"corpii" as plural of "corpus"

[Robin Hamilton]

> At 4:46 AM +0000 3/10/10, Robin Hamilton wrote:
>>>Just for general purposes, what would be the folk-derived plural of
>>>"corps"? For that matter, what /is/ the plural of corps?
>>>
>>>     VS-)
>>
>>                corpsies
>
> Are we talking about the plural of "corps" or of "corpse"?  I thought
> it was the former.
>
> LH

The simple answer here would be "yes", and that I screwed up.

            My line of thinking went:

1.  While "corps" and "corpse" are homophones, the plurals should differ.

2.  Thus corpse => corpses  AND  corps => corpsies

            ...  but

3.  In the attempt to illustrate this, I somehow couldn't bear to omit the
phrase, "Little corpsies inside boxies," which deploys the [putative] plural
of "corps", but suggests an image of multiple corpses [sic].

Thus the confusion, illicit slide, or whatever, that Laurence quite rightly
chastode me for.

Robin

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