1186. This week, we look at why the word "troops" is surprisingly ambiguous and what style guides say about using it to refer to individual service members. Then, we look at why spelling bees are called "bees" and explore fun bee-related phrases like "a bee in your bonnet," "make a beeline," and "put the bee on someone."
1186. This week, we look at why the word "troops" is surprisingly ambiguous and what style guides say about using it to refer to individual service members. Then, we look at why spelling bees are called "bees" and explore fun bee-related phrases like "a bee in your bonnet," "make a beeline," and "put the bee on someone."
The bees segment was written by Neal Whitman, an independent writer and consultant specializing in language and grammar and a member of the Reynoldsburg, Ohio, school board. You can search for him by name on Facebook, or find him on his blog at literalminded.wordpress.com.
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Grammar Girl here. I’m Mignon Fogarty, and today we’re talking about troops and spelling bees.
This segment is by Neal Whitman.
Memorial Day is next week, when we in the U.S. honor members of the military who have died in the line of duty. So today, I’ll answer a question some readers have had about the word “troops.” Alicia writes:
I have a question about the use of the word "troops" to mean individual soldiers. For the longest time, when I heard a phrase like, "The president is asking Congress to send 10,000 more troops," I thought the speaker meant that 10,000 troops of soldiers were being sent. Then, in my mind, I would try to calculate how many individual soldiers that would actually mean. Eventually, I realized that the word "troop" is being used to mean individual soldiers. And I wonder why we don't just say "soldiers"?
Alicia isn’t alone. Unfortunately, the plural noun “troops” is ambiguous.
One of its meanings is indeed a group of soldiers. The Random House Dictionary defines “troop” as “an armored cavalry or cavalry unit consisting of two or more platoons and a headquarters group.” The American Heritage Dictionary defines it as “a unit of cavalry, armored vehicles, or artillery in a European army, corresponding to a platoon in the U.S. Army.”
Under those definitions, “two troops” could be upwards of several dozen people. The grammatical term for this kind of word, by the way, is a collective noun. Other collective nouns include “family” and “group.”
However, when a news report mentions some number of troops, it's almost certainly talking about that many service members. In other words, “troops” is being used as a noncollective noun. How did the word “troops” come to have this ambiguity, and is it OK to use it this way?
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, “troop” entered the language in the mid-1500s, and you can find many early examples of it referring to units of cavalry, in phrases like “ten troops of horses and dragoons,” meaning ten groups of heavily armed, mounted soldiers.
But in the 1700s, examples begin to appear in which “troop” is no longer a collective noun, in which “1,000 troops” means 1,000 men. For example, in volume 4 of “Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland,” published in 1788, the historian Sir John Dalrymple estimates the yearly expenses for “1,000 English troops,” and also refers to this group as “1,000 men (1).” There's also a source from 1744 that refers to 16,000 troops and clearly means 16,000 individuals (2). The usage probably goes back even earlier, but without a lot of historical knowledge, it’s hard to say.
Although writers have been using “troops” in a noncollective way to refer to individuals for close to 300 years, until recently it usually happened with large, round numbers in the hundreds or thousands. That may have caused some confusion, but complaints about it seem to have surfaced relatively recently. The earliest I’ve found is in Barbara Wallraff’s book “Word Court,” published in the year 2000, in a letter from one of her readers.
And complaints increased in the 2000s as news reports coming out of Iraq and Afghanistan told about small numbers of military personnel being injured or killed by roadside bombs or guerrilla attacks — sentences such as “Five troops were killed today” really draw attention to the ambiguity.
So why do people use noncollective “troops” to refer to small numbers? At least in the modern era, it’s useful for talking about members of more than one branch of the armed forces. You can’t always replace the word “troops” with “soldiers” because under some definitions, “soldiers” refers only to members of the Army, with “Marines” used for the Marine Corps; “sailors” for the Navy; and “airmen” for the Air Force.
In fact, “airmen” brings up another benefit of the noun “troops”: nonsexist language. Even a cover term like “servicemen” excludes women who serve in the armed forces. “Troops” avoids this problem, and is shorter than “service members” or “members of the armed forces.”
Currently, you'll find a continuum of opinions about noncollective “troops.” The most restrictive position is that you shouldn’t use it at all, whether you’re mentioning numbers or not. In an essay for NPR in 2007 (3), linguist John McWhorter argued that noncollective “troops” trivializes individual soldiers, a feeling we've also heard from listeners and readers. In 2008, author Susan Jacoby made the same point in her book “The Age of American Unreason.”
A slightly less restrictive position is that noncollective “troops” is OK as long as you don’t mention any numbers.
The Associated Press takes an even less restrictive position (4). In AP style, noncollective “troops” is OK by itself to indicate a vague number of military personnel, or with large, round numbers—but using “troops” with small, specific numbers is out.
