The English plural reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Jul-2004
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English plural

Time you got around to sponsoring a child
In the English language, nouns are inflected for grammatical number—that is, singular or plural numerus. This article discusses the variety of ways in which English nouns form their plurals. Phonetic transcriptions, given inside slashes, are in SAMPA notation.

Table of contents
1 Regular plurals
2 Almost-regular plurals
3 Irregular plurals
4 Plurals of numbers
5 Defective nouns
6 Nouns with multiple plurals
7 Plural to singular by back formation
8 Plurals of names of peoples

Regular plurals

Most nouns form the plural by adding -s to the singular form (see exceptions below). This is pronounced /z/ except when the preceding sound is a voiceless consonant (see phonation), in which case it is pronounced /s/. Examples:

boy           boys

girl          girls

cat           cats

chair         chairs
Where a noun ends in a sibilant sound—such as s, sh, x, soft ch—the plural is formed by adding es (also pronounced as z with a neutral vowel sound or short i):

glass         glasses

dish          dishes

witch         witches
Phonetically, these rules are sufficient to describe most English plurals. However, there are several complications in spelling -

The -oes rule: most nouns ending in o preceded by a consonant also form their plurals by adding -es (pronounced /z/):

hero          heroes

potato        potatoes

volcano       volcanoes
The -ies rule: nouns ending in a y preceded by a consonant drop the y and add -ies (pronounced /:iz/):

cherry        cherries

lady          ladies
Note, however, that proper nouns (particularly those for people or places) ending in a y preceded by a consonant form their plurals regularly:

Harry         Harrys (as in There are three Harrys in our office)

Germany       Germanys (as in The two Germanys were unified in 1990)
This does not apply to words that are merely capitalised common nouns:

P&O Ferries (from ferry)
A few common nouns ending in a y preceded by a consonant form their plurals regularly:

henry         henrys

zloty         zlotys

Almost-regular plurals

Many nouns of Italian or Spanish origin are exceptions to this rule:

canto         cantos

grotto        grottos

piano         pianos

portico       porticos

quarto        quartos

solo          solos
Most nouns ending in f or fe form their plurals by changing the f into a v and adding es:

calf          calves

half          halves
Some just add an s:

proof         proofs

muff          muffs
Some can do either:

Irregular plurals

There are many other less regular ways of forming plurals. While they may seem quirky, they usually stem from older forms of English or from foreign borrowings.

Irregular Germanic plurals

The plural of a few Germanic nouns can also be formed from the singular by adding n or en:

ox            oxen

eye           eyen    (Rare, found in some regional dialects)

shoe          shoon   (Also rare/obsolete)
Note: "box", referring to a computer, is semi-humorously pluralized "boxen" in the Leet dialect.

The plural is sometimes formed by simply changing the vowel sound of the singular, in a process called umlaut (these are sometimes called mutated plurals): 

foot          feet

goose         geese

louse         lice

man           men

mouse         mice

tooth         teeth

woman         women



Some nouns have singular and plural alike:


sheep



deer



cod



series



trout




Irregular plurals of foreign origin

Because English includes words from so many ancestral languages, as well as many loanwords from Classical Greek and Latin and other modern languages, there are many other forms of plurals. Such nouns often retain their original plurals, at least for some time after they are introduced. In some cases both forms are still vying for attention: for example, for a librarian, the plural of appendix is appendices (following the original language); for physicians, however, the plural of appendix is appendixes. Likewise, an electrician works with antennas and an entomologist deals with antennae. The "correct" form is the one that sounds the better in context.

Correctly formed Latin plurals are the most acceptable, and indeed are often required, in academic and scientific contexts.  In common usage, back-formed plurals are sometimes preferred.


radius         radii



alumnus        alumni



viscus         viscera



virus          viruses



corpus         corpora



Note: See article on the Plural of virus.


stigma        stigmata



stoma         stomata



Though some take s more commonly:


cactus         cactuses / cacti



hippopotamus   hippopotamuses / hippopotami



octopus        octopuses / octopi



platypus       platypuses



rhinoceros     rhinoceroses / rhinoceri



The Greek plural for words ending in -pus meaning "foot", is podes, but that plural is not used in English.


kimono         kimono



samurai        samurai



otaku          otaku



Note: kimonos, following the French model, is now generally accepted in English.

Nouns from languages that have donated few words to English, and that are spoken by relatively few English-speakers, generally form plurals as if they were native English words:



canoe            canoes



kayak            kayaks



igloo            igloos



cwm              cwms (Welsh valley)



Some words of foreign origin are much better known in the plural; usage of the proper singular may be considered pedantic or actually incorrect by some speakers.  In common usage, the proper plural is considered the singular form.  Back-formation has usually resulted in a regularized plural.


Proper singular   Proper plural/    Common plural



                  common singular





candelabrum       candelabra        candelabras



datum             data              data (mass noun)



agendum           agenda            agendas / (less common) agendae



graffito          graffiti          graffiti (mass noun)



insigne           insignia          insignias



alga              algae             algae / algaes



opus              opera             operas



viscus            viscera           (not a word in common usage)



phalanx           phalanges         (not a word in common usage)





Note: A single piece of data is often referred to as a "data point".

A related phenomenon is the confusion of a foreign plural for its singular form:


phenomenon        phenomena



criterion         criteria



symposium         symposia



Mouses is sometimes seen for computer pointing devices, although mice is probably more common.


