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Claudii is an established plural, actually. Legolas Send a noteboard - 01/11/2011 10:02:52 PM
If in an alternate reality you were confronted by a mob of Jesus clones, and you wanted to say, "Oh shit, look at all those ________!", what would you use besides "Jesuses"? After all, I'm fairly certain other names follow a similar form. "There are a lot of Guses in this town." "Did you see all those Samuses at that cosplay convention?" Unless Jesus as a name has a special grammatical convention for plurality? Such as Jesu or something? Or perhaps it is like a moose and you would simply say, "Look at all those Jesus!" That seems potentially grammatically vague. Surely you don't mean to imply that it should be converted like a Latin word and be Jesi? I would have thought that would not apply to proper names. Though that is a good question. If Claudius were cloned, would you say, "Holy shit, look at all those Claudii!"?

What with it being a family name (calling it "last name" is a bit confusing in the Roman naming system), the plural was sometimes used when referring to an entire family, or to several people (the most famous example is probably "the Gracchi", the two brothers Gracchus in the second century B.C.).

Actual first names are a different story, of course.

Though really, since Jesus' native language was Aramaic and his friends and family called him something closer to Joshua than to Jesus (I don't recall what exactly it is in Hebrew/Aramaic), it seems a little absurd to go look at Latin plurals - if you're gonna translate his name to another language anyhow, you might as well just stick with the English plurals.

I think possibly I'm taking this question even more too seriously than you did... :P And now I'm wondering about the grammaticality or lack thereof of the previous sentence, which probably means I'm starting to ramble and should leave it at this. ;)
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What would you say is the proper plural form of Jesus? - 01/11/2011 09:51:31 PM 369 Views
Claudii is an established plural, actually. - 01/11/2011 10:02:52 PM 432 Views
I want to reread Lamb: The story of Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal now - 01/11/2011 11:38:26 PM 435 Views
Jesī *NM* - 01/11/2011 10:06:29 PM 204 Views
Minor addendum: it seems to be a defective fourth declension. The plural should still be Iesūs. - 01/11/2011 10:44:08 PM 331 Views
Ah, interesting. - 02/11/2011 10:22:37 AM 311 Views
The source? Any good Latin grammar should do. *NM* - 02/11/2011 05:06:31 PM 139 Views
Also, a massive number of names follow 3rd declension. - 02/11/2011 05:30:16 PM 268 Views
He is singular in nature - 01/11/2011 10:08:43 PM 360 Views
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Re: Ha. - 02/11/2011 01:12:22 AM 360 Views
Lots of Mexican guys in one room could still be "Jesuses". *NM* - 01/11/2011 10:47:03 PM 112 Views
So is it Jesūs, Jesii, or Jesuses then? - 02/11/2011 01:04:58 AM 282 Views
maybe his name is a plural anyway *NM* - 01/11/2011 11:13:03 PM 139 Views
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I honestly wasn't making it a US thing - 02/11/2011 02:50:08 PM 327 Views

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