'Bellows': singular or plural?

ME Super

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"I have a spelling checker
It came with my PC
It plane lee marks four my revue
Miss steaks aye can knot sea.

Eye ran this poem threw it
Your sure reel glad two no
Its vary perfect in it's weigh
My checker tolled me sew."
-- From "Candidate for a Pullet Surprise" by Jerrold H. Zar, Prof. Emeritus, Northern Illinois University.



However, one cannot argue with this statement: "Defeat of deduct go over defense before detail."


The English language. Gotta love it with all its inconsistencies.
 

Down Under

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Like everything else in life, it depends. The verb or the noun.

In the photographic sense, the plural takes it.

 
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Down Under

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Fancy that, the same thing happened not long ago in our household. There must be some strange connection or link at work here.

Then my beloved Leitz Focomat 1c with its Ilford Multigrade head (the heavy, expensive one) slipped a disc or whatever happened, and kept slipping down to its lowest focus point on the column. It "lost its erection" - that's what the Leitz technician I spoke to called it anyway, so who am I to quibble? A very simple rubber thingie fixed it without much fuss or bother. As it turned out, Leitz had one such bittie in stock, apparently in its Unloved Bits And Pieces drawer, and very kindly gave it to me, even the postage. It's good to be given something from Leitz for nothing...

The Leitz Focomat 1c is truly a unique printing machine but such a behemoth of a contraption. For the past decade or longer I've hunted for a bulb dome top (bulb or globe holder, depending on if you are American or British) for mine, as insurance for the day when the Mutigrade head finally gives up the ghost, which thankfully so far it shows no sign of doing. Apparently these heads turn up on Ebay every now and then, but so far I've had no luck in finding one. I need the two parts, top and bottom, so even more difficult.

When the dreaded day happens,both the "bellow" and "bellows" in my house will come from the photographer and not a camera.

(Disclaimer: Sagittarian humor alert here!)
 

abruzzi

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From Wikipedia, referencing the Oxford English Dictionary:


So even though you are describing a single object, it still is plural. I’d love to read the entire OED entry on that, but I don’t have access. Like other permanently plural words such as ‘pants’ it’s probable the grammatical anomaly is because it began as two of something—pants, two legs, bellows, two plates pushed together to force air.

The camera use of bellows is a much later addition.
 
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