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Collective noun

In linguistics, a collective noun is a word referring to a collection of things taken as a whole. Most collective nouns in everyday speech are not specific to one kind of thing. For example, the collective noun "group" can be applied to people ("a group of people"), or dogs ("a group of dogs"), or objects ("a group of stones").

Some collective nouns are specific to one kind of thing, especially terms of venery, which identify groups of specific animals. For example, "pride" as a term of venery always refers to lions, never to dogs or cows. Other examples come from popular culture such as a group of owls, which is called a "parliament".

Different forms of English handle verb agreement with collective count nouns differently. For example, users of British English generally accept that collective nouns take either singular or plural verb forms depending on context and the metonymic shift that it implies, while in some other forms of English the verb agreement is less flexible.

Derivation
Morphological derivation accounts for many collective words and various languages have common affixes for denoting collective nouns. Because derivation is a slower and less productive word formation process than the more overtly syntactical morphological methods, there are fewer collectives formed this way. As with all derived words, derivational collectives often differ semantically from the original words, acquiring new connotations and even new denotations.

Proto-Indo-European
Early Proto-Indo-European used the suffix *eh₂ to form collective nouns, which evolved into the Latin neuter plural ending -a, as in "datum/data". Late Proto-Indo-European used the ending *t, which evolved into the English ending -th, as in "young/youth".

English
The English endings -age and -ade often signify a collective. Sometimes, the relationship is easily recognizable: baggage, drainage, blockade. Though the etymology is plain to see, the derived words take on a distinct meaning. This is a productive ending, as evidenced in the recent coin, "signage".

German
German uses the prefix ge- to create collectives. The root word often undergoes umlaut and suffixation as well as receiving the ge- prefix. Nearly all nouns created in that way are of neuter gender: There are also several endings that can be used to create collectives, such as "welt" and "masse".
 * das Gebirge, "group of hills, mountain range" < der Berg, "mountain" or "hill"
 * das Gepäck, "luggage, baggage" < der Pack, "pack, bundle, pile"
 * das Geflügel, "poultry, fowl (birds)" < late MHG gevlügel(e), under the influence of der Flügel, "wing" < MHG gevügel < OHG gifugili = collective formation of fogal, "bird"
 * das Gefieder, "plumage" < die Feder, "feather"
 * das Geschwisterkind, "sibling of another child" or "child of a sibling" < die Schwester, "sister"
 * die Geschwister, "siblings" < die Schwester, "sister"
 * "Der Gebirgszug" and "die Bergkette" also mean "mountain range", drawing on the words "der Zug" = train, and "die Kette" = chain.

Dutch
Dutch has a similar pattern but sometimes uses the (unproductive) circumfix :
 * berg 'mountain' > gebergte 'mountain range'
 * been 'bone' > gebeente 'skeleton'
 * vogel 'bird' > gevogelte 'poultry'
 * blad 'leaf' > gebladerte 'foliage'

Swedish
The following Swedish example has different words in the collective form and in the individual form:
 * An individual mosquito is a mygga (plural: myggor), but mosquitos as a collective is mygg.

Esperanto
Esperanto uses the collective infix -ar- to produce a large number of derived words:
 * monto 'mountain' > montaro 'mountain range'
 * birdo 'bird' > birdaro 'flock'
 * arbo 'tree' > arbaro 'forest'
 * ŝipo 'ship' > ŝiparo 'fleet'
 * manĝilo 'eating utensil' > manĝilaro 'silverware', 'cutlery'

Metonymic merging of grammatical number
Two examples of collective nouns are "team" and "government", which are both words referring to groups of (usually) people. Both "team" and "government" are countable nouns (consider: "one team", "two teams", "most teams"; "one government", "two governments", "many governments").

Agreement in different forms of English
Confusion often stems from the way that different forms of English handle agreement with collective nouns—specifically, whether or not to use the collective singular: the singular verb form with a collective noun. The plural verb forms are often used in British English with the singular forms of these countable nouns (e.g., "The team have finished the project."). Conversely, in the English language as a whole, singular verb forms can often be used with nouns ending in "-s" that were once considered plural (e.g., "Physics is my favorite academic subject"). This apparent "number mismatch" is a natural and logical feature of human language, and its mechanism is a subtle metonymic shift in the concepts underlying the words.

In British English, it is generally accepted that collective nouns can take either singular or plural verb forms depending on the context and the metonymic shift that it implies. For example, "the team is in the dressing room" (formal agreement) refers to the team as an ensemble, while "the team are fighting among themselves" (notional agreement) refers to the team as individuals. That is also the British English practice with names of countries and cities in sports contexts (e.g., "Newcastle have won the competition.").

In American English, collective nouns almost always take singular verb forms (formal agreement). In cases that a metonymic shift would be revealed nearby, the whole sentence should be recast to avoid the metonymy. (For example, "The team are fighting among themselves" may become "the team members are fighting among themselves" or simply "The team is infighting.") Collective proper nouns are usually taken as singular ("Apple is expected to release a new phone this year"), unless the plural is explicit in the proper noun itself, in which case it is taken as plural ("The Green Bay Packers are scheduled to play the Minnesota Vikings this weekend"). More explicit examples of collective proper nouns include "General Motors is once again the world's largest producer of vehicles", and "Texas Instruments is a large producer of electronics here", and "British Airways is an airline company in Europe". Furthermore, "American Telephone & Telegraph is a telecommunications company in North America". Such phrases might look plural, but they are not.

Examples of metonymic shift
A good example of such a metonymic shift in the singular-to-plural direction (which exclusively takes place in British English) is the following sentence: "The team have finished the project." In that sentence, the underlying thought is of the individual members of the team working together to finish the project. Their accomplishment is collective, and the emphasis is not on their individual identities, but they are still discrete individuals; the word choice "team have" manages to convey both their collective and discrete identities simultaneously. Collective nouns that have a singular form but take a plural verb form are called collective plurals. An example of such a metonymic shift in the plural-to-singular direction is the following sentence: "Mathematics is my favorite academic subject". The word "mathematics" may have originally been plural in concept, referring to mathematic endeavors, but metonymic shift (the shift in concept from "the endeavors" to "the whole set of endeavors") produced the usage of "mathematics" as a singular entity taking singular verb forms. (A true mass-noun sense of "mathematics" followed naturally.)

Nominally singular pronouns can be collective nouns taking plural verb forms, according to the same rules that apply to other collective nouns. For example, it is correct usage in both British English and American English usage to say: "None are so fallible as those who are sure they're right." In that case, the plural verb is used because the context for "none" suggests more than one thing or person. This also applies to the use of an adjective as a collective noun: "The British are coming!"; "The poor will always be with you."

Other examples include:

 * "Creedence Clearwater Revival was founded in El Cerrito, California" (but in British English, "Creedence Clearwater Revival were founded ...")
 * "Arsenal have won the match" (but in American English, "Arsenal has won the game")
 * "Nintendo is a video game company headquartered in Japan".

This does not, however, affect the tense later in the sentence:

 * "Cream is a psychedelic rock band who were primarily popular in the 1960s.

Abbreviations provide other "exceptions" in American usage concerning plurals:

 * "Runs Batted In" becomes "RBIs". "Smith had 10 RBIs in the last three games."
 * "Revised Statutes Annotated" or RSAs. "The RSAs contain our laws."

When only the name is plural but not the object, place, or person:

 * "The bends is a deadly disease mostly affecting SCUBA divers."
 * "Hot Rocks is a greatest hits compilation by The Rolling Stones"

Terms of venery
The tradition of using "terms of venery" or "nouns of assembly", collective nouns that are specific to certain kinds of animals, stems from an English hunting tradition of the Late Middle Ages. The fashion of a consciously developed hunting language came to England from France. It was marked by an extensive proliferation of specialist vocabulary, applying different names to the same feature in different animals. The elements can be shown to have already been part of French and English hunting terminology by the beginning of the 14th century. In the course of the 14th century, it became a courtly fashion to extend the vocabulary, and by the 15th century, the tendency had reached exaggerated and even satirical proportions. Other synonyms for "terms of venery" include "company nouns," "gatherations," and "agminals."

