2

Is it "chaises longues" or just "chaise longues"? Both examples exist in different dictionaries. Or should it be something else entirely?

JSBձոգչ
  • 54,843
AJ01
  • 167
  • Hello AJ01, I don't know how to say it the best way but I'll try :D your question is very basic, the answer is easily found looking up a dictionary (I just did with 2), so I'm voting to close it as General Reference. This one is one of those two dictionaries I checked. I think it will help you. :) – Alenanno Jun 09 '11 at 10:40
  • 1
    I voted to close this as well, before seeing @Peter's answer. I didn't think there was any disagreement about this. Since there is, maybe it should stay open. – Callithumpian Jun 09 '11 at 11:32
  • 1
    @Callithumpian: The answer @Peter provided more info than required. But that's the problem: how the question is being asked, not the answer(s). I mean, the question as is is just two basic. If he asked something like "I found two ways to make the plural: which one is correct?", then it would have been a perfectly fine question, in my opinion. Maybe we/he should edit the question. – Alenanno Jun 09 '11 at 12:29
  • @Alenanno, @Calli, I edited the question to make it more clearly acceptable. – JSBձոգչ Jun 09 '11 at 14:07
  • @JSBangs: thanks :)... EDIT: OMG, I just noticed I wrote "is two basic..." – Alenanno Jun 09 '11 at 14:08
  • I think this is a specific case of Plurals of foreign words, but it's getting more useful and interesting answers so I'm not voting to close :-) –  Jun 09 '11 at 14:41

2 Answers2

5

For this question, dictionaries disagree. Oxford says chaises longues. American Heritage and Encyclopedia Britannica say chaise longues. And Merriam Webster says both.

The French plural is chaises longues, although neither pluralizing 's' would be pronounced in French. I can't imagine anybody pronouncing chaises with two 's's. The default rule in English, to add an 's', produces chaise longues. Google Ngrams shows both spellings are quite common.

So I'd say both spellings are acceptable. For pronunciation, I can't imagine saying anything but "shays longs". However, Oxford says the plural is pronounced the same as the singular, and Merriam-Webster says both shays longs and shays long are correct, so I suppose there are two correct pronunciations, as well.

Peter Shor
  • 88,407
  • Actually, Merriam-Webster and American Heritage say you don't have to pronounce the 's' in longues as well, so I guess there are probably two acceptable pronunciations of the plural. I'm editing my answer. – Peter Shor Jun 09 '11 at 12:27
  • +1 Peter.
    • "chaise" being a substantive has to be pluralised.
    • "longue" being the adjective qualifying the noun has to pluralised as well.
     – Alain Pannetier Φ Jun 09 '11 at 12:55
  • One more comment: if, as some people do, you pronounce longues in the French manner, ending with /ŋg/, adding an extra /z/ would sound quite peculiar to me. And to me it seems difficult to pronounce, although logically it shouldn't be any more difficult than the /ŋks/ in links. So there is a reasonable justification for not pronouncing the 's'. – Peter Shor Jun 17 '11 at 12:38
2

According to Encyclopædia Britannica, it is Chaise Longues.

Mehper C. Palavuzlar
  • 35,654