Absent Apostrophes

[Conrad]

Sorry Conrad.. Seems I am buggering you all day so apologise!

This is just a foul rumour and I am firmly sat down ON MY SEAT.

Sorry Hoppy, I couldn't resist.

[Conrad]

Er.. I noticed you have King's Heath, Brum and King's Norton, Brum in your pub listings. It is common mistake and they never had apostrophe in their names. If you dont believe me.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_Heath and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_Norton..

Just spent a while looking into this, I think we actually have it correct.

Is this where you type Kings Heath or Kings Norton into our search and it comes back under the Google results? If so those are nothing to do with us, just us passing on results from a Google search, so you will have to take it up with a higher power

[oldboots]

Er.. I noticed you have King's Heath, Brum and King's Norton, Brum in your pub listings. It is common mistake and they never had apostrophe in their names. If you dont believe me.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_Heath and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kings_Norton..

Just spent a while looking into this, I think we actually have it correct.
so you will have to take it up with a higher power

I don't know if they're a higher power but the Ordnance Survey prints King's Heath, King's Norton, Acock's Green on its maps. Bromsgrove isn't Brom's Grove though

I don't have much trouble with apostrophes, either missing or of the greengrocer's type but I get very confused when people don't understand the difference between there, their and they're.

[Conrad]

Ohhhhh, so who is the greater authority wikipedia or Ordnance Survey. The joys that apostrophes bring.

I know what you mean about there, their and they're. When they are done wrongly it always causes my brain to stall.

[hopwas]

Ohhhhh, so who is the greater authority wikipedia or Ordnance Survey. The joys that apostrophes bring.

I know what you mean about there, their and they're. When they are done wrongly it always causes my brain to stall.

Surely Birmingham City Council has higher authority than OS.

I'll leave you do the thinking...

[oldboots]

Surely Birmingham City Council has higher authority than OS.

I'll leave you do the thinking...

don't get me started on town hall jobsworths for gods* sake, all I know is it certainly ain't Wikipedia




* should it or shouldn't it have one?

[trainman]

Well, I, too, get (un)duly wound up about apostrophe mis-use & am somewhat surprised Maldenman hasn't been along to name me as one of Sir Mustapha's unpaid cohorts. The thread though, has thrown up a couple of questions:

it is staffed by a hard working band of dedicated pubic servants!

Are you sure about that Rex?

"Its a matter of principle"

Superb!

don't tell any of my chums from the Apostrophe Police that I said that, or I'll never get another invite to their Christmas party at the Apostrophile's Arms!

or is it Apostrophiles' Arms? Hmm, I suppose if the arms belong to the innkeeper, rather than his customers, then you'd be correct Rex.

Sorry Conrad.. Seems I am buggering you all day

Conrad beat everyone to a response, but it would be churlish to to 'bump' the issue...

* should it or shouldn't it have one?

Yep, but not where that asterisk is!

[Rex_Rattus]

Thanks for your input Trainman. When I mentioned to Maldenman in the pub the other night that I was thinking of starting this thread (or more accurately alerting Conrad to the absent apostrophe - I didn't know it was going to run to a thread) he did speculate that you might well feel obliged to have a say!

"hard working band of dedicated public servants" No, not sure about that one; could be an oxymoron I suppose.

"Apostrophile's Arms" Of course it could be The Apostrophiles' Arms - as you know it depends on how many apostrophiles own the pub. But as it's my pub, then it's for me to say that it is singular in this case!

"gods*". Another very good question.The apostrophe should certainly be before the "s" if oldboots is appealing to the Christian God, but it could correctly be after the "s" if he is appealing to the Hindu, Greek, Roman or Norse Gods. In any case it should be capitalised. I'm so glad you raised that one!

[Conrad]

"gods*". Another very good question.The apostrophe should certainly be before the "s" if oldboots is appealing to the Christian God, but it could correctly be after the "s" if he is appealing to the Hindu, Greek, Roman or Norse Gods. In any case it should be capitalised. I'm so glad you raised that one!

Is that right?

[Rex_Rattus]

Is that right?

In grammatical terms, it would be correct for the apostrophe to be after the "s" (as in for Gods' sake) if he is appealing to more than one God - as in "Norse Gods". I'm right there, aren't I Trainman? There were (or are - I don't want to appear Norseist!!) quite a lot of them! Or do you mean that it might not be correct to capitalise "Norse Gods"? I would have thought that it was correct, but I am not an expert on these sort of semi religious matters. There's probably someone, somewhere, who thinks I'm committing heresy just by referring to Odin, Thor, Loki, etc, etc as Gods! I really don't want to bring the Norse Police down on our heads, do I, Conrad?!