteration and therefore lexically limited.

In any case, I doubt Slavs should complain ("wierchy", "panowie", "włose"...).


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## berndf

Awwal12 said:


> it originated in early Middle English


Yes, the spellings with v emerged when in Middle English, because of the many French loans, [v] started to become an independent phoneme rather than an allophone of /f/.


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## Poland91pl

Awwal12 said:


> Basically most words that were present in Old English have that -f/-ves (/-f/ > /-vz/) pattern as the only possibility or as an alternative (hooves, calves, halves, thieves etc.); if I remember correctly, it originated in early Middle English. However, by now it's a purely historical alteration and therefore lexically limited.
> 
> In any case, I doubt Slavs should complain ("wierchy", "panowie", "włose"...).


Wierch- sounds old Polish
Panowie- Polish
Włose? I don't know. 
It would be włosy in Polish


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