The Treatise, written by Walter of Bibbesworth in the mid-1200s, is the earliest source for collective nouns of animals in any European vernacular (and also the earliest source for animal noises). The Venerie of Twiti (early 14th century) distinguished three types of droppings of animals, and three different terms for herds of animals. Gaston Phoebus (14th century) had five terms for droppings of animals, which were extended to seven in the Master of the Game (early 15th century). The focus on collective terms for groups of animals emerged in the later 15th century. Thus, a list of collective nouns in Egerton MS 1995, dated to c. 1452 under the heading of "termis of venery &c.", extends to 70 items, and the list in the Book of Saint Albans (1486) runs to 164 items, many of which, even though introduced by "the compaynys of beestys and fowlys", relate not to venery but to human groups and professions and are clearly humorous, such as "a Doctryne of doctoris", "a Sentence of Juges", "a Fightyng of beggers", "an uncredibilite of Cocoldis", "a Melody of harpers", "a Gagle of women", "a Disworship of Scottis", etc.

The Book of Saint Albans became very popular during the 16th century and was reprinted frequently. Gervase Markham edited and commented on the list in his The Gentleman's Academie, in 1595. The book's popularity had the effect of perpetuating many of these terms as part of the Standard English lexicon even if they were originally meant to be humorous and have long ceased to have any practical application.

Even in their original context of medieval venery, the terms were of the nature of kennings, intended as a mark of erudition of the gentlemen able to use them correctly rather than for practical communication. The popularity of the terms in the modern period has resulted in the addition of numerous lighthearted, humorous or facetious collective nouns.

title: Collective noun


text:
Talk:Collective noun

PLEASE READ: rules for new candidates
In a break from usual tradition of "edit as you see fit" I'm going to ask people to list new candidate nouns here. I am running an Access database which generates the table scripts automatically - it is a lot easier than scrolling through all that wiki-code.

If you modify or correct something, could you also list it here, so I can edit the database. If anyone wants the db, just email me (address is on my personal page). It's currently only 200K in size.

Please list candidates here. If you can find a dictionary reference for it, please say so. Many collective nouns are obscure and archaic - hence a citation from any (respectable) dictionary will be deemed to validate the term.

If you know the term is spurious, then say so. I have no problem listing spurious nouns, so long as they are clearly marked as such. Things like "a clutch of mechanics" have humour value, even if illegitimate. - MMGB

Nice one, Manning, I wish I'd thought of doing this! I'll put some more up for the collection, and many thanks for your help with this. sjc

- shelfful of books - carpet of flowers - drift of snow - stack of papers, cards - arsenal of weapons - hail of bullets - coil of stamps - tissue of lies - circle of friends - trail of tears (somebody please flag this? this is an ugly trivialization of race-based genocide in the USA) - growth of trees - series of games - hand of cards - pack of cards - can of worms - I think this only refers to a problematic situation, and is not a collective term for worms - sleeze of sponges (possible spelling issues) - cord of wood - bushel of wheat/corn/potatoes (also peck = 1/4 bushel) - barrel of oil (42 gallons) - TCF of natural gas (trillion cubic feet) - Quad BTU or just Quad (quadrillion British Thermal Units) - wate of meetings (sounds like wait/weight)

This should live on collective noun, shouldn't it? And, given that we're not going to have subpages, all the subpages could conveniently live on, e.g., collective nouns sorted by subject and collective nouns for birds. --LMS

Oh bugger. - MMGB

Sorry, really I am. :-) --LMS

This is a cool idea. Anthology of prostitutes. Heh, heh. Not brilliant prose, but I just wanted to contratulate you, Manning. I think it's good work! <>< tbc

Actually, I originally started this Talk page to try to get a better definition of the subject at hand. I gave a couple of examples that I thought might be questionable, thinking that they might have been omitted for a definite reason. They weren't really intended as suggested additions, but rather to try to identify the scope of the subject. Partly this was because lots of obvious ones were missing. For example, deck of cards is included, but not stack of cards, or pile of cards, or hand of cards. Am I to understand that all these should be included, but the list just isn't yet complete? -HWR

Always assume the list isn't complete. - MMGB

- drift of snow - isn't this singular?

Wouldn't that exclusion also apply to:

- anthology of prose - heap of trash - slew of homework - wad of money

hmmm... fair comment. - MMGB

Prose, money and those

I've got a list I've had lying around on my hard drive for quite a while, which was based off of information in Paul Hellweg's "Insomniac's Dictionary." Rather than check the existing lists and cull out duplicates, though, I figured I'd let you do all the hard work for me with your fancy-dancy database. :)

Paul has a whole whack of references at the back of his book, but doesn't specify which ones these came out of. Still, the book seems well-researched, so perhaps it counts as a suitable reference on its own.

(long list deleted, one by one...) Every single item you listed was already included, except for the one listed below. I'm waiting for opinions as to what to do with this one.

Wolves	Route - ''currently listed as "rout". couldn't find a citation for "route"''

 * Looks like a typo or an American unfamiliar with the English word "rout" to me... I always thought it was a rout of wolves, myself. sjcTW:

a quarrel of crossbow bolts sjc

Also, Manning, I notice that goldfinches are no longer referenced as a charm. I have always referred to them as a charm (we get about twenty or so of them at a time in our garden in summer sometimes), and so does everyone else I know who knows what they're on about! They are perfectly delightful. I am reinstating the most prevalent usage of charm as a collective noun (in my neck of the woods at any case). sjc

 * After 50 or so of them flew up in my face out of some high grass, I coined the phrase "rush of goldfinches". Gold rush, get it.

Could someone whose opinion of collective nouns is slightly more NPOV than my personal burning hatred point out in the intro to the article that collective nouns are not a fixed construction of the English language -- one can refer to a group of any sort of thing as just that, a "group", or indeed mix and match in any way one sees fit. This would be for the benefit of non-native speakers: I would hate them to think they actually have to learn all this rubbish. Collective nouns are very much a literary game, and even that is a tenous description as any writer worth their salt recognises them as dead metaphors. -- Tarquin 15:44 Sep 27, 2002 (UTC)

 * The worst mistake I have made in my Wikipedia career was rudely and ignorantly trashing one of the collective nouns collections (both verbally, and due to a browser bug, physically). I have stayed away from them since then, out of some combination of embarrassment and good manners, so I can't be the one to clear up this either, but all this stuff is distinctly countereducational. I hate hurting people's feelings.  I have stayed away from this since my first weeks in Wikipedia and even took it off my Watchlist because I was so upset with myself, but Tarquin's comments have brought me reluctantly back to the issue.  Fun's fun, but somehow this isn't fun.

 * Here is my summary.
 * Like Tarquin said, a group is a group and that's that for 99 per cent of the cases.
 * There are a few English words (two dozen?) meaning a group of people or things -- clan, band, choir, etc.
 * There are also a few more legitimate specialized words for groups of certain kinds of things -- pod of whales, gaggle of geese (which means flying geese, by the way, walking geese are a flock, like most birds).
 * Then there was/is a parlor game of making these things up for other groupings -- fanfare of strumpets is my favorite. I just added rush of goldfinches up above in the same spirit.
 * Then there are many that are just plain dumb, aanthology of aardvarks, etc.
 * Finally there are the inane, that don't even meet the extremely low requirements of this category, such as (culled from above) hail of bullets, coil of stamps, tissue of lies, trail of tears

 * The root article here haltingly manifests some awareness of these distinctions, but the collection of links goes to cripplingly overcoded and barely editable list articles that provide almost no guidance in the use of these nouns and are filled with cases marked "spurious", or with worthless, unannotated sublists like brigade of soldiers, company of soldiers, platoon of soldiers, squad of soldiers. Overall this has been a great deal of hard work on someone's part that is not really good encyclopedia material.  Compare it to English plural to see how weak it really is. (Yes, I started  the plural article, but many many people have contributed to it.  It is the only article I regularly worked on that now seems almost complete.)  Ortolan88

are there free etymology dictionary?
the question in the article Do there exist any freely accessible dictionaries of etymology on the Web? is moved here.

among collegiate-sized dictionaries, websters, merriem webster, American Heritage, AHD is the most endowed with respect to etynomology.

they are freely avaliable on the web: m-w.com, dictionary.com

PS AHD provides a "notes" section on "collective nouns", see dictionary.com on flock.

