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Joined: Nov 2000
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old hand
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OP
old hand
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 866 |
Am I having a senior moment or what?
It's panto season here in Perth (school holidays you know) - and Snow White's on stage doing her stuff with the seven little people at the Regal Theatre.
There's heaps of ads on TV and flyers in all the shopping centres - all of which refer to "...the Seven Dwarfs". My first reaction was that the promoter was a cretin because I thought it should be "dwarves". The folk at work agree, but my Chambers and my son's Macquarie Junior are silent on the matter. Now I'm feeling all insecure and unsure.
help
please
it's not fun getting old
..............
stales
(PS The flyer advises that this is "The stage Adaptation of the BROTHERS GRIMM (their caps.) Immortal Story" Ah, those abused apostrophes again!!)
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Joined: Jan 2001
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Search on Yahoo! gives it both ways. I think Disney original was "Dwarfs".
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Dec 2000
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Am I having a senior moment or what?
What?
Seriously, it looks like either is correct. The word was originally not with an f but with a gh, cognate with German Zwerg. The brick and mortar OED doesn't give a citation in f till the 15th century, so we're out of the OE voiced-between-vowels rule. The OED also gives plurals both dwarfs and dwarves; the former from 1770, 1834 and 1894 and the latter from 1818.
Ya pays yer nickel and ya takes yer cherce.
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Joined: Nov 2000
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 819 |
OE voiced-between-vowels rule. The OED also gives plurals both dwarfs and dwarves;
Well, Faldage, you made short work of that query!
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enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 393 |
From Appendix F of The Lord of the Rings:
It may be observed that in this book as in The Hobbit the form dwarves is used, although the dictionaries tell us that the plural of dwarf is dwarfs. It should be dwarrows (or dwerrows), if singular and plural had each gone its own way down the years, as have man and men, or goose and geese.
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old hand
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OP
old hand
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 866 |
Well, I for one have learnt something.
Many thanks for your responses.
stales
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
Well, since dwarfs is shorter than dwarves, I'll side with dwarfs.
Speaking of senior moments, I'm having one of those jamais vu moments in which the word dwarves looks like the strangest word on earth. I see wharves in it, and wharves doesn't concoct a single image relating to a little man--unless a little man who works by the sea. Title of book: Dwarves at the Wharves. Whole thing looks jamais vu to me. (Also, Dwarfs at the Wharfswould work, too.
Best regards,
WordWharves
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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All of the dwarfs are now working underground in Paris, where they wander the tunnels to keep the trains running on time. They are, of course, known as Metro-Gnomes.
TEd
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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 This is getting to be a habit ...
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Ol' TEd had a good vacation and he's back and rollin'. Smoke 'em if you've got 'em. I heard that somewhere, I can't remember wherepost edit That's a cigar reference, right?
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