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'woollen' or 'woolen'

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Anne Drewett

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Jun 22, 1999, 3:00:00 AM6/22/99
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Hiya,

Thanks to those that gave input on the "friendly as an adverb" thread.. much
appreciated :)

I noticed a spelling of 'woolen' recently, which made me curious, because I
had a feeling it should be double 'l'.. on checking on my computer (American
English), I got only 'woolen', but in my Oxford Dictionary, only 'woollen'.
Is this another difference between American and British spelling? Once
again, I should curse having only a pocket-sized English dictionary, though my
English-Swedish dictionary has "woolen: Am, see woollen". Are both spellings
acceptable in both American and British English, or is 'woolen' exclusively
American, and 'woollen' exclusively British? (Having British English as
mother tongue, I feel more inclined to use 'woollen'..)

Thanks in advance for any input!

Cheers,
Anne

Robert M. Wilson

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Jun 22, 1999, 3:00:00 AM6/22/99
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Anne Drewett wrote in message <7knmek$2er$1...@tekla.ing.umu.se>...

>I noticed a spelling of 'woolen' recently, which made me curious, because I
>had a feeling it should be double 'l'.. on checking on my computer
(American
>English), I got only 'woolen', but in my Oxford Dictionary, only 'woollen'.
>Is this another difference between American and British spelling?
[much removed]

England = double el
USA = single el
Canada = both or either

see: jeweler/jeweller, jewelry/jewellery, counselor/counsellor/, etc.

N.Mitchum

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Jun 22, 1999, 3:00:00 AM6/22/99
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Anne Drewett wrote:
-----

> I noticed a spelling of 'woolen' recently, which made me curious, because I
> had a feeling it should be double 'l'.. on checking on my computer (American
> English), I got only 'woolen', but in my Oxford Dictionary, only 'woollen'.
> Is this another difference between American and British spelling? [...]
>.....

You got it. British spelling doubles the l and American does not
... in general ... when the writer or editor remembers the
distinction. In fact I can't swear to the truth of this rule. I
read such a mix of British and American writing, and am so
thoroughly accustomed to seeing both spellings, that I don't
really notice the difference anymore.


----NM


Anne Drewett

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Jun 22, 1999, 3:00:00 AM6/22/99
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In article <376FDF...@lafn.org>, N.Mitchum <aj...@lafn.org> wrote:
>Anne Drewett wrote:
>-----
>> I noticed a spelling of 'woolen' recently, which made me curious, because I
>> had a feeling it should be double 'l'.. on checking on my computer (American
>> English), I got only 'woolen', but in my Oxford Dictionary, only 'woollen'.
>> Is this another difference between American and British spelling? [...]
>>.....
>
>You got it. British spelling doubles the l and American does not

.. does this apply to all suffixes of words ending in -l? So, 'woolly' in
British English is 'wooly' in Amer. English?

What exactly is the rule here? Does it only apply to a noun ending in a single
'l' that has a suffix added to it? I mean, 'successful' ends in a single l,
but is not spelt 'successfuly' in Am English (I assume), so are adjectives
ending in a single -l exempt from the rule? And are all nouns that end in a
single l doubled in British English, but not in American English?

Thanks again in advance,
Anne


Fabian

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Jun 22, 1999, 3:00:00 AM6/22/99
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Robert M. Wilson <r...@island.net> wrote in message
news:7kof64$e6k$1...@frasier.island.net...

>
> Anne Drewett wrote in message <7knmek$2er$1...@tekla.ing.umu.se>...
> >I noticed a spelling of 'woolen' recently, which made me curious,
because I
> >had a feeling it should be double 'l'.. on checking on my computer
> (American
> >English), I got only 'woolen', but in my Oxford Dictionary, only
'woollen'.
> >Is this another difference between American and British spelling?
> [much removed]
>
> England = double el
> USA = single el
> Canada = both or either

So if they use both, they spell it 'woolllen', eh?


---
Fabian
Rule One: Question the unquestionable,
ask the unaskable, eff the ineffable,
think the unthinkable, and screw the inscrutable.


R. Fontana

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Jun 22, 1999, 3:00:00 AM6/22/99
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On 22 Jun 1999, Anne Drewett wrote:

> In article <376FDF...@lafn.org>, N.Mitchum <aj...@lafn.org> wrote:
> >Anne Drewett wrote:
> >-----

> >> I noticed a spelling of 'woolen' recently, which made me curious, because I
> >> had a feeling it should be double 'l'.. on checking on my computer (American
> >> English), I got only 'woolen', but in my Oxford Dictionary, only 'woollen'.

