Other usual forms include cacti and gladioli, and our files at the dictionary department show scarcely any examples of nucleuses or funguses. Common usage appears to indicate a slight preference for termini rather than terminuses, but syllabuses rather than syllabi. Like octopi, the plural hippopotami is now generally taken to be either funny or absurdly pedantic, and the usual plural is hippopotamuses. Other words ending in -us show a very varied pattern. Octopus is not a simple Latin word of the second declension, but a Latinized form of the Greek word oktopous, and its ‘correct’ plural would logically be octopodes. It may also depend on whether the Latin or Greek form of the plural is either easily recognizable or pleasant to the speaker of English.Īlthough it is often supposed that octopi is the ‘correct’ plural of octopus, and it has been in use for longer than the usual Anglicized plural octopuses, it in fact originates as an error. What Are The Plurals Of "Octopus," "Hippopotamus," and "Syllabus"?Įnglish words of Latin or Greek origin have rather unpredictable plurals, and each one usually depends on how well established that particular word is.
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