How long is a fortnight?

Where did the time measurement come from?

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How long is a fortnight?

A fortnight is a unit of time equal to two weeks: that is 14 days, or literally 14 nights. The term is common in British English and Australian English, but rarely used in American English. It derives from the Old English feowertiene niht, meaning "fourteen nights".

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Originally posted by Sherasi:
How long is a fortnight?

That is such an extraordinary question !
(Well, it would be if you were British ).

Everybody in Britain uses it for 'two weeks consecutive and no more'. So we would say 'For the first two weeks of the three he was in France' but would say 'He took a fortnight's holiday in June' or 'I'll be there for a fortnight'.

(This is one of the discoveries of usage that the British make in America. Another is your use of no prepositions with some verbs : 'He came Thursday' 'They protested the war' instead of 'on Thursday' and 'against the war')

Americans find it strange that Parliament is a plural noun and one recovers "in hospital."

As far as Brits are concerned, Parliament is singular. We say "Parliament is based at Westminster" or "Parliament is a pain in the derriere". And a group of owls is "a parliament" Why do you think it should be plural?

Because I have heard the expression "Parliament are reconvening" both on the BBC and CBC.

Wouldn't that have been "the Houses of Parliament are..."? That is, the Lords and the Commons.

In America an-d the UK, don't people also recover "at home" sometimes? Or study "in school"? Isn't that the same, grammatically, as "in hospital"? Do people always say "in a hospital" or "in the hospital" in the US, or am I missing your point?

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"the Houses of Parliament are..."?

Nope...just Parliament. And, "where is your mother?" "She's in hospital" vs "She's in the hospital."

Some mishearing perhaps? Parliament is in session, not 'are' in session. It would never be 'are' in that context. However you may be confused by the British habit of using singular and plural together with the same subject: 'The Cabinet is meeting and it is expected that they will disagree' etc
PS 'She's in hospital' means 'she is hospitalised'. 'She's in the hospital' means 'She is in the hospital' [and I understand you to know which hospital I mean and not just a hospital]'

On the hospital question - In the same way; "he's in school" means "he's following a course of study somewhere", and "he's in a/the school" means a specific school, which you (the listener) either know of or not. I didn't realise that this was a British/US difference.

Canadians also habitually switch between singular and plural verbs for 'collective' nouns. "The staff is large" and "the staff are large" have very different meanings. The difference seems to be whether you have an image in your mind of many people, or an impersonal group.

We maybe use "Microsoft makes..." or "Microsoft make..." depending on whether we think of Microsoft as a monolithic corporation, or a bunch of computer geeks. Possibly, it's the same with Parliament. Is it 'the government' or just a bunch of power-hungry cheats and swindlers?

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Is it 'the government' or just a bunch of power-hungry cheats and swindlers?

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