283 Master Holbyta.

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There’s a bunch of rules that go along with talking about dwarves.  I couldn’t be bothered to look them up.  If I remember correctly, dwarves is the accepted spelling for the plural of dwarf, when refering to the fantasy race.  When talking about a group of people afflicted with dwarfism you use dwarfs.  I’m not sure what dwarfs like to be called.  I’ve heard “little people”, but I don’t think that’s really a step up. 

Also, I think the spelling for holbyta, in the page title, is correct.  My copy of LOTR is down a steep flight of stairs, as is my very nerdy sourcebook, and I didn’t want to go after them.  Of course now I want them right here where I can get at them easily… 

30 Comments

I know nothing of the worlds of men and dwarves. And apparently, neither does firefox because it says dwarves is bad.

So did Tolkien’s editors. They also changed ‘elves’ and ‘elven’ to ‘elfs’ and ‘elfin.’ Bastards. So the first edition has stupidity in it from those sho didn’t get that Tolkien was crafting something new and wonderful…

“Little people” sounds kind of insulting to me. I think “short people” in more accurate and politically correct.

How about “people”? After all, size doesn’t matter… at least that’s what the women in my life keep telling me.

“dwarves is the accepted spelling for the plural of dwarf.”

Hello, Walking Dictionary -as my friend calls me-, here,
Just wanted to say, in no insulting or mean manner, the above is LIES. -.- Wherever you heard it, discount the source. The technical plural of “dwarf” is “dwarfs”. J.R.R. Tolkien used “dwarves” in his style, just as he invented “orcs”. When printing it, the editors changed it as a typing error to “dwarfs” as well as “elven” to “elfin” Though elven is now an accepted word in our language today (except Microsoft Word still hates it along with “elves” =P) I can’t recall the whole “Note on the text” but that’s about the gist of it, along with revisions and recalls and such. And about the son, Christopher.

Dwarves is the accepted pluralization of Dwarf as a fantasy race with many writers and game designers. As a living language and such, it’s just a matter of context and personal opinion. There’s no friggin’ god of grammar and spelling (no matter what your High School English teacher may say about him/herself), and you won’t get struck down for it. Chastised maybe, but I doubt that there’s a level of the Abyss reserved for people who improperly spelled received.

The spelling of words changes with popular opinion, therefore, if you ever misspell a word & just make your spelling popular opinion the word’s spelling will change. This has happened alot in History, especially American History. And in southern Illinois many words that are misspellings of other words become words of there own. Seriously, I’d know about it I live in Grayville… If you have no idea where Grayville, Illinois is, look it up on google maps. I live here, therefore, it must exist…
And yes I know about my multiple sentence fragments, I just don’t care.

Both Games Workshop and Discworld use Dwarfs as the plural for Dwarf.

That is because Discworld is from Pratchett’s unique view on the world and Games Workshop . . . . . is dumb. Sorry, had to be said.

They are more of a dumb company trying to make money off a field than a part of that field.

Dwarves are the fantasy race, accept no imitation!!

I’ve always thought of the word “dwarves” and “dwarfs” as interchangeable depending on the author’s preference (Microsoft Word even accepts both).

Would you all just read The Hobbit and LOTR already? Tolkien, being a linguist, said specifically in the introduction that the correct English plural of dwarf is dwarfs, but goes on to say that he uses the spelling dwarves when referring to Gloin’s race, who have absolutely nothing to do with those afflicted with dwarfism (and they look nothing alike either). And Crave, the correct spelling is “holbytla”, with two l’s, from what I believe is Old English for “hole dweller”. (Oh fudge, now my geek is showing agani) Great comic by the way, loving every update!

Don’t forget The Silmarillion. Seriously does nobody care about how the world was created?

The guide to middle earth. Doesn´t anyone else care about how much of their time is spent looking things up?

I mean, yeah, I read The Hobbit and TLotR, but one re-read to find some obscure reference was one too many. So after the fifth or sixth of those, I found the guide, and have been very happy with it. Plus, it lets me reference things out of that one Tolkien book that was too textbooky for me to get very far into, let alone through.

I dunno with his arms and height I pegged him as an Igor type, all he needs is a limp and some stiches *hides the bats

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