Unfortunately, here in the States the
plural "fishes" is almost commonplace, and often makes its way into the media
(especially in nature programs). This notwithstanding the famous Seussian
title, "One Fish, Two Fish ... " (one Dr. Seuss, two Dr. Seese??).
Cattle, from Middle Latin (through
French) CATELLUS, originally was synonomous with "herd"; the middle English
plural for cow was "kine".
In general, there are three types of
plural in English: -s, -en (children, kine), and umlaut (goose >
geese). The last two types are very common among IE languages ("kine"
actually represents a dual form, both and -n and an umlaut plural).
Finally, for certain animals, there is the type "sheep/deer", but I believe
these also have origin with an umlaut form.
"Fish/Fishes" is somewhat
interesting. Is "Fish" pl. akin to the type "sheep/deer", or is there a
phonetic component as well, due to an assimilation of "-s" with "sh"? At
any rate, "fishes" is used as a simple plural, not as a collective, as in
"sands" (meaning "sandy terrains"), "moneys" (meaning "funds").
Just a few meditations for the
group,
SJ
