Talk:octopi

Actually, I've found that no matter the etomogically correct plural form of Octopus, Octopi is the most often used, and the form taught in the classroom. The English language is, at any rate, descended from many languages, not all with a latin root, and to apply latin rules in all instances to a language which was severely contorted to even accomodate a few rules, seems slightly idiotic to me. Is this dictionary cataloguing the way a language should be, or the way words are actually used in the real world? 81.79.204.93 AS English Student [Anon]

Though I am a prescriptivist, Wiktionary is a mainly descriptivist dictionary, at times mentioning that “X thinks ignorant usage is incorrect” or “Considered bad style by many”. Anyway, you seem to have misunderstood my RfC; octopus comes from Greek, not Latin (as the entry incorrectly states) — this is what I want corrected (I would correct it myself, but I do not know to which Greek declension octopus / octopodes belongs). Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 20:56, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

I corrected it myself regardless. As pous>podes does not seem to fit into either the Greek first or second declensions, and as no article exists for the Greek third declension, I can only deduce that the rule comes from the third declension. Oh well, if I’m wrong, I imagine that someone will come along and correct me... Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 21:06, 27 August 2006 (UTC)