family of ruminants (Ruminantia)
Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Deer
Deer - Wikipedia
2 weeks ago - For many types of deer in modern English usage, the male is a buck and the female a doe, but the terms vary with dialect, and according to the size of the species. The male red deer is a stag, while for other large species the male is a bull, the female a cow, as in cattle.
Reddit
reddit.com › r/grammar › so "deer" is a zero plural word is there any other animal that has a zero plural name?
r/grammar on Reddit: So "deer" is a zero plural word is there any other animal that has a zero plural name?
January 1, 2024 - It's not so much that "deer" has no plural, it's just that the plural form looks and sounds exactly the same as the singular form.
Videos
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SAME spelling IRREGULAR Plural Nouns: The word is spelled the SAME ...
Did you know? The word “deer” is both singular and plural in ...
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deer in singular and plural #shorts - YouTube
Deers” is generally not considered correct in standard English because “deer” is both singular and plural. For example:Singular: I saw a deer in the woods. #Plural: I saw five #deer in the woods. However, “deers” can appear in rare cases when referring to different species of deer. For example: “The zoo has various deers from around the world.” But in everyday usage, “deer” is the correct plural form. | TikTok
🦌 Deer - Singular / Plural (American English) #improveenglishpronunciation #englishpronunciation | TikTok
The reason “fish” and “deer” have the same form for both ...
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It's a matter of historical origin and subsequent development.
In the oldest recorded English deer belonged to the neuter declension, which did not have a distinct plural ending in the nominative and accusative cases. (It is believed that this declension did have plurals in Proto-Germanic, but they disappeared before English or any immediate ancestor was written down.) At that time there was no ambiguity, since the determiners accompanying these nouns did change in the plural.
Later, when the Old English endings were mostly lost, the majority of these neuter nouns acquired 'regular' plural endings in -n, eventually superseded by endings in -s: wīf, for instance, became wives in the plural. A few, however did not, and deer is one of these.
It is often remarked that all these nouns with invariant plurals denote animals, deer, sheep, fish, swine, which are either herded or hunted; and it has been suggested that both the 'mass noun' sense with herd animals and the custom of referring to all hunted animals in the singular (we hunt bear, lion, and elephant as well as deer) helped inhibit plural regularization.
ADDED: See the second edition (1954) of Jespersen, A Modern English Grammar on Historical Principles, Part II SYNTAX (First Volume), Ch.III The Unchanged Plural (pp. 49–69), especially 3.1–3.2 and 3.71.
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A good answer of StoneyB. I can only add that the lack of distinction between plural and singular forms of some old nouns (which logically must have this distinction) exists in many languages and can be traced back to the ancient state of the language, where the same word was used to describe both the class of elements and one particular element. For example, such a peculiarity still can be found in Korean or Chinese - you usually don't bother about plural ending, unless you want to emphasize the plurality.
Oxford English Dictionary
oed.com › dictionary › deer_n
deer, n. meanings, etymology and more | Oxford English Dictionary
Old English díor, déor, Middle English deor, (Middle English dær), Middle English der, (Middle English dor, Middle English dier, Middle English duer, Middle English dur, Middle English dure, deure), Middle English–1500s dere, (Middle English–1600s deere, Middle English , 1600s diere, Middle English– (Scottish) deir, 1500s–1600s deare), Middle English– deer, (Middle English theer). plural Old English–1800s normally same as singular; also Middle English deore, deoran, Middle English deoren; Middle English deores, dueres, 1600s–1800s occasionally deers.
EF
ef.edu › english-resources › english-grammar › singular-and-plural-nouns
Singular and plural nouns | EF United States
Some nouns have the same form in the singular and the plural.
Preply
preply.com › home › english › singular of deer is called
Singular of deer is called | Learn English
April 28, 2020 - Hi James, ‘Deer’ is an irregular plural (like ‘sheep’). One deer, two deer. Some grammar books call this an ‘unmarked’ plural to show that it doesn’t change.