Laxer still is Bryan Garner’s position in the fifth edition of Modern English Usage: Noncollective “troops” can refer to any number of individuals greater than one. “Two troops”? Yes. “One troop”? No.
The laxest position of all is that “troops” or “troop” can refer to any number of individuals, including one. Though “one troop”may seem to be a recent development, you can find examples of the singular noun “troop” referring to one service member from throughout the past few decades. In 1990, President George Bush used it in a speech during the Persian Gulf crisis (5). Some veterans who served in the 20th century recall being addressed as “troop (6).” The Oxford English Dictionary even has an example from 1832 of the singular noun “troop” referring to one soldier.
Our advice is to go with the AP’s position, and use “troops” by itself or with large, round numbers to refer to service members. The Quick and Dirty Tip: The OO in “troops” looks like the two zeroes you'll find at the end of big, round numbers such as one hundred or one thousand.
For smaller numbers, “troops” or “troop” isn’t wrong, but many readers find it confusing or even ridiculous, so you should reword your sentences to avoid the problem. Use a specific term such as “soldiers” or “Marines,” if appropriate. If not, use “service members” (or “servicemen” or “servicewomen,” if appropriate). If that is unacceptably awkward, then use “troops” as a last resort.
That segment was written by Neal Whitman, an independent writer and consultant specializing in language and grammar and a member of the Reynoldsburg, Ohio, school board. You can search for him by name on Facebook, or find him on his blog at literalminded.wordpress.com.
References
[1] Sir John Dalrymple. 1788. Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. 4. Accessed at Google Books, https://books.google.com/books?id=zgMMAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA1-PA74&dq=troops&lr=lang_en&as_drrb_is=b&as_minm_is=0&as_miny_is=1700&as_maxm_is=0&as_maxy_is=1799&as_brr=0&client=firefox-a&cd=200#v=onepage&q=troops&f=false (accessed May 10, 2026).
[2] “[f we take 16,000 into our Pay, fresh Troops must be raised for that Purpose, and, I hope, I may say, without any Derogation, that 16,000 Hanoverians newly raised, are not so good as 16,000 of the Veteran Troops of any other Potentate in Europe.” The History and Proceedings of the Second Session of the Third Parliament of King George II, 1742-1743. Accessed at Google Books, https://books.google.com/books?id=-q0TAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA176&dq=%2216000+hanoverians%22&lr=lang_en&as_drrb_is=b&as_minm_is=0&as_miny_is=1700&as_maxm_is=0&as_maxy_is=1799&as_brr=0&client=firefox-a&cd=13#v=onepage&q=%2216000%20hanoverians%22&f=false (accessed May 10, 2026).
[3] John McWhorter. Mar. 27, 2007. “Who Do We Mean When We Say ‘Troops’?” https://www.npr.org/2007/03/27/9163122/who-do-we-mean-when-we-say-troops (accessed May 10, 2026).
[4] "troop, troops, troupe." AP Stylebook, 57th edition. https://www.apstylebook.com/ap_stylebook/troop-troops-troupe (accessed May 10, 2026).
[5] Andrew Rosenthal. Nov. 24, 1990. “Mideast tensions; Bush says Syria supports the use of force on Iraq.” The New York Times online. https://www.nytimes.com/1990/11/24/world/mideast-tensions-bush-says-syria-supports-the-use-of-force-on-iraq.html (accessed May 10, 2026).
[6] Mark Liberman. Feb. 25, 2005. “Language change after childhood.” Post on Language Log, http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/001924.html (accessed May 10, 2026).
by Mignon Fogarty
Next, the Scripps National Spelling Bee starts May 26, so it's a great time to answer a question from a long-time listener in Prague named Jiří who asked why spelling bees are called bees. What is a bee?
One explanation is that we can trace it back to the buzzing insects. Bees are cooperative and social; they live and work together in a hive, and people seem to perceive them as always working. As far back as the 1400s, people were saying busy workers were “as busy as bees.”
Hundreds of years later, the word “bee” was being used to describe events like quilting bees and husking bees, where people would get together to do work like those buzzing, cooperative, and social insects. Although a spelling bee is more of a competition than a social working group, it still took on the name, maybe because it was a social activity for the community and spelling seemed like work.
Other sources, though, such as Merriam-Webster, say the name “bee” comes from the Middle English word “bene,” (B-E-N-E, “ben-eh”) which described a prayer or favor and later came to have a British dialect meaning related to voluntary help you give to neighbors, such as farmers who need to raise a barn or husk a lot of corn.
Ultimately, it seems the origin of the word “bee” is still up for debate. Scripps itself says it's a language puzzle "that has never been satisfactorily accounted for," but either way, you can think of it as going back to old-time social gatherings.
