The Latin Neuter Plurals in Romance - Page ON

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are also forms without classical originals, fora (in Dante) ‘wounds’ (apparently
a deverbal from FORARE ‘pierce’), old fastella ‘bundles’ from *FASCELLA, and
old quadrella and quadrelle ‘quarrels (arrows)’, ‘square tiles’ from
*QUADRELLA, cf. the singulars Occ. cairello ‘arrow’, Sp. cuadrilla, OPtg.
quadrella ‘squadron of soldiers’, ‘quadrille’. From FLAGELLA ‘whips’, with the
similar suffix -ELLA, has come OIt. flagella, paralleled by Sard. frogedda(s)
‘flexible twig(s) for making baskets’. There are also certain old plural forms in
-e for nouns in -o which go back to Greek neuters, such as idole ‘idols’ (cf. the
fem. sings. Fr. idole, OSp. idola) and vangel(i)e/guagnele/guagielie ‘gospels’.
And while I am on the subject of isolated forms let me mention the Sard.
(Log.) mundza ‘toil’, (Camp.) mundža ‘housework’ from MUNIA ‘civic duties’,
though these, as feminine singulars, belong properly in the next section.
d) Besides these forms from classical Latin neuters there are also a
number coming from old masculines which adopted neuter forms in late Latin;
many of these have already been dealt with in earlier sections, but some remain.
Thus from late FUSA ‘spindles’ come the plurals Rum. fuse, fusuri and old and
dialectal It. fusa, dial. fuse, fusəra, fusuri, the collective singulars Surs. fisa,
Cent. Rh. foisa, feisa ‘vanes of a mandrel (spindle)’, and the individual
singulars old and dialectal Fr. fuse ‘axle’, Occ. fuso, and from *ANELLA ‘rings’
(cf. “hoc anulum” in Plautus) Rum. pl. inele ‘rings’, It. collective pl. anella,
formerly ‘rings’ now ‘curls’, dial. anelle (old) and anelləra, flanked by the
sings. Surs. niala ‘curl’, Occ. anello ‘large ring’, Cat. anella ‘link’, Sp. anilla
‘ditto’, Sard. anedda (so Hall, but the DES gives aneddu or anella, anel’a from
Cat.); Portuguese is not represented, as it uses the indigenous elo for ‘link’,
having the loanword anel for ‘ring’. In its plural function Latin PUTEA ‘wells’
has given way to -ORA forms in Rum. puŃuri, SIt. pozzərə, puzzuri, but it is
preserved as a singular in It. pozza, Friul. poze, Sp. poza, Ptg. poça ‘puddle’,