Plural of \'peristyle\'

[Epictetus]

Would anyone happen to know the plural of ‘peristyle’?

The Oxford English Dictionary doesn’t help, but says the English word comes from the French péristyle, which comes from the Latin peristylum, which comes from the Greek peristulon, peristulos.

Sometimes these loan words have borrowed plurals – think amphora and amphorae. Does anyone know if this is the case with ‘peristyle,’ or is it simply ‘peristyles’?

[Kegluneq]

In one sense it already is a plural, as it refers to a group of columns around a court (cf. environs, trousers). As it is an English word, I imagine you could just say 'peristyles', but referring to 'many peristylar/peristyled courts' may also work.

[Epictetus]

Actually, that is a very good point which I didn't quite realise. The OED says it is 'a row of columns surrounding a building, court, cloister' but it also says it can refer to 'the court etc. surrounded by the columns.' I was thinking of this second meaning. I suppose if you are using the first meaning, it is already plural.

Although the analogy isn't quite the same, perhaps it is like 'one deer' and 'two deer'?

[John W Davison]

I think the normal convention in English would only adopt the Latin or Greek plural form when the original ending had been retained.

If the English form retained were "peristylum" (Latin), the plural would be (I think) "peristyla", and likewise if the English had retained the Greek version, "peristulion", then we would use "peristulia".

As we have "de-inflected" this noun (i.e. removed the variable ending from the stem), "peristyles" would seem to be the logical plural form. There will be more recent, far higher-level and competent classics scholars on this forum than I - please feel free to correct my very rusty 2nd declension neuter nouns!

Regards,
John

[M. Demetrius]

Since peristylum is a singular form, it naturally would become peristyla in Latin plural. It seems awkward to think that any given building would have more than one, though.

In English, I suppose there's no problem with peristyles for plural. Stylestyles is correct, but English is the most lawless and irregular language on the face of the planet.


singplural
Moosemoose
Goosegeese
Mousemice
Househouses
Deerdeer
Beerbeers

There is no grammar rule in English that is without exceptions, except this one.

[Macedon]

In my opinion it all depends on which form you use for singular.

peristyle -> peristyles (English)

peristylum -> peristyla (Latin)

peristylon -> peristyla (original Greek)

- even though the English form might mislead us into thinking that in Greek the word is feminine (which wold make the plural -stylae), in reality it is neutral.

[Epictetus]

So it seems the consensus is that in English, use 'peristyles' as a plural, at least when you are referring to the court itself. Via internet searching, I see this is also how it is used in some Journal of Archaeology articles, so I guess this would be the way to go.

Thanks!

[M. Demetrius]

Peristyles if you're talking about more than one of them. In the same building, it would still be peristyle, I think, whether the court or the overhanging porch, or both. If there were two of them in the same building, then peristyles should be OK. As in, "This villa had two peristyles, one near the entrance, and the other on the rear part of the building adjoining the bath."

In two or more buildings, peristyles would be proper, like, "Both of these buildings had peristyles. The peristyle of the villa was much smaller than the one at the temple complex."

Without knowing the exact context of your usage, it would be hard to know, and even then, not many use that word these days, so you would probably not get any criticism.

Would the study of peristyles be peristylology?