Ten pounds worth or Ten pound worth?

2011-08-01 4:13 pm

Hello, it's me again.

I would like to know why sometimes we say "ten pounds of petrol", although it's quite natural to say it, is it grammatically correct?

I know that if a noun is used to modify another noun after it, the first noun is normally singular, like "shoe shop" not "shoes shop"

But sometimes I heard that some say "arms control", "antiques dealer" with "s" at the end of the first nouns.

Could anyone tell me why?

Many thanks in advance.

回答 (4)

[匿名]

2011-08-01 4:24 pm

✔ 最佳答案

All your examples are 'plurals'.

1 pound - 2 pounds
1 antique - 2 antiques

'Arms' is the norm (have you heard of someone buying an arm?, No, they buy arms plural)

Shoe is different in that it is considered the 'a pair' is one item, like trousers (you can't buy one trouser, trousers being a pair of legs - Hey don't ask, this is the English language, remember? Haha)

Hope that helps.

參考: Educator

👍 0 👎 1

[匿名]

2011-08-01 4:15 pm

Ten pounds' worth (note the punctuation). Pounds is plural, so ' comes after the s, and it's possessive: the worth OF the pounds.

👍 1 👎 1

[匿名]

2016-12-13 6:19 pm

Ten Pound Shop

參考: https://shrinkurl.im/bahxX

👍 0 👎 0

[匿名]