Newsgroups: sci.lang
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!news2.near.net!noc.near.net!yale.edu!yale!yale!gumby!newsxfer.itd.umich.edu!gatech!howland.reston.ans.net!EU.net!uunet!olivea!charnel.ecst.csuchico.edu!csusac!csus.edu!netcom.com!alderson
From: alderson@netcom.com (Richard M. Alderson III)
Subject: Re: When did dwarves come into use?
In-Reply-To: sarima@netcom.com's message of Thu, 13 Oct 1994 04:09:42 GMT
Message-ID: <aldersonCxMG7r.5rt@netcom.com>
Reply-To: alderson@netcom.com
Fcc: /u52/alderson/postings
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)
References: <sarimaCxLFK6.4y2@netcom.com>
Date: Thu, 13 Oct 1994 17:21:26 GMT
Lines: 16

In article <sarimaCxLFK6.4y2@netcom.com> sarima@netcom.com (Stanley Friesen)
writes:

>I am interesting in the timing of the origin of the irregular plural "dwarves"
>as opposed to the regular plural ("dwarfs").

>When did the voiced form first appear, and when did it become common?

1937.  Late 1960s.

Or so my reading of Tolkien's appendices would lead me to believe...
-- 
Rich Alderson   You know the sort of thing that you can find in any dictionary
                of a strange language, and which so excites the amateur philo-
                logists, itching to derive one tongue from another that they
                know better: a word that is nearly the same in form and meaning
                as the corresponding word in English, or Latin, or Hebrew, or
                what not.
                                                --J. R. R. Tolkien,
alderson@netcom.com                               _The Notion Club Papers_
