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What is the true plural of 'fish'?

Words Unravelled

115,940 views

Rob and Jess are taking the deepest of dives into the origins of words from the ocean.
🐟 Are many fish 'fish' or 'fishes'?
🦈 Why is there a mystery around sharks?
🐠 What is a sarcastic fringehead?
These questions answered, and many more, in this subaquatic special of Words Unravelled.

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==LINKS==
Rob's YouTube channel: robwords
Jess' Useless Etymology blog: https://uselessetymology.com/
Rob on X: x.com/robwordsyt
Jess on TikTok: tiktok.com/@jesszafarris

#etymology #wordfacts #English

20 Comments

@RoryLittle-y5i 1 month ago

Dolphins who speak in ultrasonics have an ulterior porpoise!

@jamesharrington5571 1 month ago

The end of the episode should have finished like an early French movie with a slide saying... Fin

@robscott9414 1 month ago (edited)

Just finished watching. So only one thing left to say:
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish(es)!

@flapjackfae 1 month ago

I wish I had more occasion to talk about whales, because I am definitely referring to sperm whales as "spunk fish" from now on.

@dragondawn420 1 month ago (edited)

"That's not how you pluralize that puss" is a phrase that just cracked. me. up. And I couldn't laugh out loud because everyone else in the house is asleep!

@theowlbeardnd 1 month ago

Most male narwhals have the tooth / horn. Generally it is the left tooth. Some males have two horns (about 1 in 500) and 15% of females have a horn as well.

@steveknight878 1 month ago

Cuttlefish - not a fish
starfish - not a fish
silverfish - not a fish
jellyfish - not a fish
shellfish - not a fish
razorfish - not a fish
Crayfish - not a fish
Seahorse - a fish

@chrisbentleywalkingandrambling 1 month ago

Rob saying 'down where it's wetter'. Love it. 😂😂😂

@stevetournay6103 1 month ago

"Oh, tell me, Rose...did they ever shoot a herring out of a cannon?"🤣

@steveknight878 1 month ago

Trigger fish is so named because of their front dorsal fin, which is reduced to three spines that are normally folded back into a groove. The first spine is the longest and toughest. When it erects the spines, the first spine is locked into place by the second, and can only be released by depressing this second spine - or trigger.

@raphaelnikolaus0486 1 month ago

Once again loving especially Jess's wordplay part of the intro.

@StarfleetCommand71 1 month ago

Squid in Norwegian: Blekksprut.
Blekk = ink.
Sprut = squirt.

Blekksprut = ink squirter.

@Misanthropes4society 1 month ago

For some reason, just watching Jess’ facial expressions make my heart happy!

@carternotsteve2242 11 days ago

Squids have pens, it's like a bone, but they're invertebrates

@bigbadthesailor5173 1 month ago

eels have probably been going to the Sargasso sea from when Atlantic was a narrow sea, and just got wider and wider over millions of years.

@FreedomExperiment 1 month ago

The first band I ever played in was called 'Plural Fish'😂

That's actually true

@mudshark5393 1 month ago

In Swedish, the Orca is called a "späckhuggare", it's something that eats or bites into blubber, so... blubber chopper.

@Sielearith 1 month ago (edited)

In greek when someone ask you to show your arm muscles they say "κάνε ποντίκι" (kane pontiki) which literally translate to "make a mouse" 😅

@deltaqs 1 month ago

The porpoise - pork connection is interesting as here in Japanese, we write 'dolphin' as 海豚 when using Kanji, and that literally is "sea pig" (based on what the Chinese used linguistically in the 16th century or so).

@richardwhite9682 1 month ago

One common type of barnacle is the goose neck barnacle, a barnacle with a long stem that supports the "shell". Most people are also surprised to learn that barnacles are a type of crustacean, and are not related to clams.