Xah P0lyglut 06:23, 2003 Dec 9 (UTC)

For free etymology online, check out http://www.etymonline.com/. It is mostly based on the OED but doesn't contain all the words they've got over there.

It might be worth adding a note to redirect people who are looking for mass noun. On Wiktionary I'm finding people constantly using the term "collective noun" when they are really talking about the idea of "uncountable noun" / "mass noun" / "non-count noun" — Hippietrail 12:35, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Comments on specific examples

 * "A wing of aircraft" I belive this applies 1) only to military aircraft, and 2) implies a specifc number of craft, just as a "squad" or a "regiment" is not a general collective noun for soldiers. DES (talk) 20:01, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A roll of coins" I belvie is a fairly specific arrangement, referring to a stack of coins rolled in a sleeve of soem sort. It does not applie to a loose pile of coins. In fact usually this implies a particualr number. For example in the U.S. a roll of quarters is a set of 40, or $10. DES (talk) 20:01, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A rouleau of coins" same coments as on "rollof coins" as this is merly the french version of that term. DES (talk) 20:01, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A wealth of information" while this ia a common phrase, the term "wealth " can also be applied to an ample provision of any substance. DES (talk) 20:08, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A chain of islands" I belive this implies a specific, albiet common arrangement -- i.e. a realatively linear grouping. DES (talk) 20:08, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A cache of jewels" a "cache" is any hidden or safely contained repository of valuable substance, such as food, gold, treasure, or data. It is as far as I know nbot in any way particular to jewels. DES (talk) 20:08, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A ring of keys" refers to a specifc arranngemet, i.e. a goup of keys held on or joined by a ring. it would not apply to a pile of loose keys, nor to any general collection of keys. DES (talk) 20:08, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A convoy of lorries" "Convoy" applies to any group of vehicles traveling togehter with a common purpose -- derived from a group of merchant ships traveling under the escort of warships. DES (talk) 20:08, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "An anthology of prose" an Anthology is any colletion of shorter works into a single colective work, adn applies no more to prose than to verse or pictures. It also does not apply to prose not so collected, so it implies a moderatly specific arrangement. DES (talk) 20:18, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A book of wagers" I belive this implies a set of wagers collected in a betting book (hence the term Bookie) and not any general collection of wagers. DES (talk) 20:18, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * A faculty of academics" this refers only to a group that in soem sense forms the personel of a specific school, college, or other institution, or in some cases a departmetn or division within such an insititution. It would not apply to a general group of academics, nor to only a portion of the personel of such an institution. DES (talk) 20:39, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A staff of employees" again thsi normally implies the complete set of the employees of a particualr firm or employer, or perhaps of a partiucualr division or section of such a firm. it would not apply to a group of employees from multiple employers, nor to only soem of the employees for a given employer. DES (talk) 20:39, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A banner of knights" I think, although I would need to verify, that this applies to a specific grouping, like a "squadron of cavalry". I belvive it orginally implied all the Knights following a particular leader (such as a "Knight bannerette). DES (talk) 20:39, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A cortege of mourners" This refers to the complete set of mourners in a funeral procession. it does not refer to only some of those mourners, nor to morners in other circumstances, nor to collections from more than one such procession. DES (talk) 20:44, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A team of players" this should mean the complete set -- all the players for a particualr side in a particualr sport. DES (talk) 20:44, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A cohort of students" this typically means all and only the students of a particular year or age. The term is also applied in demographic or population studies, to any group of people of the same age, or who passed a particular milestone (such as marrying or giving birth) in a particualr year. It is thus a very specific term, but it is not particualrly specific to students. DES (talk) 20:44, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A coven of witches" implies a specific group who gather for particualr rituals, not any genric group of witches. DES (talk) 20:48, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * "A congregation of worshipers" this refers to the particualr group who gather at a particular place or institution for worship, either on a specific occasion or on a regualr basis. it does not refer to any general gathering or group of worshipers, nor to a group that is only part of a congregation. DES (talk) 20:48, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * In the Royal Air Force groups aircraft and the names of their officers are (from smallest) Flight Lieutenant, Squadron Leader, Wing Commander and Group Captain. Hence Flight, Squadron, Wing and Group.

etymology question
I've never heard of a "parcel of pigs", but the variant "passel" made me do a doubletake! Is this actually used somewhere? If it is, and this is what struck me, is it possible that this was derived from Yiddish or Ashkenazi Hebrew? This seems almost paradoxically impossible, but "passel" is one way I've heard Yinglish speakers pronouncing פסול ... "pasûl", a Hebrew word for "unfit", "unclean", "improper" and by extension in Yinglish, "prohibited". This pretty well describes the halakhic view of pigs... Also, another Hebrew word, derived from the same shoresh, is פסל ..., meaning "idol"...  If this is the source, it pretty well describes, at least according to one story, how a pig used by Antiochus sparked the Maccabean revolt...  Or is this all just fanciful conjecture and amazing coincidence? Tom e rtalk 19:46, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

"passel of" is American slang, sort of "farmer/country western" or Appalachian, meaning "a bunch of", it comes from the word parcel. "he had a whole passel of corncobs", i.e. not necessarily applied to pigs. It's possible whoever decided to add this term to the fanciful venery list was aware of the yiddish wrt pigs 2603:8001:D300:A631:0:0:0:10D0 (talk) 20:17, 13 September 2022 (UTC)

Merger proposal
I am proposing a merger of plural, nullar, trial (grammatical number), paucal, collective noun and singulative with grammatical number. Here are my reasons: A related page which is probably best left separate is the one on the dual number, which seems too large to merge with 'grammatical number'. See also Talk:Grammatical_number. FilipeS 14:57, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Most of those other entries have very little in them. They could easily become sections, or even paragraphs in 'grammatical number';
 * One exception is the plural entry, which does contain quite a bit, but a lot of what it has could just as well be in a general entry about 'grammatical number';
 * I think that some of what is currently in the plural article might be used to improve the quality of the 'grammatical number' article;

Proposal withdrawn. See Talk:Grammatical_number. FilipeS 20:14, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Collateral vandalism on birds pages
A user is repeatedly censoring the collective noun of birds on some pages, at least Lark and Raven. Editors of collective nouns may be interested in chiming in about what I see as unilateral and unencyclopedian vandalism. Issue commented with diffs at User_talk:Jimfbleak.

Note: the user seem in the habit of purging his talk page without archival, especially for censoring criticism; you may have to look at this revision from today if my item has been deleted.

-- 62.147.38.149 11:29, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

 * I am the user referred to, and if anyone believes that I am a vandal, please look at my user contributions (20,000 plus). The anon user above persists in inappropriate additions to Lark and Raven, despite my explanation that the made-up Victorian terms he uses have no genuine usage outside lists of collective nouns. If the terms are meaningful at all, (and the anon user provides no references) they apply only to the Common Raven and Skylark.

 * Can anyone give a counterexample, eg a published reference to an exultation of any of the African or Asian larks?

 * Furthermore, despite my pointing out that vandal is a term of abuse, the user persists in using it, and did not have the decency to let me know he was denigrating me on this forum. More in sorrow than anger, jimfbleak 12:41, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

 * I've just noticed the other snide dig. I delete all old and dealt with talk content - please look at the example the anon user gives, and decide for yourselves. I never delete ongoing material, despite the innuendo. It is easy to retrieve old edits from history, so I've never bothered to archive jimfbleak 12:47, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

 * What about this compromise this for the lark family, assuming anon doesn't produce verification that exultation is used for all larks (edits must be verifiable)?

