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The plural of chief is 'chiefs.' However the plural of thief is 'thieves.'
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it is chieves, for examle goose, geese, tooth, teeth, leaf - leaves
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"Chief" is a singular noun with its own unique plural form, which is "chiefs." It follows the standard rule for forming plurals in English, where most words simply add an "s" to show they are in plural form.
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no nigeria has a president lollll
Nigeria is a republic, but has many Kings and Queens. They have no political power, except among the people of their tribes. Some of them are, Alafin of Oyo, Oba of Benin. Olu of Warri, Ooni of Ife, and Emir of Sokoto. All towns, cities, and villages have kings or kinglets or chieves. All the wives of these people are queens. There children are Princes and Princesses.
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The words ending in -ief can form normal plurals. In this case, it is chiefs.
An example of the other form is thief, which becomes thieves.
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The plural of kerchief is kerchiefs - not kerchieves, so the plural of handkerchief is handkerchiefs - not alternatives which is copping out.
The same as the plural of thief is thieves and not thiefs. There must be some grammatical or maybe contextual rule about this, but I cannot see it. Does anybody know, or do we have to remember all of these archaic rules of spelling rather than applying a rule that can be applied to all nouns ending in ief?
I thought of verbs that could also be gerunds, or nouns that were also verbs - such a thieving, but not handkerchieving, but that fails when we consider a belief and believing in its plural being beliefs.
So there are no apparent rules: does anybody know of any universal law of spelling that meets my believes - sorry, beliefs? Chiefs can chief but thiefs cannot thief - so is that it? The verb form? If you can thieve then you are thieves and thieving, and if you can chief then your are chiefs and chiefing?
But how about belief and beliefing? That doesn't work. There must be a rule there somewhere!
I am confused - anybody any ideas?
Pete
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P.S.: I spell-checked this, and thiefs, chiefing and beliefing were all wrong - I know that, so where do we go from here?
Later addition by Pete: I have thought on this, and:
More than one thief thieves, and plural is thieves
More than one chief doesn't chieve, so plural isn't chieves
More than one belief is beliefs, so plural is beliefs (Obviously)
More than one brief doen't brieve so plural is briefs ?
There is an inkling of a pattern there - isn't their? Or maybe it's just that there are so few words ending in 'ief' that nobody has a clue what their plural is!
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