English Plural

Regular plurals

Almost-regular plurals

  Dwarf is an interesting case: the common form of the plural was dwarfs — as, for example, in Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs — until J. R. R. Tolkien popularised dwarves, perhaps for its old-fashioned sound.  Multiple dwarf stars, or non-mythological short human beings, however, are dwarfs.  Staff in the sense of "a body of employees" the plural is always staffs; otherwise both staffs and staves are acceptable, except in compounds; such as flagstaffs.  The stave of a barrel or cask is a back-formation from staves, which is its plural.  (See the Plural to singular by back-formation section below.) 

Irregular plurals

Irregular Germanic plurals

sheep

deer

fish, cod, trout, etc.

Irregular plurals of foreign origin

• Final a becomes ae (strictly æ) — or just adds s:

• Final ex or ix becomes ices (pronounced or ) — or just adds es:

• Final is becomes es (pronounced :

• Final ies remains unchanged:

• Final on becomes a:

• Final um becomes a – or just adds s

• Final us becomes i (second declension) or era or ora (third declension) — or just adds es (especially in fourth declension, where it would otherwise be the same as the singular):

• Final as in one case of a noun of Greek origin changes to antes:

• Final ma in nouns of Greek origin add ta:

• Final us in nouns of Greek origin "properly" add es. These words are also heard with the Latin -i instead, which is sometimes considered "over-correct", but this is so common as to be acceptable in most circumstances, even technical ones.

• Some nouns of French origin add x

• Nouns of Hebrew language origin add im or ot (generally m/f) — or just s
  Note that ot is pronounced os in the Ashkenazi dialect.

• Some nouns of Japanese origin have no plural and do not change:

• In New Zealand English, nouns of Māori origin can either take an s or have no separate plural form. Words more connected to Māori culture and used in that context tend to retain the same form, while names of flora and fauna may or may not take an s, depending on context. The addition or omission of the s on nouns of Māori origin varies throughout the sociolinguistic spectrum and is politically charged: among Pakeha, older speakers are more likely to add an s, while younger speakers are more likely to omit. Omission is regarded by many as an example of political correctness.

• Nouns from languages that have donated few words to English, and that are spoken by relatively few English-speakers, generally form plurals as if they were native English words:

Plurals of numbers

• When modified by a number, the plural is not inflected, that is, has no s added. Hence one hundred, two hundred, etc. For vaguer large numbers, one could say several hundred, but many hundreds.

• When used alone, or followed by a prepositional phrase, the plural is inflected: dozens of complaints, scores of people. However, either complaints by the dozen or complaints by the dozens is acceptable.
• The preposition of is used when speaking of non-specific items identified by pronouns: two hundred of these, three dozen of those. The of is not used for a number of specific items: three hundred oriental rugs. However, if the pronoun is included with the specific item, the of is used: five million of those dollar bills.

Defective nouns

annals, billiards^*, measles, nuptials, thanks, tidings, victuals/vittles

^* This refers to the table game, not the number 10¹⁵ in the long scale system of numeric names, which can be singular billiard.

pants, scissors, trousers, tweezers

• Abstract nouns

goodness, idleness, wisdom, deceit, honesty, freshness

• Arts and sciences (even those ending in ics are treated as singular)

chemistry, geometry, surgery, biometrics, mechanics, optics, blues (music)

• Other mass nouns, such as chemical elements and substances:

antimony, gold, oxygen, equipment, furniture, species, distress, sand, water, air, information

• Specie and species make a fascinating case. Both words come from a Latin word meaning "kind", but they do not form a singular-plural pair; they are separate nouns. Coins, such as nickels, euros, and cents are specie, but there is no plural. The idea is "payment in kind". And species, the "kinds of living things", is the same in singular and plural.
• Some names of elements, such as nickel, have plurals in non-chemical uses, as "five nickels to the quarter".

Nouns with multiple plurals

  Childer has all but disappeared, but can still be seen in Childermas (Innocents' Day).  Kine is still used in rural English dialects.  Dies is used as the plural for die in the sense of a mould; dice as the plural (and increasingly as the singular) in the sense of a small random number generator.  Fish: the plural for one species of fish, or caught fish, is fish, but for live fish of many species, or in poetic usage, fishes is used.   If you have several (British) one-penny pieces you have several pennies. Pence is used for an amount of money, which can be made up of a number of coins of different denominations: one penny and one five-penny piece are together worth six pence.  Penny and pennies also refer to one or more U.S. one-cent pieces.  But in American usage, a nickel is worth five cents, not five pence, though a penny is worth one cent (not plural).  For multiple plants, say iris, but for multiple blossoms say irises.  Clothes refers collectively to all of the cloth covering a person's body. 

Plurals of symbols and abbreviations

"mind your p's and q's"

Plurals of headless nouns

Plural to singular by back-formation

Plurals of names of peoples

Ojibwa

Iroquois

Blood

Mi'kmaq

Discretionary plurals

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