A cavalcade of collective nouns

From a murder of crows to a misbelief of painters, Chloe Rhodes investigates the intriguing origins of her favourite collective nouns

A BLOAT OF HIPPOPOTAMUSES

This comparatively recent addition to the collective noun canon appears for the first time in print in CE Hare’s 1939 hunting and fishing manual The Language of Field Sports. An average male hippo weighs just under 3 600kg and their bodies are covered in a layer of subcutaneous fat that helps them to float well. It is likely that they do have bloated stomachs much of the time, because their diet is grass, and they can store what they have ingested for up to three weeks.

A MISBELIEF OF PAINTERS

We’re talking artists here, rather than decorators, and, in particular, painters of portraits. One aim of early portraiture was to present the sitter as they hoped to be remembered after their death. Artists, like poets, depended on wealthy patrons for their living, so portrait painters had to strike a balance between truth and flattery. Shoulders could be broadened, eyes brightened, paunches flattened and foreheads heightened. Misbelief meant an erroneous belief, rather than an inability or refusal to believe, so the painter’s job was to conjure misbelief in those who viewed his work; to create the illusion of beauty even where he found none.

A PARLIAMENT OF OWLS

This group name has its origins in the 1950s children’s classic The Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis and is a reference to Chaucer’s allegorical poem The Parliament of Fowls, in which all the birds of earth gather to find a mate. Lewis adapts the title of Chaucer’s poem to describe a council of owls that meet at night to discuss the affairs of Narnia. The international success of Lewis’s books — they have sold more than 100 million copies in 47 languages — has made the term far more widely known than most of the traditional collective nouns and it is now recognised by dictionary compilers as the “correct” term for a group of owls.

A PROMISE OF TAPSTERS

“Tapster”, now obsolete, can be translated as barman or barmaid in charge of the “tap”. The tapster’s “promise” is that slight inclination of the chin, subtle nod or lift of the eyebrow that says: “You’re next.” But can it be trusted? There’s never been a better embodiment of a false promise than the tapster’s. In As You Like It, Celia and Rosalind make the point in their discussion about the promises of love with the damning line: “. . . the oath of a lover is no stronger than the word of a tapster”.

A MURDER OF CROWS

Most terms for groups of birds are linked to their song or habitat, but this one has its roots in medieval folklore. With their dark feathers and jet-black eyes, crows were regarded by 15thcentury peasants as messengers of the devil or witches in disguise. They were suspected of having prophetic powers, and the appearance of a crow on the roof of a house was taken as an omen that someone inside would die soon. There are also accounts of the birds living up to their murderous name by enacting something known as a crow parliament ( kråkriksdag in Swedish), during which up to 500 birds are said to gather before pouncing on one of their number and tearing it to pieces.

A SUPERFLUITY OF NUNS

This 15th-century term can be interpreted in two ways, the first is as simple fact: There were 138 nunneries in England between 1270 and 1536, many of which were severely overcrowded. The convent was seen as a natural step for the daughters of the nobility who had passed marriageable age, and lords often put pressure on prioresses to accept their daughters even if they were already full. Alternatively, the term could have been a reference to the emerging view among agitators for church reform that the days of the monastery and convent were over. Fifty years after this term was recorded in print, Henry VIII had ordered their closure and the Protestant Reformation was in full swing.

A SHREWDNESS OF APES

It seems hard to believe that this collective noun was in use a full 500 years ago. Nowadays, shrewdness means intelligence and, more precisely, astuteness. And although recent studies into the behaviour and brains of apes have revealed startling cognitive abilities, these findings would have shocked medieval naturalists. Instead, our forefathers noted in apes a kind of playful mischievousness, and in their day shrewdness meant wickedness.

In a wonderful stroke of luck, the evolution of our language has mirrored the evolution of our scientific understanding, so that a term that made perfect sense in 1486 also makes perfect sense to us.— The Guardian

Chloe Rhodes’s An Unkindness of Ravens: A Book of Collective Nouns is published by Michael O’Mara