 * "The collective noun for larks is a flock (sources: Mullarney, Svensson, Zetterstrom and Grant, Collins Bird Guide ISBN 0-00-219728-6, Handbook of the Birds of Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa: The Birds of the Western Palearctic)"

 * Raven is more of a problem in that the species I know about do not actually form flocks. One of the nonsenses of these so-called collective nouns is that they are apllied to birds that do not form flocks, such as ravens and owls. they are basically a twee literary conceit with no place in a scientifically orientated article.

 * jimfbleak 14:23, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

 * Good point about collective nouns applied to birds that do not actually hang out together. I came to the talk page to see if anyone else had objected to the example in the introduction being a "parliament of owls" since 1) it is obscure and therefore is not as helpful at immediately introducing the topic as a more common term and 2) it is, in fact, a ridiculous term that would never apply to birds outside of a zoo.  Ventifact

Hmm, I just noticed that the "parliament of owls" example links to the article on The Silver Chair (C.S. Lewis), which has convinced me that using it as the introductory example was based on someone's personal fancy. Ventifact

American English Usage
The entry's remark on collective nouns' use in U.S. English was as follows when I found it: ''In the English spoken in the United States and at least in other Indo-European languages, one says "the team is..." (seen as a singular noun, unless it is actually "teams").'' This seemed remarkably garbled and unclear, so I have altered it. I am not sure what the reference to Indo-European languages was supposed to mean, so I have removed it; was it supposed to say that in all other IE languages collective nouns are always singular? Also it might be worth mentioning that the music industry tends to be the major American exception to using collective nouns as singular ("the band are currently on tour"). 216.186.101.104Ventifact

As a bonafide American (US style) I'd like to take exception to this last statement. I myself would never say "the band are currently on tour" ("is" I would say), I don't believe it's common in the industry, and I just googled "the band is on tour" (using quotes) and found over half a million hits. Granted, "the band are on tour" got more hits, and I did not determine how many in each search are American vs British, but still. At any rate, I find the whole business of English vs American differences in using collective nouns interesting, especially regarding sports teams.RI-jim (talk) 23:57, 22 December 2012 (UTC)

Following up on my post of 22 Dec, I have to say I find the second paragraph of "Metonymic merging of grammatical number" somewhat puzzling. I mean this: <<In British English, it is generally accepted that collective nouns can take either singular or plural verb forms depending on the context and the metonymic shift that it implies. For example, "the team is in the dressing room" (formal agreement) refers to the team as an ensemble, whilst "the team are fighting among themselves" (notional agreement) refers to the team as individuals. This is also British English practice with names of countries and cities in sports contexts; for example, "Germany have won the competition.", "Madrid have lost three consecutive matches.", etc.>> My question: When, in current British usage, is "team" or "Germany" (as a team) or "Arsenal" (team) ever mated with a singular verb? As an American who pays some attention to soccer/football, I don't think I ever see it. It's hard to believe that this is because Brits always have notional agreement in mind; I suspect it's because custom has eclipsed making a distinction so that now a team is always a "they" and never an "it". In today's online Guardian I see this headline: "Liverpool fall short against Zenit". The individuals on the team acting in disparate ways fell short? Or the team as a unit fell short? Is it just my American perspective that sees the latter are more sensible? RI-jim (talk) 00:14, 22 February 2013 (UTC)

Other Languages?
Are collective nouns used in other languages?

If so, please list here.

Tabletop 07:34, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

 * In German, collectives are formed in basically one way only - by adding Ge- etc - which hardly counts as a collective noun.

 * In English, when a new word needs a new collective noun, people go out to find or invent a new one.

 * Again, what about other languages?   Tabletop (talk) 00:22, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

 * Not quite true that all collectives in German are formed with "Ge-". German has lots of other collective nouns such as die Polizei, "the police", or die Mannschaft, "the team", which invariably take the singular, unlike English. --Bermicourt (talk) 07:58, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Swedish: boskap: cattle, folk: people avkomma:progeny, ärter: peas (in general -- if you can count them you say ärtor), polis : the police force see: http://books.google.se/books?id=Z0v3qu0s5Y8C&pg=PA27&dq=swedish+collective+nouns&hl=sv&sa=X&ei=aRtSVMrtJ-bVygOu2YGgAg&ved=0CCoQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=swedish%20collective%20nouns&f=false also section 121

Lacreighton (talk) 11:13, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

 * In Esperanto, -ar is an explicit and quite productive suffix, used creatively to produce a large number of words, e.g. tree/forest, fish/school, and step/stairs. I'll include a few examples and a Wiktionary link. Probably the various languages should be moved into subsections, as is customary in similar articles, e.g. pejorative suffix. -Simplulo (talk) 18:09, 19 April 2015 (UTC)

Metonymic merging of grammatical number: AmE epistemology
The recent change that I reverted was not an improvement; in fact it obscured the reference to the very idea that there are epistemological considerations of how language users do or don't define "right" and "wrong" in grammar, and thus it was not NPOV, which the earlier version was. The straw-man example added, "The cars am traveling fast", is only speciously parallel to the metonymical shift seen with collectives: yes, it has "number mismatch", but not for any etically logical reason. Before edit-warring on this topic, please make sure that you understand what epistemology and metonymy are. Lumbercutter 15:33, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Collective nouns by status?
I'm given to understand that Wikipedia is not meant to be a significant source of funny, per se, but if the collective noun list is going to include spurious entries (and I hope it continues to do so, as some of them are quite amusing and/or clever), it might be handy to add a page that lists them by status - or, indeed, to include a page that only lists the spurious ones. Actually, come to think of it, it might be useful to include a list by status, including uncertain or questionable collective nouns, so that those with expertise might be more able to find them and provide evidence for or against them.

Relatedly, what qualifies a spurious collective noun for inclusion? Are there criteria somewhere that I just haven't seen? If not, shouldn't there be? -Id the Mildly Confused 05:06, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Terminology
The term "Collective Noun" is just one of many ways of describing these expressions. It should be stated that they are sometimes referred to as "collective terms", "terms of association", "company terms", "nouns of multitude", "group terms", "terms of venery" and "venereal terms" (the "venery/venereal" here refers to "hunting" ... originally many such terms were used for groups of animals). Linguists also refer to them as "partitives", though this can cause confusion with words such as "some" which are "partitives" for the grammarians. This can be particularly confusing for foreigners (and learners of Romance languages ... as well as other languages including Japanese) who would use the term "partitive" to refer to the preposition "of" joined to a definite article, as in French when "de"+"le" becomes "du", or in Italian when "di"+"la" becomes "della". These combinations take on a partitive meaning (=some) when used to mean a vague amount, as in "du pain". (14:39, 4 August 2007 62.10.34.251)

The opening paragraph is also a little misleading about what "collective noun" really means. "Pride" in the sense of a group of lions is a collective noun regardless of whether it's in the phrase "pride of lions" or standing alone. I think it would be better to use "group" as the introductory example, and then introduce terms of venery as a special case later. Not R (talk) 17:29, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Chicago Manual of Style vs. Wikipedia (Buy Your Tickets Here!)
I quote from the most recent copy I've seen of the CMOS website:

 * http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/CMS_FAQ/new/new_questions01.html

 * Q. I’m curious about your equating collective nouns with mass nouns in CMOS 5.8. The explanation at Wikipedia states that it is incorrect to equate the two.

 * A. The article you cite takes the stickler’s view in the face of dictionary evidence that the two kinds of nouns are commonly equated. That’s the kind of “incorrectness” we’re prepared to live with.

Any takers?

Timothy Perper (talk) 19:03, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

fxhb j —Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.50.201.140 (talk) 02:50, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

So, "The United States are ..." or "The United States is"? I would like to know; surely I am not the only one. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.227.105.200 (talk) 07:13, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

 * "The United States is". —JerryFriedman (Talk) 20:45, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

Refrencedesk query
Please couold somebody her ehelp with RD/L this reference desk query about collectiv nouns? THanks! 117.241.120.150 (talk) 08:48, 17 March 2011 (UTC)
 * This is at least 3 different places you've posted this question. The most obvious thing to do is contact the publisher. If they don't make an electronic version, then any electronic version you might find on the internet must necessarily be a copyright violation. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 09:30, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

deleted text
I deleted this text because I don't see a need for an example from fiction:

 * Arthur Conan Doyle in Sir Nigel (1906), set in the mid-14th century, depicts the situation of hunting terminology in the late medieval period. The novel's protagonist in chapter 11 is instructed that "for every collection of beasts in the forest, and for every gathering of birds in the air, there is their own private name so that none may be confused with another." The speaker reports that the chief huntsman of the duke of Burgundy was supposed to have been able to list more than a hundred such terms, but suspects that he had been making them up as he went along, as "there was none to say him nay".

