Friday
30Oct2009
Collective Nouns
Friday, October 30, 2009 at 8:42AM Logo-geek that I am, I love collective nouns. My mother owns a terrific book of them called An Exaltation of Larks. The internet has no shortage of lists of them; here's a terrific compilation, some of which were coined or collected by Dame Julia Barnes in 1486.
A murder of crows (one of the more famous collective nouns) recently appeared in an episode of Flash Forward. But all this is merely a preamble to David Malki !'s latest genius, which I graciously reproduce for you below. In the interest of full FTC disclosure, David Malki ! (see here for the explanation for the interesting "spelling" of his name) in no way compensates me for my faithful fandom.
tagged Fascista
Fascista
Reader Comments (9)
That is an awesome list!!!
A marvelous list! I was attempting to come up with just the right collective noun for a post title a month or so ago when I finally chose "A Gaggle of Friends" but I'm sure there's something better....
Where was this list when I needed it?!?
And speaking of lists, I do have a response to your last post, the meme, The Power of Five. It's not up, but it's done.
Perhaps I should just email it to you....
Delightful!
I love the term "a murder of crows". I don't know why but I do. I saw that FlashForward too and I thought it was interesting. (especially considering the play on words there.)
Thanks for that list! I'm totally geeking out over it.
Love it!
Back when my husband was a tech writer, we spoke of "a quandary of documentalists."
Meming today...we'll see how it goes.
Where's the botanical class? Would a "rosary" of roses make for a good collective noun?
(I love his "Irregular" class with "The Borg.")
What I would like to know (and probably this is showing my utter ignorance but there you have it) is who decides what these should be? Have they been around for so long that no one knows? Do they just become a part of the venacular through popular usage or is there a semitheon of demigods somewhere making the call?
I liked many of these, but I think "a racket of banshees" is my favorite.
wow
so much left fo rme to study and learn. I had no clue about such diversity