{{Short description|Form of plurality}} {{distinguish|Reduplicated plural}} {{Expand Dutch|Stapelmeervoud|October 2024}} A '''double plural''' is a plural form to which an extra suffix has been added, mainly because the original plural suffix (or other variation) had become unproductive and therefore irregular. So the form as a whole was no longer seen as a plural, an instance of morphological leveling. For example, if "geese" (the plural) became the word for "goose" (the singular) in a future version of English, a word ''geeses'' might become the licit plural form.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Nordquist |first=Richard |title=Double Plurals in English |url=https://www.thoughtco.com/double-plural-grammar-1690409 |access-date=October 28, 2024 |website=ThoughtCo.}}</ref> Likewise, "peoples" in English currently means "nations or ethnic groups" but is sometimes used informally as a plural of "person" (eg, "these peoples standing here").
==Examples==
===English and Dutch=== Examples of this can be seen in the history of English and Dutch. Historically, the general English plural markers were not only ''-s'' or ''-en'' but also (in certain specific declensions) ''-ra'' and ''-ru'' (which is still rather general today in German under the form ''-er''). The ancient plural of ''child'' was "cildra/cildru", to which an ''-en'' suffix was later added when the ''-ra'' and ''-ru'' became unused.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Moylan |first=Peter |title=Double Plural |url=http://www.pmoylan.org/pages/articles/language/Double_plurals.html |access-date=October 28, 2024 |website=Peter & Lynne's place}}</ref> The Dutch plural form ''kind-er-en'' and the corresponding Zeelandic form ''kind-er-s'' are also double plurals which were formed in the same way as the English double plurals, while for example German and Limburgian have (historically conservative) single plurals such as ''Kind-er''.
''Breeches'' is an example involving an old plural that did not use a suffix. It was formerly ''breech'' which came from Old English ''brēċ'' which was the plural of ''brōc'', the latter developing separately as ''Brook''.
==References== {{Wiktionary|double plural}} {{reflist}}
==Further reading== {{Refbegin}} * {{Cite journal |last=Alexiadou |first=Artemis |year=2024 |title=Double plural marking in language mixing and the building blocks of nominals |url=https://www.glossa-journal.org/article/id/11585/ |journal=Glossa |volume=9 |doi=10.16995/glossa.11585|doi-access=free }} {{refend}}
Category:Grammatical number Category:Historical linguistics
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