I have been trying to find an accredited collective noun for butterflies - there are plenty of suggestions on the web but does anyone know a collective noun for butterflies which can be traced to any authorised source?
<< collective noun for butterflies >
Collective nouns were originally called "nouns of congregation" (when I was a youth, many years ago) Possibly the ommission of such a noun for butterflies is because they don't congregate ?
if you've ever seen a Monarch migration, you would have to agree that (while they may travel individually) they certainly congregate wherever there is milkweed.
and on a coincidental note, Amazon claims that "What do you call a group of butterflies?" is to be published this month, so perhaps we'll soon have an answer....
> if you've ever seen a Monarch migration,
As a staunch republican (with a small initial), a Monarch migration is what I would dearly love to see.
Rather belated welcome, Rhuby!
>>As a staunch republican (with a small initial), a Monarch migration is what I would dearly love to see.
That was a good one! Very slick. Yes, I chose purple deliberately.
Looking forward to reading many more from you!
Welcome, Tim, and thank you for giving me another opportunity to check James Lipton's wonderful "An exaltation of larks". Alas he has nothing on butterflies, but as usual, I found some other beauties:
- a piddle of puppies
- a sloth of bears (no polar bears, Jackie!) and
- an incredulity of cuckolds.
More when serendipity strikes again.
a churn of butterflies, perhaps? Or a stomach of butterflies?
Bingley
flurry sounds so... well... agitated. how about 'float' (apologies to M. Ali), or even 'flutter'....
i'll go with "stomach of butterflies"
Very belated welcome, Tim. (I got interrupted during my last visit here.)
Muhammad Ali is from where I live. One of our major
downtown streets got changed to Muh. Ali Boulevard.
I like the word float, myself, but actually have always just
said there was a cloud of butterflies.
>if you've ever seen a Monarch migration...
while not specific to butterflies, there is this from the OED:
flight 1-e Of birds or insects: A migration or issuing forth in bodies.
1832 Lyell Princ. Geol. II. 114 A similar flight [of butterflies] at the end of the last century is recorded by M. Louch.
Ignoring all the things I should be doing this afternoon, I went to the web in quest of the answer to this question.
When I went to the site for The Lepidopterists' Society,
I saw that one of the committee members who established their rules for collecting lives right here in Louisville.
(This is an international committee.)
So I called him! He said, "There is none". No official group name, though if many are flying together, they are sometimes called a migration.
Now that you mention it, Jackie, a cloud of butterflies does sound familiar ...
Bingley
[oh, what the hell...]
<< collective noun for butterflies >>
The North American Butterfly Association uses "swarm of butterflies". Collective Noun collectors seem to prefer "rabble of butterflies". de gustibus non est disputandum
I suggest a Flutter of Butterflies, When a baby, my younger son Spoonerized butterfly as flutterby. I rather like it myself, yes, even better than flury, swarm and "rabble" ! rabble is *not* for butterflies ... sorry tsuwm.
I Googled the society and made my bid with them, via email, for A Flutter of Butterflies" ... it is a very pretty and informative site.
>sorry tsuwm
no need to be -- they're not *my words. (this is the thanks I get for dredging up year-old threads....)
-joe (i am not thin-skinned) bfstplk
http://rinkworks.com/words/collective.shtmlhttp://www.biconet.com/lures/Flutterby.html
How interesting that Rhu's first post was a response to the first, last and only post of Tim_Morton. It seems Biblical somehow.
well, Tim didn't exhibit biblical patience, that's for certain.
I found a collective noun for butterflies, but I think it stinks: a rabble of butterflies. A flutterby of butterflies would be a bit more descriptive.
wow (and bill (and all you rabble)),
many of these collective nouns are not just fanciful, but rather have some etymological basis. to wit, the first sense of rabble:
†1. A pack, string, swarm (of animals). Obs.
13+ Gaw. & Gr. Knt. 1703 [The dogs] runnen forth in a rabel. Ibid. 1899 Renaud com+& alle þe rabel+ryŠt at his helez. 1513 Douglas Æneis xi. ix. 29 The rawk vocit swannis in a rabyll. a1529 Skelton P. Sparowe 1313 He brought out a rable Of coursers and rounses. 1591 Sylvester Du Bartas i. v. 909 Flies, Butterflies, Gnats, Bees, and all the rabbles Of other Insects.
-joe (i am a member of the rabble in good standing) friday
2. a. A tumultuous crowd or array of people, a disorderly assemblage, a mob.
...and an array of butterflies is certainly a disorderly assemblage.
Your explication of "rabble" is as usual entirely sound. However, "rabble" just does not to me in any way suggest the beauty or behaviour of butterflies.
If this is a question of first impression, I'd vote for "flutter".
However, it must be admitted that a poster framed on my wall, collecting such terms, says "a rabble of butterflies". (Googling this term produced many lists that include it, but I've found none that cites a primary authority.)
note to paulb: I too checked Lipton's book, without success. However, Lipton cites The Book of St. Albans, 1486, as the seminal authority. Any idea how to find that, or any reprint, to check for butterflies? My weak googling skills aren't up to the task.