Plurals of numbers

Plurals for the names of numbers differ according to how they are used.  Such words include dozen, hundred, thousand, million, and so forth.  The following examples apply to all of these.  

Defective nouns

Some nouns have no singular form:


annals              billiards           cattle



measles             nuptials



thanks              tidings             victuals / vittles



Note, however, that billiard as a singular is used as a number in some versions of British English for 1015 (others will call this a thousand billion or trillion), but when speaking of the table game, only exists as plural.  These words do have non-noun forms that do not end in s.  For example, thank you or billiard ball.

Neither do some names of things having two parts:


scissors



trousers



tweezers



pants



Note, however, that the fashion industry frequently calls a single pair of pants a pant; this is a back-formation.

Some words in which the modifier follows the noun form the plural inside the word or phrase, particularly legal terms from French:


attorney general       attorneys general



son-in-law             sons-in-law



court martial          courts martial



armful                 armsful / armfuls (the latter is preferred today)



governor-general       governors-general  



Knight Hospitaller     Knights Hospitallers



agent provocateur      agents provocateurs



It is common in informal speech to pluralise the last word in the usual way, but in edited prose, the forms given are preferred. 



Non-countable, or "mass" nouns do not represent distict objects, so the singular and plural semantics do not apply in the same way.  Some examples:


antimony            gold                oxygen



equipment           furniture           specie              distress



sand                water               air                 informations



Some mass nouns can be pluralized, but the meaning thereof may change slightly. For example, when I have two pieces of sand, I do not have two sands; I have sand.  There is more sand in your pile, not more sands.  But there could be many "sands of Africa" - either many distict stretches of sand, or distinct types of sand perhaps of interest to geologists.

It would be less acceptable to pluralize "information" or "furniture" in this way.

There is only one class of atoms called oxygen, but there are several isotopes of oxygen, which might be referred to as different oxygens.  In casual speech, "oxygen" might be used as shorthand for "oxygen atoms", but in this case it is not a mass noun, so it is entirely sensible to refer to multiple oxygens in the same molecule.

One would interpret Bob's wisdoms as various pieces of his wisdom (i.e. pieces of advice), a series of deceits as a series of instances of deceitful behavior, 
and the different idlenesses of the worker as plural distinct manifestations of the mass concept of idleness (or as different types of idleness).

It would be less acceptable to pluralize "information" or "furniture" in this way.


Nouns with multiple plurals

Some nouns have two plurals, one used to refer to a number of things considered individually, the other to refer to a number of things collectively. In some cases, one of the two is nowadays archaic or dialectal.


A final odd case is person. The word people is usually treated as the suppletive plural of person (one person, many people). However, in legal and other formal contexts, the plural of person is persons; furthermore, people can also be a singular noun with its own plural (for example, "We are many persons, from many peoples").

Symbols and abbreviations whose plural would be ambiguous if only an s were added are pluralized by adding 's.  


  mind your p's and q's  



Regular words and non-ambiguous abbreviations (like PCs or ICBMs) should be pluralized in the normal way, not with an apostrophe, lest they be confused with the possessive.


Plural to singular by back formation

Some words have started out with unusually formed singulars and plurals, but more "normal" singular-plural pairs have resulted.  For an example from the vegetable world, pease was the singular and peasen the plural, but over the centuries, first pease became the plural and pea the singular, and finally the plural was altered to peas.  Similarly, termites and primates were the three-syllable plurals of termes and primas, respectively, but these singulars were lost, the plurals given two syllables, and now we have termite and termites and primate and primates.  Syringe is a back formation from syringes, itself the plural of syrinx, a musical instrument. Cherry is from Norman French cherise.  Finally, phases was once the plural of phasis, but the singular is now phase.

Kudos is a singular Greek word meaning praise, but the same process may be happening to it.  At present, kudo is an error, however.


Plurals of names of peoples

There are several different rules for this.

In discussing peoples whose demonym takes -man or -woman, there are two options: pluralize to -men or -women if referring to individuals, and use the root alone if referring to the whole nation.


Englishman       Englishmen        the English



Frenchwoman      Frenchwomen       the French



Dutchman or      Dutch people      the Dutch



    Dutchwoman



This also applies to the Irish and the Welsh. One can say "a Scots(wo)man" or "a Scot", "Scots(wo)men", "Scottish people", or "Scots," and "the Scottish" or "the Scots". (Scotch is a drink.)

Several peoples have names that are simple nouns and can be pluralized:


Dane             Danes             the Danes (or) the Danish



Finn             Finns             the Finns (or) the Finnish



Swede            Swedes            the Swedes (or) the Swedish



Spaniard         Spaniards         the Spaniards (or) the Spanish 



                                               (much more common)



Names of peoples that end in -ese take no plural:


Chinese          Chinese           the Chinese



                   (or Chinese people)



Neither do Swiss or Quebecois. 

Most names for American Aboriginal groups are not pluralized:


Ojibwa           Ojibwa



Iroquois         Iroquois



Blood            Blood



Mi'kmaq          Mi'kmaq



Some exceptions include Crees, Mohawks, Hurons, Algonquins, Chippewas, Oneidas, Aztecs. Note also:


Inuk             Inuit



Most other peoples of the world are pluralized using the normal English rules.