Wiktionary
en.wiktionary.org › wiki › deer
deer - Wiktionary, the free dictionary
deer · you (plural) (formal) you (singular) [edit] [edit] deer · stressed dative of du ·
Collins Dictionary
collinsdictionary.com › us › dictionary › english › deer
DEER definition in American English | Collins English Dictionary
Word forms: plural deer language note: Deer is both the singular and the plural form.
Published January 25, 2018
Grammar Book
grammarbook.com › home › singular vs. plural › what is the plural of deer?
What Is the Plural of Deer? - The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation
November 23, 2022 - If you came to this article because you were wondering about the plural of deer, the answer might seem confusing at first. After all, similar words are made plural by adding an “-s” to the end. For instance, the plural of beer is beers. So why does the singular deer not become the plural deers?
Encyclopedia Britannica
britannica.com › dictionary › eb › qa › plural-possessive-deer-s-or-deers
Plural possessive: Deer's or deers' ? | Britannica Dictionary
All the sources I consulted agreed that the plural possessive of deer should be written with an apostrophe before the -s, as in this example:
Alaska Department of Fish and Game
adfg.alaska.gov › static › home › library › pdfs › writersguide_section7.pdf pdf
68 7 Section 7: Plurals
For the names of certain types of animals, the singular is used to denote both one · and more than one individual. Use: deer, fish, moose, sheep · Some of these nouns have the same form for singular and plural. The regularly formed · plural is used to indicate more than one species, strain, or variety.
Quora
quora.com › Why-is-the-term-deer-both-a-singular-and-plural-noun
Why is the term 'deer' both a singular and plural noun? - Quora
Answer (1 of 4): This is because it is derived from another language and so according to the rules of that language it is used as both singular and plural. Hope it helps:)
The Guardian
theguardian.com › notesandqueries › query › 0,,-197456,00.html
Why do some English words have the same singular and plural? Examples are mostly animals - deer, fish, moose, sheep, swine, buffalo - but also aircraft, stone (weight), head (cattle). Is it related to the Norman/ Saxon divide noted in Ivanhoe? | Notes and Queries | guardian.co.uk
Skip to main content · David Null, Claremont, California, USA Could it be that these are animals that were hunted, fished, or herded and that there was a convention that used the singular as a sort of generic plural when going after these creatures for sport or food?
Preply
preply.com › home › english › singular of deer
Singular of deer | Learn English
September 14, 2016 - It is often remarked that all these nouns with invariant plurals denote animals, deer, sheep, fish, swine, which are either herded or hunted; and it has been suggested that both the 'mass noun' sense with herd animals and the custom of referring to all hunted animals in the singular
Quora
quora.com › Why-do-the-English-language-words-deer-fish-bison-sheep-etc-have-the-same-form-for-singular-and-plural
Why do the English language words 'deer' 'fish' 'bison' 'sheep' etc. have the same form for singular and plural? - Quora
Answer (1 of 8): http://hatmandu.net/2011/12/animal-words-are-strange-fishes/ Some internet sources suggest this convention when speaking of game or other animals. This is speculation, but perhaps there is some link to the practice of referring to a group of animals by a special name, i.e. a h...
MetaFilter
ask.metafilter.com › 272460 › What-animals-are-plural-and-singular
What animals are plural and singular? - words elk deer | Ask MetaFilter
December 3, 2014 - As a general rule, game or other animals are often referred to in the singular for the plural in a sporting context: "He shot six brace of pheasant", "Carruthers bagged a dozen tiger last year", whereas in another context such as zoology or tourism the regular plural would be used. Eric Partridge refers to these sporting terms as "snob plurals" and conjectures that they may have developed by analogy with the common English irregular plural animal words "deer", "sheep" and "trout".[references 7] Similarly, nearly all kinds of fish have no separate plural form (though there are exceptions—such as rays, sharks or lampreys).
Scribd
scribd.com › document › 424022037 › Deer
Deer (Singular and Plural) Are The | PDF | Deer | Even Toed Ungulates
There are two main groups: the Cervinae which includes elk and fallow deer, and the Capreolinae which includes reindeer, roe deer an…Full description