—JerryFriedman (Talk) 20:46, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

Mangled sentence
In the "Terms of venery" section, four lines from the bottom of the first paragraph, the word "introduced" is repeated. I started to delete one of the words, but I think something else is wrong; I'm just not sure what. Here's the phrase: "...the list in the Book of Saint Albans (1486) runs to 165 items, many of which, even though introduced by introduced [ital] the compaynys of beestys and fowlys, [ital] do not relate to venery but to human groups and professions and are clearly humorous." I'm not sure where the italicized portion came from nor what it has to do with the rest of the sentence, but if read literally, ignoring the repeated "introduced," it would seem to say that "the compaynys of beestys and fowlys" introduced items to the list in the Book of Saint Albans, which obviously makes no sense. I understand that many additions were made to the list for the sake of humor as opposed to creating a specific word to differentiate between groups of animals, but what did the author intend to write? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Loupgrru (talk • contribs) 04:41, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

the point is that the list is introduced (headed, titled) by the compaynys of beestys and fowlys, but then it has many items that concern neither beasts nor fowls, but people/professions. --dab (𒁳) 18:38, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

Crowd-sourced collective nouns
I'm not sure how to fit it within the text itself, so I'll leave that to someone else. However I really think that http://all-sorts.org/ should be mentioned as an (unofficial) source of collective nouns. Most are closely related to puns or topical references. —174.78.94.230 (talk) 21:34, 11 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Might want to submit it to http://www.dmoz.org. Wikipedia isn't a web directory and crowdsourced sites don't qualify as reliable sources. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 21:52, 11 March 2013 (UTC)

Agreement of collectives
Where do we find WP guidance on the verbal agreement of collective nouns e.g.

 * "There is a number of article..." or "There are a range of options..." Whilst the latter "sounds" correct, the former appears grammatically correct. --Bermicourt (talk) 08:00, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Proposed merge with Collective singular
"Collective singular" refers to the noun-verb agreement of collective nouns. If not a full merge, there certainly needs to be more references between the two. heat_fan1 (talk) 12:40, 4 May 2017 (UTC)
 * ✅ Klbrain (talk) 10:30, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

Agreement in different forms of English
As an aside in American English until the Civil War it was common in to refer to "[These] United States are ..." since the Civil War "[The] United States is ...", so part of the difference between the dialects may be explained by that change bought about by the Federal government winning that war, and it use extending to other similar collective nouns in American English.

I have a problem with these sentences in the paragraph that starts "In American English":

The problem is that companies and corporations have a legal identity, and as such all those example would be the same in British English. For example in British English very few if any would write "British Airways are an airline company in Europe", so I am not sure why they are listed as examples under American English -- PBS (talk) 10:33, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

Should one use 'is' or 'are' when referring to a territory with a plural name?

 * See Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (geographic names). (contributions by User:PatLurcock, User:Chipmunkdavis, User:Roger 8 Roger and User:Wee Curry Monster)

The examples raised in that discussion are: Falkland Islands, Seychelles, Maldives, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, and the Marshall Islands. I would add the British Isles. Are there any differences in use between dialects of English for these territories?

For example in British English I would write "The British Isles are off the coast of mainland Europe. The inclusion of Ireland in the British Isles is controversial". Would someone writing in American English use "is" instead of "are" in the first sentence? What about for the Falkland Islands "The Falkland Islands are in the South Atlantic." or "The Falkland Islands is ..."? In the case of the "British isles" is not an synonym for the United Kingdom, but "Falkland Islands" is also used as a name for the territory listed one of the British Overseas Territories. In British English it would be "The [British territory of the] Falkland Islands is in the South Atlantic ..." so context matters. -- PBS (talk) 10:33, 22 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Is the different usage based on whether we are talking about the political unit (is) or the geographical group (was). For the second we could also use 'is' if referring to an archipelago, so yes, context matters. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 10:47, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

 * I believe I have answered this question previously.  The examples given are examples of Collective nouns and Metonymy.  For example Falkland Islands can refer to the BOT but can also be a metonym for the archipelago.  As such the verb agreement can take either singular or plural verb forms depending on context.  At least that is the case with British English and WP:ENGVAR should be respected where British English is appropriate.  I'm not 100% whether the same applies in American English but I believe it does. WCM email 11:11, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

Covid update for this topic (yes, there is such a thing)
According to the Australian government's ABC, mutations on a virus occur in "constellations". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:8003:E422:3C01:85A:DD8A:8283:8A61 (talk) 09:21, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

"one kind of thing" or "one kind of things"?
@User:Megaman_en_m In your edit summary your wrote: "one kind of things" brings up less than 15 hits ''. But my Goggle returns completely different results:

Google [All/Books] results: Do we use the same Google? 85.193.252.19 (talk) 01:38, 25 January 2022 (UTC)
 * "one kind of things" 1.7m/83k
 * "one kind of thing" 1.6m/58k

 * Running the query through Google again I got a different result. No idea what happened last time. Anyway, this still doesn't sit right with me. I hereby invite other people to give their thoughts on this matter.--Megaman en m (talk) 02:10, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Talk:Collective noun


text:
Carat (mass)

The carat (ct) is a unit of mass equal to 200 mg, which is used for measuring gemstones and pearls. The current definition, sometimes known as the metric carat, was adopted in 1907 at the Fourth General Conference on Weights and Measures, and soon afterwards in many countries around the world. The carat is divisible into 100 points of 2 mg. Other subdivisions, and slightly different mass values, have been used in the past in different locations.

In terms of diamonds, a paragon is a flawless stone of at least 100 carats (20 g).

The ANSI X.12 EDI standard abbreviation for the carat is CD.

Etymology
First attested in English in the mid-15th century, the word carat comes from Italian carato, which comes from Arabic (qīrāṭ; قيراط), in turn borrowed from Greek kerátion κεράτιον 'carob seed', a diminutive of keras 'horn'. It was a unit of weight, equal to 1/1728 (1/12$3$) of a pound (see Mina (unit)).

History
Carob seeds have been used throughout history to measure jewelry, because it was believed that there was little variance in their mass distribution. However, this was a factual inaccuracy, as their mass varies about as much as seeds of other species.

In the past, each country had its own carat. It was often used for weighing gold. Beginning in the 1570s, it was used to measure weights of diamonds.

Standardization
An 'international carat' of 205 milligrams was proposed in 1871 by the Syndical Chamber of Jewellers, etc., in Paris, and accepted in 1877 by the Syndical Chamber of Diamond Merchants in Paris. A metric carat of 200 milligrams – exactly one-fifth of a gram – had often been suggested in various countries, and was finally proposed by the International Committee of Weights and Measures, and unanimously accepted at the fourth sexennial General Conference of the Metric Convention held in Paris in October 1907. It was soon made compulsory by law in France, but uptake of the new carat was slower in England, where its use was allowed by the Weights and Measures (Metric System) Act of 1897.

UK Board of Trade
In the United Kingdom the original Board of Trade carat was exactly $3 1647/9691$ grains (~3.170 grains = ~205 mg); in 1888, the Board of Trade carat was changed to exactly $151 27/64$ grains (~3.168 grains = ~205 mg). Despite it being a non-metric unit, a number of metric countries have used this unit for its limited range of application.

The Board of Trade carat was divisible into four diamond grains, but measurements were typically made in multiples of $3 17/101$ carat.

