Re: Bad Latin 101: The Double-Plural of Neuter Nouns

On Thu, 1 Feb 2001, Danny Wier wrote:

> Now look what I did. I formed the plural of _criterium_, a neuter noun,
> which is _criteria_. Then I treated that as a feminine singular noun and
> turned that into a plural: _*criteriae_.
>
> I don't think the case paradigms for masculine plural and feminine singular
> are the same, so this only works for nominative case. At least. The use for
> this unconventionalily in Latin would be to denote plurals of plurals, or
> more precisely, plurals of collectives.
In Valdyan you wouldn't notice the difference! Most collectives end
in -in or -i. Words that end in -in in the singular have the plural
in -in as well (okay, it's long 'i' in the plural but that
distinction has disappeared apart from a few dialects). No words end
in -i except names, and they don't usually have a plural at all.

   Irina

--
           Varsinen an laynynay, saraz no arlet rastynay.
irina@valdyas.org (myself)     http://www.valdyas.org/irina/valdyas