> From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of
> Igor Roshchin
> "A pair of binoculars" - is this two binoculars or just one
> _binocular_?
> ;-)
>
it's a pair of binoculars.
>
> My ears/eyes are irritated even when people use "pair of ..." with the
> nouns which are usually not used in a singular form (at least in the
> contemporary language), such as "pants" ("pantaloons"), "trousers",
[...]
>
> ------
> [*] I spent some time investigating this question, and found that this
> usage and word etymology is very similar in many languages from the
> Indo-European family, including English, French, Russian and several
> other slavic languages. And, in particular, it extrapolated on the
> objects that never had separate parts, such as "shorts" (aka "short
> pants").
>
> [#] Unlike e.g. Bob S. who owns two binoculars.
>
It's perfectly correct to say 'pair of...' these things in English.
>
> Igor
>
> PS. This reminded me of a question I wanted to ask some time ago.
> Question for Italian speakers (Dario?): I wonder if "pair of
> 'pantaloni'"
> ("accoppiamento dei pantaloni"[?] - or whatever it is) is a common
> expression in Italian?
Pantalone is interesting because it originally did not refer to gentlemen's
legwear but to a character in the Commedia dell' Arte - a Venetian merchant,
usually one of the characters blocking the young lovers who are always
trying to get each others pants off. His name became somehow attached to the
legwear, and stuck.
Pantaleon was one of the early Christian martyrs. He has a hill and a
monastery in Ethiopia that I've been to. Near Axum if I recall correctly.
Got some nice photos there one morning before a pair of monks (that's 2
monks) woke up and chased me away.
B
--
PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List
[email protected]
http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow
the directions.