Refiners' carats
There were also two varieties of refiners' carats once used in the United Kingdom—the pound carat and the ounce carat. The pound troy was divisible into 24 pound carats of 240 grains troy each; the pound carat was divisible into four pound grains of 60 grains troy each; and the pound grain was divisible into four pound quarters of 15 grains troy each. Likewise, the ounce troy was divisible into 24 ounce carats of 20 grains troy each; the ounce carat was divisible into four ounce grains of 5 grains troy each; and the ounce grain was divisible into four ounce quarters of $151 1/2$ grains troy each.

Greco-Roman
The solidus was also a Roman weight unit. There is literary evidence that the weight of 72 coins of the type called solidus was exactly 1 Roman pound, and that the weight of 1 solidus was 24 siliquae. The weight of a Roman pound is generally believed to have been 327.45 g or possibly up to 5 g less. Therefore, the metric equivalent of 1 siliqua was approximately 189 mg. The Greeks had a similar unit of the same value.

Gold fineness in carats comes from carats and grains of gold in a solidus of coin. The conversion rates 1 solidus = 24 carats, 1 carat = 4 grains still stand. Woolhouse's Measures, Weights and Moneys of All Nations gives gold fineness in carats of 4 grains, and silver in troy pounds of 12 troy ounces of 20 pennyweight each.

title: Carat (mass)


text:
European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations

The European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations (CEPT) was established on June 26, 1959, by nineteen European states in Montreux, Switzerland,  as a coordinating body for European state telecommunications and postal organizations. The acronym comes from the French version of its name Conférence européenne des administrations des postes et des télécommunications.

CEPT was responsible for the creation of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) in 1988.

Organization
CEPT is organised into three main components:
 * Electronic Communications Committee (ECC) - responsible for radiocommunications and telecommunications matters and formed by the merger of ECTRA (European Committee for Telecommunications Regulatory Affairs) and ERC (European Radiocommunications Committee) in September 2001
 * The permanent secretariat of the ECC is the European Communications Office (ECO)
 * European Committee for Postal Regulation (CERP, after the French "Comité européen des régulateurs postaux") - responsible for postal matters
 * The committee for ITU Policy (Com-ITU) is responsible for organising the co-ordination of CEPT actions for the preparation for and during the course of the ITU activities meetings of the council, Plenipotentiary Conferences, World Telecommunication Development Conferences, World Telecommunication Standardisation Assemblies

Member countries
As of March 2022: 46 countries.

Albania, Andorra, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, San Marino, Serbia, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Vatican City. The Russian Federation and Belarus memberships were suspended indefinitely on March 17, 2022.


text:
Tramlink

Tramlink, previously Croydon Tramlink and presently branded as London Trams, is a light rail tram system serving Croydon and surrounding areas in South London, England. It is the first operational tram system serving the London region since 1952. Tramlink is presently managed by London Trams, a public body part of Transport for London (TfL), and has been operated by FirstGroup since 2017. It is one of two light rail networks in Greater London, the other being the Docklands Light Railway. Tramlink is the fourth-busiest light rail network in the UK behind the Docklands Light Railway, Manchester Metrolink and Tyne and Wear Metro.

Studies for the delivery of a modern day tram system in Croydon begun in the 1960s and detailed planning was performed in the 1980s. Approval of the scheme was received in 1990 and, following a competitive tender process, construction and initial operation of the tramway was undertaken by Tramtrack Croydon (TC) via a 99-year Private Finance Initiative (PFI) contract. The official opening of Tramlink took place on 10 May 2000; by the end of the year three routes were operational. The network consists of 39 stops along 28 km of track, on a mixture of street track shared with other traffic, dedicated track in public roads, and off-street track consisting of new rights-of-way, former railway lines, and one right-of-way where the Tramlink track runs parallel to a third rail-electrified Network Rail line. The network's lines coincide in central Croydon, with eastern termini at Beckenham Junction, Elmers End and New Addington, and a western terminus at Wimbledon, where there is an interchange for London Underground.

Since its original opening, the tram network has been expanded and additional rolling stock has been purchased. During 2008, TfL took over Tramlink operations, ending the PFI and making the company a subsidiary of TfL. Additional rolling stock was introduced during the early 2010s. Furthermore, numerous extensions to the network have been discussed, the most recent of which is the Sutton Link, an extension to connect Sutton to Colliers Wood. Sutton Link was paused in 2020 until funding can be secured. In the 2020s, TfL began work to order new trams for the system.

Inception
In the first half of the 20th century, Croydon had many tramlines. However, these were all closed, the first was the Addiscombe – East Croydon station route through George Street to Cherry Orchard Road in 1927 and the last to close was the Purley - Embankment and Croydon (Coombe Road) - Thornton Heath routes closed in April 1951. However, in the Spring of 1950, the Highways Committee were presented by the Mayor with the concept of running trams between East Croydon station and the new estate being constructed at New Addington. This was based on the fact that the Feltham cars used in Croydon were going to Leeds to serve their new estates on reserved tracks. During 1962, a private study with assistance from BR engineers, showed how easy it was to convert the West Croydon - Wimbledon train service to tram operation and successfully prevent conflict between trams and trains.

These two concepts became joined in joint LRTL/TLRS concept of New Addington to Wimbledon every 15 minutes via East and West Croydon and Mitcham plus New Addington to Tattenham Corner every 15 minutes via East and West Croydon, Sutton and Epsom Downs. A branch into Forestdale to give an overlap service from Sutton was also included. During the 1970s, several BR directors and up-and-coming managers were aware of the advantages. Chris Green, upon becoming managing director, Network South East, published his plans in 1987 expanding the concept to take in the Tattenham Corner and Caterham branches and provide a service from Croydon to Lewisham via Addiscombe and Hayes. Following on from the opening of the DLR a small group working under Tony Ridley, then managing director, London Transport, investigated the potential for further light rail in London. The report 'Light Rail for London', written by engineer David Catling and Transport Planner Jon Willis, looked at a number of possible schemes including conversion of the East London Line. However a light rail network focussed on Croydon, with the conversion of existing heavy rail routes, was the most promising. The London Borough of Croydon wanted to improve access to the town centre without further road building and also improve access to the LCC built New Addington estate. Furthermore, road traffic in Croydon expanded considerably during the 1980s and planners were keen to apply public transit to fulfil the recorded growth in demand in the area. The project was developed by a small team in LT, headed by Scott McIntosh and in Croydon by Jill Lucas.

The scheme was accepted in principle in February 1990 by Croydon Council who worked with what was then London Regional Transport (LRT) to propose Tramlink to Parliament. The Croydon Tramlink Act 1994 resulted, which gave LRT the power to build and run Tramlink.

Construction
Both the delivery and operation of the tramway was accomplished via a competitive tender process. During November 1995, it was announced that four consortia were shortlisted to build, operate and maintain Tramlink:
 * Altram: John Laing, Ansaldo, Serco
 * Croydon Connect: Tarmac, AEG, Transdev
 * CT Light Rail Group: GEC Alsthom, Mowlem, Welsh Water
 * Tramtrack Croydon: CentreWest, Royal Bank of Scotland, Sir Robert McAlpine, Amey, Bombardier Transportation

In May 1996, Tramtrack Croydon (TC) was awarded a 99-year Private Finance Initiative (PFI) contract to design, build, operate and maintain Tramlink. The equity partners in TC were Amey (50%), Royal Bank of Scotland (20%), 3i (20%) and Sir Robert McAlpine with Bombardier Transportation contracted to build and maintain the trams and FirstGroup operate the service. TC retained the revenue generated by Tramlink and LRT had to pay compensation to TC for any changes to the fares and ticketing policy introduced later.

Construction work started in January 1997, with an expected opening in November 1999. The first tram was delivered in October 1998 to the new depot at Therapia Lane and testing on the sections of the Wimbledon line began shortly afterwards. Part of its track is the original route of the Surrey Iron Railway that opened in 1803.

Opening
The official opening of Tramlink took place on 10 May 2000 when route 3 from Croydon to New Addington opened to the public. Route 2 from Croydon to Beckenham Junction followed on 23 May 2000, and route 1 from Elmers End to Wimbledon opened a week later on 30 May 2000. It was the first modern tram project in London, with low-floor trams and low platforms allowing accessibility for all.

