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Why is the plural of reindeer sometimes "reindeer"?

Wiktionary has the following etymology:

From Middle English, from Old Norse hreindýri ‎(“reindeer”), from hreinn + dýr ‎(“animal”).

while the etymology of deer doesn't have any mention of Old Norse, so I assume knowing about the pluralisation of "deer" (from Why is the plural of “deer” the same as the singular?) isn't sufficient to explain this.

Community
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Golden Cuy
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    The plural of deer is usually deer. – Peter Shor Dec 21 '15 at 00:39
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    Are you asking why the plural of deer is deer, and just using "reindeer" for your question to give it a seasonal touch? Or are you asking why reindeer follows the model of deer rather than forming its plural in -s? – ruakh Dec 21 '15 at 00:40
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    I wonder if there's a hat in this, it's so... unusual for a high-rep user. – anongoodnurse Dec 21 '15 at 00:41
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    "Mongoose" and "moose" don't share the same pluralisation as "goose", nor does "fox" share the same pluralisation as "ox". – Golden Cuy Dec 21 '15 at 00:46
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    The plural of moose in English is moose but that is not because the Algonquian languages that gave us the word lacked a distinct plural form for it: in Ojibwe, for instance, singular is mooz, plural moozag. – Brian Donovan Dec 21 '15 at 00:56
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    Dormouse shares its plural with mouse. And the plural of muskox is muskoxen. – Peter Shor Dec 21 '15 at 01:29
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    Goose, geese; moose, meese; mouse, mice; house, hice. What is not clear? – Drew Dec 21 '15 at 01:49
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    Excuse me a minute, the UPS guy just delivered a couple of boxen... – Jim Dec 21 '15 at 01:49
  • @Jim something made out of boxwood? https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/boxen#Etymology_1 (before looking it up, I only knew the "Etymology 2" version) – Golden Cuy Dec 21 '15 at 02:13
  • @PeterShor I've looked up the etymology of reindeer, and while it may be cognate with "deer", it doesn't look like it's directly formed from it. I've edited the question accordingly. – Golden Cuy Dec 21 '15 at 02:25
  • You're expecting English speakers to figure out what plurals they use based on etymology? That works remarkably often, but I think being confused about reindeer is only to be expected. – Peter Shor Dec 21 '15 at 04:18
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    @AndrewGrimm but Fox is not a kind of ox, and mongoose and moose are not a kind of goose (neither is any of these a kind of oose). But a reindeer is (linguistically, at least) a kind of deer. To put it another way, it's not that reindeer and deer are similar words, it's that the word deer is a component of the word reindeer. – phoog Dec 21 '15 at 04:32
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    The real question is "why is it sometimes reindeers?". Because reindeers is the rare one. – ermanen Dec 21 '15 at 04:35
  • @PeterShor no, but you are. – Golden Cuy Dec 21 '15 at 04:38
  • @AndrewGrimm are there any old Norse words in English that are pluralized differently from their English cognates? Can we really say that -deer from Norse and deer from Anglo-Saxon are different words? Perhaps the English translated "reindeer" rather than borrowing it, or maybe the two etymological streams can be said to have merged. – phoog Dec 21 '15 at 04:45
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    OED says: The Germanic base of rein n.2 + the Germanic base of deer n.), with remodelling of the second element after deer n. – ermanen Dec 21 '15 at 04:52
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    I think that all members of the deer family share the same behavior wrt plurals (plural has the same form as singular): deer, reindeer, moose, elk,... – Drew Feb 01 '16 at 02:34
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    @Drew Do you mean all members of the deer family speak the same language? – ab2 Nov 23 '17 at 03:15
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    @ab2: Maybe not between generations. You know - those millenials. – Drew Nov 23 '17 at 06:13

2 Answers2

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My Chambers English dictionary plainly states that 'deer' is derived from Old English 'deor' and the plural is 'deer'. The plural of reindeer is also reindeer. I don't think this is related at all to the other usages quoted such as: 'there are lion in these parts', 'there are tiger in these forests', 'man first discovered fire when lightning struck a fallen branch of oak'.

Lynette Arden
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I can find no reference to support this, but isn't the singular form of many animal nouns used when they are being considered as a species, especially when they are being tracked, hunted or eaten?

"Look out! There are lion in these parts."

"I prefer rabbit to squirrel".

Dan
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  • I don't think the wording of this is quite right. I'd say instead that the plural form is the same as the singular. (In a sentence like "Reindeer have four hooves," the word "reindeer" is technically plural, not singular, as shown by the plural verb agreement.) – herisson Dec 21 '15 at 07:58
  • @Sumelic - You're right, thanks. I'm not entirely happy with my edit, but it's better I think! – Dan Dec 21 '15 at 11:37
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    Both lion and lions can be used as a plural, but virtually nobody uses the word deers or reindeers (as a plural or not). – Peter Shor Dec 21 '15 at 18:04