> >> Is this another difference between American and British spelling? [...]
> >>.....
> >
> >You got it. British spelling doubles the l and American does not
>
> .. does this apply to all suffixes of words ending in -l? So, 'woolly' in
> British English is 'wooly' in Amer. English?

I've seen both spellings, as with woolen and woollen; I'd guess wooly is
more common in contemporary US English.

> What exactly is the rule here? Does it only apply to a noun ending in a single
> 'l' that has a suffix added to it? I mean, 'successful' ends in a single l,
> but is not spelt 'successfuly' in Am English (I assume), so are adjectives
> ending in a single -l exempt from the rule? And are all nouns that end in a
> single l doubled in British English, but not in American English?

As is generally true of English spelling, there are no bright-line rules.
You are correct that "successfully" (as well as other words forming
"-fully" from "-ful") has two l's in Am. English.

RF


a1a5...@bc.sympatico.ca

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Jun 23, 1999, 3:00:00 AM6/23/99
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On Tue, 22 Jun 1999 19:15:16 +0100, "Fabian"
<rhi...@chikyuujin.earthling.net> wrote:

>
>Robert M. Wilson <r...@island.net> wrote in message
>news:7kof64$e6k$1...@frasier.island.net...
>>
>> Anne Drewett wrote in message <7knmek$2er$1...@tekla.ing.umu.se>...

>> >I noticed a spelling of 'woolen' recently, which made me curious,
>because I
>> >had a feeling it should be double 'l'.. on checking on my computer
>> (American
>> >English), I got only 'woolen', but in my Oxford Dictionary, only
>'woollen'.
>> >Is this another difference between American and British spelling?

>> [much removed]
>>
>> England = double el
>> USA = single el
>> Canada = both or either
>
>So if they use both, they spell it 'woolllen', eh?
>
>
>---
>Fabian

No; that's Strine advertising hyperbole.

N.Mitchum

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Jun 23, 1999, 3:00:00 AM6/23/99
to
Anne Drewett wrote:
------

> What exactly is the rule here? Does it only apply to a noun ending in a single
> 'l' that has a suffix added to it? I mean, 'successful' ends in a single l,
> but is not spelt 'successfuly' in Am English (I assume), so are adjectives
> ending in a single -l exempt from the rule? And are all nouns that end in a
> single l doubled in British English, but not in American English?
>.....

To be honest, I long ago gave up looking for a rule that would
tell me how to handle words ending in l. Grammar and usage books
made a stab at the problem, but in the end I resigned myself to
just memorizing how to spell each word rather than trying to apply
their highly inconsistent rules.


----NM


warpedandtw...@gmail.com

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Apr 10, 2016, 11:42:09 AM4/10/16
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How about this for a spanner in the works... I am Canadian/Scottish (currently residing in Scotland) and in Scotland it is woolen, while in England it is woollen... no wonder North Americans can't decide what's right!

Robin Bignall

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Apr 10, 2016, 6:16:01 PM4/10/16
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On Sun, 10 Apr 2016 08:42:07 -0700 (PDT),
warpedandtw...@gmail.com wrote:

>How about this for a spanner in the works... I am Canadian/Scottish (currently residing in Scotland) and in Scotland it is woolen, while in England it is woollen... no wonder North Americans can't decide what's right!

COD11 (which presumably covers Scotland) gives 'wool', 'woollen' and
'woolly'. I suspect 'woolen' to be an American spelling.
--
Robin Bignall
Herts, England (BrE)

GordonD

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Apr 11, 2016, 5:55:01 AM4/11/16
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I remember my mother telling me that when she was asked to spell the
word at primary school, she responded with "double-you, double-o,
double-l-e-n", which for some reason displeased the teacher.
--
Gordon Davie
Edinburgh, Scotland

RH Draney

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Apr 11, 2016, 2:47:30 PM4/11/16
to
On 4/11/2016 2:54 AM, GordonD wrote:
>
> I remember my mother telling me that when she was asked to spell the
> word at primary school, she responded with "double-you, double-o,
> double-l-e-n", which for some reason displeased the teacher.

There was a joke to that effect in a 1939 jokebook I inherited from my
grandmother, in which a man asked to give his full name began spelling
it: "O double T I double U E double L double U double O D"...after
several cycles through the "how was that again?" routine, he said his
name was "Ottiwell Wood" and spelled it once again....

