An escargatoire of snails

I wonder if other languages have as many collective nouns as English does – and sometimes there are several collective nouns for each group of whatever it is. For example what I might have called a clump of snails when I saw this pile of molluscs in the car park is actually an escargatoire of snails… but it could be a walk of snails or a rout of snails.

I had to look this up, I confess and came across some love collective nouns for other animals… If you saw a lot of zebras, you could correctly call them a herd, or even a cohort, or be adventurous and call them a zeal of zebras; but the best collective noun for them has to be a dazzle, a dazzle of zebras, how perfect is that?! Turtles… a nest, a dole or a bale? Tigers – is this really true, is a collection tigers really called an ambush or a streak? Really? There are twelve different words for a group of swans, eleven for ducks, and there are even ten for sheep… what’s wrong with flock, or even herd? I’m not sure there actually is a bike of hornets… that does seem an invention too far… and a congregation of alligators – are they all dressed in their Sunday best?

4 Comments

david lewis on March 31, 2015 at 4:13 pm

I’ve heard it said ( their off like a herd of turtles). Bout you?

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Lois on March 31, 2015 at 5:03 pm
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I haven’t actually… but how interesting – do you think it comes from when turtles hatch and they all make a mad dash for the sea?

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david lewis on March 31, 2015 at 6:04 pm

Don’t really know but sounds like an oxymoron something like jumbo shrimp, It seems that the BBC like to pull an April Fools day trick every year and one was Italian peasants harvesting spaghetti from pasta trees and it seemed half of it’s viewers thought it was real. I wonder do they still do it and what other jokes did they pull?

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