Hi Keiva:
re Book of St Albans: We may have to ask one of our English colleagues to check out the original edition which should be in either the British Library or the Bodleian Library. Any takers?
Since they are apparently not Congregational, perhaps you would call them a catholic (small c) of butterflies.
Welcome to the board, Tim! A timely query. Here in Cape May, New Jersey, we are descended upon every Fall by swarms of migrating monarch butterflies (we always called them swarms), they love the nectar of a certain kind of goldenrod that flourishes on the dunes and sandy soil here (along with milkweed), and it's always an inspiring sight to see the beauty of thousands of orange monarchs draped over the yellow blossoms along the beach! We always said "swarms" here...but I like "flutter" the best of all the suggestions posted here! Migration clusters...hmmm, "cluster"...we use that sometimes, too...can number up to the millions, I think, on their way to the mountains of Mexico and a certain new wintering spot in Florida (though not large enough to sustain the monarchs if they continue to lose their Mexican habitat). I have the figures somewhere...I'll post them when I can be more exact. I attended a Monarch seminar last year at The Wetlands Institute here given by a scientist who is the foremost expert/researcher on Monarch butterflies, so I'm sure the proper term is somewhere in the literature I filed from it. I'll look and get back if I find it.
a response to the first, last and only post of Tim_Morton.
Tim was just a flutterby, never a part of our rabble.
>A timely query
yes; well it was, after all, an anniversary thing.
Hi Paulb:
re Book of St. Albans: We may have to ask one of our English colleagues to check out the original edition
An original may not help; I gather it's in a very ornate, hard-to-read print. More art than writing. A transcription though? (Beineke Rare Book Library at Yale may have one, but I can't seem to get it loaded up.)
Apparently the Book of St. Albans was quite significant: my info is that it's repeatedly discussed in histories of printing, and that OED cites it over 800 times. So something should be available.
what a terrific notion -- a theme week of words from The Book of St. Albans! thanx.
"It is agluttyd and kelyd wyth the glette that she hath engendred."
a theme week of words from The Book of St. Albans! thanx. "It is agluttyd and kelyd wyth the glette that she hath engendred."
Oy! My head aches already.
Maybe Tim is still waiting patiently for us to notice that he hasn't been back.
Was it something I said, I wonder?
I've noticed the same thing at parties - someone asks a question and I start to give an answer: ten minutes later, I'm ther, standing on my own. It makes you wonder why people ask, if they're not interested in the - -
Oh, Well! I might as well head back to the drinks table.
In reply to:
The Book of St. Albans, 1486, as the seminal authority. Any idea how to find that, or any reprint, to check for butterflies?
Should any AWADer have one hundred and fifty pounds to spare:
http://www.justbooks.co.uk/asp/collectables/col_result.asp?cus_ID=317&src=col
See under Berners for a Victorian reprint of the Book of St. Albans.
PS. I googled with Albans hunting hawking
PPS. If I've understood this entry correctly, a microfiche copy is available somewhere in Chicago. Is there a University of Chicago?
http://cofc.edu/MARION/ABQ-9752
Bingley
When yowre hawke is encombred in the bowillis+hir Eighen will be derke and she will looke ungladli.
-Bk. of St. Albans, Hawking
and she will looke ungladli
Ungladly: that is such a wonderful word, it deserves a resurrection, I think - don't you?
If I've understood this entry correctly, a microfiche copy is available somewhere in Chicago. Is there a University of Chicago?
Yes, there is: reasonably near me (and my alma mater). If need be, I'll see if they'll let me peruse.
If I've understood this entry correctly, a microfiche copy is available somewhere in Chicago. Is there a University of Chicago?
the link you gave is to a College of Charleston web site. the entry, I think, indicates the genesis of their "Microfiche. Chicago, Ill. : Library Resources, inc."
Oh, heavens. Let's not confuse the University of Chicago and the College of Charleston; we'll end up with maroon cougars, which just can't be good.
maroon cougers...I love the assonance there, Sparteye!
Good Gawd,Bingley! Run for cover ... there is definetly a University of Chicago. And damned proud of it those Chicagoans are and rightly so.
Read any of Andrew M. Greeley's books and you'll find it (UC) mentioned often. Chicago is Greeley's bailiwick. I particularly liked the Father Blackie Ryan mysteries. Greely's unlikely hero got to be a Bishop then Greeley stopped writing them for awhile. However he has just come out with a new one called "The Bishop and the Missing L Train" --now in paperback. (Forge Books)
Another Father-now-Bishop Blackie Ryan mystery is due in July 2002 called : The Bishop and the Beggar Girl of St. Germain, wherein Blackie goes to Paris (France, that is!)
When yowre hawke is encombred in the bowillis+hir Eighen will be derke and she will looke
ungladli.
When my hawk gets constipated I give her a mouse stuffed with castor oil.