I used to tell my parents they should give out their phone number as
"four eighty eight ninety ninety eighty nine" (480-890-9089) but as far
as I know they never took me up on it...(they're both deceased now and
the number has gone back into the pool at the phone company, so don't
bother trying to call it)....r

Peter T. Daniels

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Apr 11, 2016, 5:49:42 PM4/11/16
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How did the Car Talk guys put it? It always went by too fast to catch.

RH Draney

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Apr 11, 2016, 6:38:19 PM4/11/16
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"Two two seven, eighty two fifty five"...that spells CAR-TALK, so you
can reconstruct it by working backwards....

They did once screw around with it, something like "double two seventy
eight twenty five, five"...just for grins....r

Peter T. Daniels

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Apr 11, 2016, 11:07:38 PM4/11/16
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You left out the area code. It was 888 or 855, and they said it with many
"double"s every week.

Athel Cornish-Bowden

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Apr 12, 2016, 2:36:21 AM4/12/16
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They could give it the traditional French style: forty eight, zero
eight, four twenties ten, four twenties ten, four twenties nine.

--
athel

Mike Barnes

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Apr 12, 2016, 1:48:47 PM4/12/16
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I thought it was "four twenty" (etc), not "four twenties". Not that I
can hear the difference.

--
Mike Barnes
Cheshire, England

James Hogg

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Apr 12, 2016, 5:00:55 PM4/12/16
to
four-twenties (quatre-vingts)

--
James

Peter Moylan

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Apr 12, 2016, 9:28:05 PM4/12/16
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But only for that one round number, n'est-ce pas? You go back to the
singular for the range 81-99.

When some French acquaintances were confused by my "septante" and
"nonante", I realised that I was speaking Belgian style, and tried to
correct my numbers back to the French versions. Unfortunately I
hypercorrected, and ended up with a number called trois-vingt-dix.

Russian has something unusual about the number 40, but since I've
forgotten nearly everything I knew about Russian I don't know what it
was. Having to use a different case, perhaps?

--
Peter Moylan http://www.pmoylan.org
Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Ian Jackson

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Apr 13, 2016, 2:38:14 AM4/13/16
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In message <nejnft$uk8$1...@dont-email.me>, James Hogg
<Jas....@gOUTmail.com> writes
While 80 is quatre-vingts, 81 is only quatre-vingt un (or so say all the
online translators) - and not quatre-vingts et un, quatre-vingt et un,
or (again minus the 'et') quatre-vingts un. 91 is similarly
quatre-vingt-onze. This is unlike (say) quarante et un, cinquante et un,
soixante et un, soixante et onze - which DO have the 'et'. Confused?



>

--
Ian

James Hogg

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Apr 13, 2016, 3:21:45 AM4/13/16
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I must have known all this forty years ago.

(And for Peter: forty in Russian is like any other number over four,
taking the genitive plural. What's odd about it is that it isn't a
compound of the word for "ten" but a word meaning a bunch of 40 sable
pelts.)

--
James

Mike Barnes

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Apr 13, 2016, 3:37:54 AM4/13/16
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Peter Moylan wrote:
> Russian has something unusual about the number 40, but since I've
> forgotten nearly everything I knew about Russian I don't know what it
> was. Having to use a different case, perhaps?

And IIRC some Japanese numbers come in different forms depending on what
sort of thing you're counting.

Peter Moylan

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Apr 13, 2016, 4:11:06 AM4/13/16
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On 2016-Apr-13 17:21, James Hogg wrote:
>
> (And for Peter: forty in Russian is like any other number over four,
> taking the genitive plural. What's odd about it is that it isn't a
> compound of the word for "ten" but a word meaning a bunch of 40 sable
> pelts.)

Thanks. I knew it took the genitive plural, because for some silly
reason the phrase сорок слов is stuck in my head. (Perhaps that was how
many Russian words I knew at the peak of my knowledge of Russian.) I
couldn't remember which other numbers take the genitive plural, although
it makes sense that it should be most of them.

I didn't know about the sable pelts.

David Kleinecke

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Apr 13, 2016, 11:52:21 AM4/13/16
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On Wednesday, April 13, 2016 at 12:37:54 AM UTC-7, Mike Barnes wrote:
> Peter Moylan wrote:
> > Russian has something unusual about the number 40, but since I've
> > forgotten nearly everything I knew about Russian I don't know what it
> > was. Having to use a different case, perhaps?
>
> And IIRC some Japanese numbers come in different forms depending on what
> sort of thing you're counting.

Many languages (of different and unrelated groups) only count using
classifiers. One common shape is a morphological pair (prefix + suffix
with nothing in between) where the prefix indicates number (and sometimes
other things) and the suffix a class of countable objects. Classes tend
to be things like "long slender object".
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