Two words into the title of this post and I hit a stumbling block. I don’t know what the correct term for a group of spiders is. I received my ten author’s copies of Spider Swat today and so was cleverly going to call this post A __________ of Spiders, with the __________ being replaced by the correct collective noun for spiders. It would have made me seem both knowledgeable and witty. Instead I look like a frickin’ idiot. Way to go, me.
I’ve just looked it up. It’s a clutter. A clutter of spiders. It doesn’t feel right. It feels like someone just made it up without giving it any real thought. But then, if I saw a pack of spiders descending on me I wouldn’t spend much time trying to find the perfect word to decribe their amassed ranks either.
Spiders, of course, aren’t really worth being scared of, and yet lots of people are. In order to compound this irrational fear, I’d probably have called a group of spiders ‘an onslaught’. Imagine telling an arachnaphobic that there was an onslaught of spiders approaching, then watching them melt into a puddle of pure terror on the carpet. I might do that anyway.
I’ve also realised that such is the power of the internet, I’ve taken ‘a clutter of spiders’ to be correct solely on the basis of a random site pulled up in a Google search. Reading further down the page, I’m not so sure the person who compiled the list isn’t just a random loony with too much time on his hands.
For example, I’m reasonably confident that the collective term for birds is ‘a flock’. Over at this site, though, they’re claiming a group of birds is ‘a volery’. Sorry, a what? No, I’m pretty sure it’s a flock. Unless there’s a different term for when they’re on the ground, maybe? A flock when they’re flying, a volery when they’re milling about looking shifty. Come on, all birds look shifty when they’re not in the air.
Going further down the page, things get even weirder. ‘A bazaar of guillemots’. ‘A murmuration of starlings’. ‘A fling of dunlin’. I don’t even know what a dunlin is, let alone why anyone would want to see them flung together.
I think my favourite is reserved for thrushes, though. A fairly harmless little bird, you’d think? So why, then, did some elect to call a group of them ‘a mutation of thrushes’? That’s just plain offensive. Well, it is if you’re a thrush. Who understands the English language.
Actually, I’ve changed my mind. ‘A mob of kangaroos’ is my favourite of the lot. I love the idea of kangaroos hanging about in mobs, drinking Castlemaine XXXX and shouting abuse at Koalas.
Oh, and for those of you wondering what to call that group of unicorns that are always hanging about outside the corner shop, it’s ‘a marvel’.
It’s definitely worth taking a look at that site, if only to realise how many animals there are out there you didn’t know existed. I also love the fact that under ‘invertebrates’ they’ve listed ‘a troop of mushrooms’. Either the person compiling that list is bowel-shatteringly mad, or I am. All things considered, I’d rather not find out which.
Anyway, what was I saying? Oh, yeah, my author’s copies of Spider Swat arrived. The book’s out August 4th, and is pretty good, even if I do say so myself.
The collective noun for clowns is ‘a giggle’.
You’ll never forget that now…
It’s a great game – just now I came up with “A clatter of office desks” and “A curse of personal computers” and that was in 5 seconds of looking at my surroundings – in fact – it could probably take over your life.
meep.