Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2023 December 30

= December 30 =

Kurdish speaking editor needed
I need someone who can provide context for the video in deletion request. Basically just join the DR and explain what the video is about and whether or not you think it realistically have any kind educational use. --Trade (talk) 02:01, 30 December 2023 (UTC)


 * If nobody can help here, you could try a note at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Kurdistan although it seems rather quiet over there. Alansplodge (talk) 22:52, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Why is it "houses" and not "hice"?
Why is it "spouses" and not "spice"? Someone who&#39;s wrong on the internet (talk) 10:24, 30 December 2023 (UTC)
 * It seems as if *hūsą was neuter gender with the singular and plural form identical in Proto-Germanic, and the forms English houses and German Häuser would be later development, whereas *mūs was feminine gender, declined strongly. "Spouse" is a later Anglo-Norman borrowing, so it'd be unlikely to have a strong declension. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 11:03, 30 December 2023 (UTC)


 * "Spouse" ultimately comes from Latin. And I wonder if you're referring to the old joke about having more than one wife being "spice". ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 16:14, 30 December 2023 (UTC)


 * I would imagine that most "Anglo-Norman" words ultimately come from Latin. 2A00:23C7:9CD1:3901:814B:BC3C:8CC4:37EF (talk) 16:22, 30 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Of course, but generally across the history of the English language Anglo-Norman and general French vocabulary was borrowed at different times and has different properties compared to vocabulary borrowed directly from Latin, so the distinction is made. Remsense  留  16:24, 30 December 2023 (UTC)


 * The historical answer is that only nouns with historical -i inflections underwent umlaut. There's oddly nothing about this that I can see on the Old_English_grammar article, but you can go to https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fot#Old_English and click on the box in the "declension" subsection to see the inflection of an Old English umlauting noun... AnonMoos (talk) 21:10, 30 December 2023 (UTC)
 * As the umlaut belonged to phonology more so than to grammar, it's covered in Germanic umlaut Crash48 (talk) 09:27, 31 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Courtesy link for us amateurs: Umlaut (linguistics). Bazza (talk) 09:46, 31 December 2023 (UTC)


 * According to Wiktionary, almost all words ending with ouse in the singular form, end with an additional s in the plural form - without any change in the other letters. Here are all one syllable words, alphabetically: blouse, bouse, douse, grouse, house, rouse, scouse, souse, spouse, touse, trouse; along with many words having more than one syllable (like carouse and so forth).
 * The only exception is mouse, maybe along with louse whose plural form can be both lice and louses. HOTmag (talk) 11:20, 31 December 2023 (UTC)


 * The Oxford English Dictionary gives only "lice".  I've never encountered any other form. 2A00:23D0:C82:9A01:844E:39:F208:D382 (talk) 16:33, 31 December 2023 (UTC)


 * See Wiktionary for more details. HOTmag (talk) 20:37, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

For a famous (or used-to-be-famous) example of "louses", see the lyrics to the "Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend" song: "That's when those louses go back to their spouses..." AnonMoos (talk) 19:15, 3 January 2024 (UTC)


 * For certain English speakers belonging to the very upper echelons of society, and whose super-elongated drawling vowel sounds are not unconnected with the British royal family, 'house' (sing.) does indeed = 'hice'. MinorProphet (talk) 03:03, 4 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Indeed. I recall another phrase once (ca. 1970?) instanced as stereotypical of our current Monarch: "I find my brine trisers on the grind." [I found my brown trousers on the ground]. The accent of The Family in general has somewhat ameliorated since then. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 51.198.104.88 (talk) 08:09, 4 January 2024 (UTC)