Buyout by Transport for London
In March 2008, TfL announced that it had reached agreement to buy TC for £98 million. The purchase was finalised on 28 June 2008. The background to this purchase relates to the requirement that TfL (who took over from London Regional Transport in 2000) compensates TC for the consequences of any changes to the fares and ticketing policy introduced since 1996. In 2007 that payment was £4m, with an annual increase in rate. Despite this change, FirstGroup continues to operate the service.

During October 2008, TfL introduced a new livery, using the blue, white and green of the routes on TfL maps, to distinguish the trams from buses operating in the area. The colour of the cars was changed to green, and the brand name was changed from Croydon Tramlink to simply Tramlink. The rebranding work was completed in early 2009.

Additional stop and trams
Centrale tram stop, in Tamworth Road on the one-way central loop, opened on 10 December 2005, increasing journey times slightly. As turnround times were already quite tight, this raised the issue of buying an extra tram to maintain punctuality. Partly for this reason, but also to take into account the planned restructuring of services, (subsequently introduced in July 2006), TfL issued tenders for a new tram. However, nothing resulted from this.

In January 2011, Tramtrack Croydon opened a tender for the supply of 10 new or second-hand trams from the end of summer 2011, for use between Therapia Lane and Elmers End. On 18 August 2011, TfL announced that Stadler Rail had won a $19.75 million contract to supply six Variobahn trams similar to those used by Bybanen in Bergen, Norway. They entered service in 2012. In August 2013, TfL ordered an additional four Variobahns for delivery in 2015, for use on the Wimbledon to Croydon link, an order later increased to six. This brought the total Variobahn fleet up to ten in 2015, and twelve in 2016 when the final two trams were delivered.

Stops
There are 39 stops, with 38 opened in the initial phase, and Centrale tram stop added on 10 December 2005. Most stops are 32.2 m long. The tram stops have low platforms, 35 cm above rail level, virtually level with the doors. This level access from platform to tram allows allows wheelchairs, prams, pushchairs and the elderly to board easily with no steps. In street sections, the stop is integrated with the pavement. All platforms are all wider than 2 m. Tramlink uses some former main-line stations on the Wimbledon–West Croydon and Elmers End–Coombe Lane stretches of line. The railway platforms have been demolished and rebuilt to Tramlink specifications, except at Elmers End and Wimbledon where the track level was raised to meet the higher main-line platforms to enable cross-platform interchange.

Stops are unstaffed and had automated ticket machines that are no longer in use due to TfL making trams cashless. In general, access between the platforms involves crossing the tracks by pedestrian level crossing. Stops also feature CCTV, a Passenger Help Point, a Passenger Information Display (PID), litter bins, a noticeboard and lamp-posts, and most also have seats and a shelter. The PIDs display the destinations and expected arrival times of the next two trams. They can also display any message the controllers want to display, such as information on delays or even safety instructions for vandals to stop putting rubbish or other objects onto the track.

Routes

Tramlink has been shown on the principal tube map since 1 June 2016, having previously appeared only on the "London Connections" map.

When Tramlink first opened it had three routes: Line 1 (yellow) from Wimbledon to Elmers End, Line 2 (red) from Croydon to Beckenham Junction, and Line 3 (green) from Croydon to New Addington. On 23 July 2006, the network was restructured, with Route 1 from Elmers End to Croydon, Route 2 from Beckenham Junction to Croydon and Route 3 from New Addington to Wimbledon. On 25 June 2012, Route 4 from Therapia Lane to Elmers End was introduced. On 4 April 2016, Route 4 was extended from Therapia Lane to Wimbledon.

On 25 February 2018, the network and timetables were restructured again for more even and reliable services. As part of this change, trams would no longer display route numbers on their dot matrix destination screens. This resulted in three routes:
 * New Addington to West Croydon, returning to New Addington every 7–8 minutes (every 10 minutes on Sunday shopping hours and every 15 minutes at late evenings).
 * Wimbledon to Beckenham Junction every 10 minutes (every 15 minutes on Sundays and late evening)
 * Wimbledon to Elmers End every 10 minutes (every 15 minutes on Sundays and terminates at Croydon in late evening every 15 minutes)

Additionally, the first two trams from New Addington will run to Wimbledon. Overall, this would result in a decrease in 2tph leaving Elmers End, resulting in a 25% decrease in capacity here, and 14% in the Addiscombe area. However, this would also regulate waiting times in this area and on the Wimbledon branch to every five minutes, from every two–seven minutes.

Former lines reused
Tramlink makes use of a number of National Rail lines, running parallel to franchised services, or in some cases, runs on previously abandoned railway corridors. Between Birkbeck and Beckenham Junction, Tramlink uses the Crystal Palace line, running on a single track alongside the track carrying Southern rail services. The National Rail track had been singled some years earlier.

From Elmers End to Woodside, Tramlink follows the former Addiscombe Line. At Woodside, the old station buildings stand disused, and the original platforms have been replaced by accessible low platforms. Tramlink then follows the former Woodside and South Croydon Railway (W&SCR) to reach the current Addiscombe tram stop, adjacent to the site of the demolished Bingham Road railway station. It continues along the former railway route to near Sandilands, where Tramlink curves sharply towards Sandilands tram stop. Another route from Sandilands tram stop curves sharply on to the W&SCR before passing through Park Hill (or Sandilands) tunnels and to the site of Coombe Road station after which it curves away across Lloyd Park.

Between Wimbledon station and Wandle Park, Tramlink follows the former West Croydon to Wimbledon Line, which was first opened in 1855 and closed on 31 May 1997 to allow for conversion into Tramlink. Within this section, from near Phipps Bridge to near Reeves Corner, Tramlink follows the Surrey Iron Railway, giving Tramlink a claim to one of the world's oldest railway alignments. Beyond Wandle Park, a Victorian footbridge beside Waddon New Road was dismantled to make way for the flyover over the West Croydon to Sutton railway line. The footbridge has been re-erected at Corfe Castle station on the Swanage Railway (although some evidence suggests that this was a similar footbridge removed from the site of Merton Park railway station).

Feeder buses
Bus routes T31, T32 and T33 used to connect with Tramlink at the New Addington, Fieldway and Addington Village stops. T31 and T32 no longer run, and T33 has been renumbered as 433.

Onboard announcements
The onboard announcements are by BBC News reader (and tram enthusiast) Nicholas Owen. The announcement pattern is as follows: e.g. This tram is for Wimbledon; the next stop will be Merton Park.

Current fleet
Tramlink currently uses 35 trams. In summary:

Bombardier CR4000
The original fleet comprised 24 articulated low floor Bombardier Flexity Swift CR4000 trams built in Vienna numbered beginning at 2530, continuing from the highest-numbered tram 2529 on London's former tram network, which closed in 1952. The original livery was red and white. One (2550) was painted in FirstGroup white, blue and pink livery. During 2006, the CR4000 fleet was refreshed, with the bus-style destination roller blinds being replaced with a digital dot-matrix display. Between 2008 and 2009 the fleet was repainted externally in the new green livery and the interiors were refurbished with new flooring, seat covers retrimmed in a new moquette and stanchions repainted from yellow to green. One (2551) has been permanently withdrawn having been significantly damaged in the 2016 Croydon tram derailment on 9 November 2016.

In 2007, tram 2535 was named after Steven Parascandolo, a well known tram enthusiast.

Croydon Variobahn
In January 2011, Tramtrack Croydon invited tenders for the supply of then new or second-hand trams, and on 18 August 2011, TfL announced that Stadler Rail had won a $19.75million contract to supply six Variobahn trams similar to those used by Bybanen in Bergen, Norway. They entered service during 2012. In August 2013, TfL ordered an additional four Variobahn trams for delivery in 2015, an order that was later increased to six. This brought the total Variobahn fleet up to ten in 2015, and 12 in 2016 when the final two trams were delivered.

Ancillary vehicles
Engineers' vehicles used in Tramlink construction were hired for that purpose.

