Dragaera

Concerning Plurality

Davdi Silverrock davdisil at gmail.com
Mon Nov 21 12:54:31 PST 2005

A minor point of usage, perhaps, but which House name, if any, ought
to be pluralized with an "s", and which are acceptably their own
plural?  There is sometimes inconsistency in the books, which is
hardly surprising, but I seem to be recalling quite a few instances of
unmodified plural House names.   Perhaps from the one example of
"teckla", there is generalizing for all of those many House names that
end in "a", and by extension, quite a few of the others that don't end
in "a".

So I wonder, which one sounds better?  Which is more canonical?

"Two Phoenixes" or "Two Phoenix"?
"Two Dragons" or "Two Dragon"?
"Two Lyorns" or "Two Lyorn"?
"Two Tiassas" or "Two Tiassa"?
"Two Hawks" or "Two Hawk"?
"Two Dzurs" or "Two Dzur"?
"Two Issolas" or "Two Issola"?
"Two Tsalmoths" or "Two Tsalmoth"?
"Two Vallistas" or "Two Vallista"?
"Two Jheregs" or "Two Jhereg"?
"Two Ioriches" or "Two Iorich"?
"Two Chreothas" or "Two Chreotha"?
"Two Yendis" or "Two Yendi"?
"Two Orcas" or "Two Orca"?
"Two Tecklas" or "Two Teckla"?
"Two Jhegaalas" or "Two Jhegaala"?
"Two Athyras" or "Two Athyra"?


I find that I personally am more comfortable with not modifying any,
except perhaps "Dragons" and "Hawks".  And I /think/ that's what SKZB
has been writing, for the most part.

Perhaps our more learned philologists and linguists could comment.