In November 2006, Tramlink purchased five second-hand engineering vehicles from Deutsche Bahn. These were two DB class Klv 53 engineers' trams (numbered 058 and 059 in Tramlink service), and three 4-wheel wagons (numbered 060, 061, and 062). Service tram 058 and trailer 061 were both sold to the National Tramway Museum in 2010.

Future fleet
In the 2020s, TfL began work to replace the CR4000 tram fleet, which are approaching their end of its life and becoming increasingly unreliable. In June 2023, one-fifth of the CR4000 fleet was temporarily withdrawn due to issues with their wheels.

In January 2024, Tramtrack Croydon invited tenders for a base order of 24 new trams with an option for 16 more and a 30-year technical support contract, costed at £385 million. The application window closed on 27 February 2024, and invitations to tender are expected to be announced on 27 June 2024. The new fleet is intended to replace the CR4000s, which are reaching the end of their design life.

Fares and ticketing

TfL Bus & Tram Passes are valid on Tramlink, as are Travelcards that include any of zones 3, 4, 5 and 6.

Pay-as-you-go Oyster card fares are the same as on London Buses, although special fares may apply when using Tramlink feeder buses.

When using Oyster cards, passengers must touch in on the platform before boarding the tram. Special arrangements apply at Wimbledon station, where the Tramlink stop is within the National Rail and London Underground station. Tramlink passengers must therefore touch in at the station entry barriers then again at the Tramlink platform to inform the system that no mainline/LUL rail journey has been made.

EMV contactless payment cards can also be used to pay for fares in the same manner as Oyster cards. Ticket machines were withdrawn on 16 July 2018.

Ownership and structure
The service was created as a result of the Croydon Tramlink Act 1994 that received Royal Assent on 21 July 1994, a Private Bill jointly promoted by London Regional Transport (the predecessor of Transport for London (TfL)) and Croydon London Borough Council. Following a competitive tender, a consortium company Tramtrack Croydon Limited (incorporated in 1995) was awarded a 99-year concession to build and run the system. On 17 March 2008, it was announced that TfL would take over Tramlink in exchange for £98 million. Since 28 June 2008, the company has been a subsidiary of TfL.

Tramlink is currently operated by Tram Operations Ltd (TOL), a subsidiary of FirstGroup, who have a contract to operate the service until 2030. TOL provides the drivers and management to operate the service; the infrastructure and trams are owned and maintained by a TfL subsidiary.

Business trends

The key available trends in recent years for Tramlink are (years ending 31 March):

Activities in the financial year 2020/21 were severely reduced by the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Passenger numbers
Detailed passenger journeys since Tramlink commenced operations in May 2000 were:

Proposals for extensions
Numerous extensions to the network have been discussed or proposed over the years, involving varying degrees of support and investigative effort.

During 2002, as part of The Mayor's Transport Strategy for London, a number of proposed extensions were identified, including to Sutton from Wimbledon or Mitcham; to Crystal Palace; to Colliers Wood/Tooting; and along the A23. The Strategy said that "extensions to the network could, in principle, be developed at relatively modest cost where there is potential demand..." and sought initial views on the viability of a number of extensions by summer 2002.

In 2006, in a TfL consultation on an extension to Crystal Palace, three options were presented: on-street, off-street and a mixture of the two. After the consultation, the off-street option was favoured, to include Crystal Palace Station and Crystal Palace Parade. TfL stated in 2008 that due to lack of funding the plans for this extension would not be taken forward. They were revived shortly after Boris Johnson's re-election as Mayor in May 2012, but six months later they were cancelled again.

During November 2014, a 15-year plan, Trams 2030, called for upgrades to increase capacity on the network in line with an expected increase in ridership to 60 million passengers by 2031 (although the passenger numbers at the time (2013/14: 31.2 million) have not been exceeded since (as at 2019)). The upgrades were to improve reliability, support regeneration in the Croydon metropolitan centre, and future-proof the network for Crossrail 2, a potential Bakerloo line extension, and extensions to the tram network itself to a wide variety of destinations. The plans involve dual-tracking across the network and introducing diverting loops on either side of Croydon, allowing for a higher frequency of trams on all four branches without increasing congestion in central Croydon. The £737m investment was to be funded by the Croydon Growth Zone, TfL Business Plan, housing levies, and the respective boroughs, and by the affected developers.

All the various developments, if implemented, could theoretically require an increase in the fleet from 30 to up to 80 trams (depending on whether longer trams or coupled trams are used). As such, an increase in depot and stabling capacity would also be required; enlargement of the current Therapia Lane site, as well as sites near the Elmers End and Harrington Road tram stops, were shortlisted.

Sutton Link
During July 2013, then Mayor Boris Johnson had affirmed that there was a reasonable business case for Tramlink to cover the Wimbledon – Sutton corridor, which might also include a loop via St Helier Hospital and an extension to The Royal Marsden Hospital. In 2014, a proposed £320m scheme for a new line to connect Wimbledon to Sutton via Morden was made and brought to consultation jointly by the London Boroughs of Merton and Sutton. Although £100m from TfL was initially secured in the draft 2016/17 budget, this was subsequently reallocated.

In 2018, TfL opened a consultation on proposals for a connection to Sutton, with three route options: from South Wimbledon, from Colliers Wood (both having an option of a bus rapid transit route or a tram line) or from Wimbledon (only as a tram line). During February 2020, following the consultation, TfL announced their preference for a north–south tramway between Colliers Wood and Sutton town centre, with a projected cost of £425m, on the condition of securing additional funding. Work on the project stopped in July 2020, as Transport for London could not find sufficient funding for it to continue.

On 24 July 2020 the project was temporarily put on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic. TfL said they were pausing development work on the scheme "as the transport case is poor and there remains a significant funding gap". Andy Byford, London's Transport Commissioner, said that this involves making 'difficult choices' about which projects can be funded.

During 2023, Sutton's council leader Ruth Dombey advocated for the project and urged TfL and the mayor's office to provide fair and adequate funding, especially in light of the ULEZ charge. However, London Mayor Sadiq Khan dismissed the project as inadequate and pointed out the £440 million funding shortfall. London Mayor Sadiq Khan faced criticism from Sutton MP Paul Scully on 21 April 2023, for the delayed Sutton tram extension project and implementing the Ultra Low Emission Zone charge without sufficient public transport alternatives, while defending the delay citing a £440 million funding gap. In December 2023, TfL stated that further progress will depend on funding agreements with other stakeholders such as local councils, the Department for Transport, as well as Government, and that the Sutton Link is currently the only extension being considered. Rival proposals included new bus routes.

Accidents and incidents

 * On 7 September 2008, a bus on route 468 travelled through a red traffic signal and collided with tram 2534 in George Street, Croydon, causing a fatality. The driver of the bus was convicted of causing death by dangerous driving a year later in December 2009 and was sentenced to four years in prison.
 * On 13 September 2008, tram 2530 collided with a cyclist at Morden Hall Park footpath crossing between the Morden Road and Phipps Bridge tram stops. The cyclist sustained serious injuries and later died. The immediate cause of the accident was found to be that the cyclist rode onto the crossing without looking at the approaching tram; among the causal factors were that the cyclist may have been wearing headphones, which prevented him hearing the audible warnings.
 * On 5 April 2011, a woman tripped over and was dragged under a moving tram. She was taken to hospital in a serious condition. She is believed to have been running to catch the tram outside East Croydon station when she tripped and fell.
 * On 17 February 2012, a tram derailed after passing over facing points as it approached the platform at East Croydon station.
 * On 7 February 2016, 5 people were injured when a car collided with tram 2535, which was going round a bend near Wellesley Road. It resulted in the tram being derailed.
 * On 9 November 2016, tram 2551 derailed on a sharp curved junction 180 m east from the Sandilands tram stop, killing 7 people and injuring at least 50 more. The British Transport Police arrested the driver on suspicion of manslaughter. Driver error was found to be the cause of the accident, with suspicions that the driver had a microsleep episode approaching the bend. Later, the driver was found not guilty and the blame was put on a faulty tram.

title: Tramlink