Other fun phrases that use the word “bee” are “a bee in your bonnet,” “bees and honey,” “to make a beeline for something,” and “to put the bee on someone.”
A Bee in Your Bonnet
The origin of “a bee in your bonnet” is what you'd probably guess. It simply relates to the agitation or intense focus you’d have if you had a literal bee in your hat or your bonnet. You wouldn’t think about much else until you resolved the problem. The Phrase Finder website believes the phrase may be of Scottish origin because of some early references and because Scottish men wore caps called bonnets around the time the phrase emerged. In its earliest uses, it usually referred to someone who was thought to be mentally unbalanced or eccentric.
It could also relate to another phrase, “to have bees in the head,” which is even more closely associated with having an irrational or unbalanced obsession.
Bees and Honey
Moving on, “Bees and Honey” is Cockney rhyming slang for the word “money.” For example, I found a movie clip on YouTube where a British man is trying to rob an American and says, “Give me the bees,” which he explains is short for “bees and honey,” meaning money.
The Guardian says that rhyming slang is about more than just rhyming — that the slang can also have a logical story behind it, and in this case, we go back again to the busy, hard-working nature of bees. You work to get sweet money, just like bees work to get that sweet, sweet honey.
Beeline
“Beeline” is another obvious one related to the behavior of bees. To make a beeline for something is to take the shortest path to it, just like bees always seem to take the shortest path back to their hive or to a source of pollen or nectar after another bee tells them where they found it.
Put the Bee on Someone
Finally, “to put the bee on someone” seems to be a phrase that peaked in the 1940s. It means to put an end to something or to ask or pressure someone for money. I couldn’t find anything about the origin of the “put an end to something” meaning, but the “asking for money” meaning ultimately seems related to the idea of volunteering for the community’s benefit.
It seems that on the American frontier there often wasn’t enough money to pay preachers, so just as the community would gather in a bee to help a farmer husk corn, the community would gather in a bee to raise money or goods for the preacher; and if people didn’t donate, the organizers would pressure them, and that aggressive asking or begging for money or gifts came to be known as “putting the bee on someone.”
The Oxford English Dictionary also says it could be related to the phrase “to sting someone,” which seems to have arisen around the same time. For example, they have a citation from 1931 from the book “American Tramp and Underworld Slang” that says, “To say ‘I put the bee on him’ usually means that the donor has been ‘stung’ when he gives up the loan, since seldom is it repaid.”
And for a further extension, a footnote in H.L. Mencken’s book “The American Language” says in addition to “put the bee on someone,” the phrase “to buzz someone” also meant to wheedle money.
From what I've read about the Scripps National Spelling Bee, it seems like a friendly affair that might still have that sense of a community enjoying an event together — albeit a somewhat stressful event in the final rounds. And it also has generous prizes these days. The winner gets $50,000, and the winners down to 7th place also get cash prizes, so the winners likely won't need to be putting the bee on anyone for a while.
Sources
Ammer, Christine. “bee in one’s bonnet.” The American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms, 2nd edition. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 2013.
Ayto, John. “have a bee in your bonnet.” Oxford Dictionary of English Idioms, 3rd edition. Oxford University Press. 2010.
Mencken, H.L., Ed. McDavid, Raven I. Jr. The American Language, 4th edition and two supplements, abridged. Knopf, New York. 1963. p. 727.
Webb, Garrison. “What’s in a Word?” Rutledge Hill Press, Nashville. http://bit.ly/2xHbe6R (accessed June 4, 2018).
“6 Actual Names for Historical Spelling Bees.” Merriam-Webster Blog. https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/alternate-spelling-bee-titles (accessed May 10, 2026).
“A Bee in Your Bonnet.” Phrase Finder UK. https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/bee-in-your-bonnet.html accessed (accessed May 10, 2026).
“The Ultimate Guide to Cockney Rhyming Slang.” The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/education/2014/jun/09/guide-to-cockney-rhyming-slang (accessed May 10, 2026).
“bee.” The American Heritage Dictionary Online. https://ahdictionary.com/word/search.html?q=bee (accessed May 10, 2026).
“bee.” Etymology Online. https://www.etymonline.com/word/bee (accessed May 10, 2026).
"bee." Merriam-Webster Dictionary Online. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bee (accessed May 10, 2026).
“bee.” Oxford English Dictionary Online. http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/16941 (accessed May 10, 2026).
"busy." Oxford English Dictionary Online. https://www.oed.com/dictionary/busy_adj?tab=meaning_and_use#232178008 (accessed May 10, 2026).
“sting.” Oxford English Dictionary Online. http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/190388#eid20713651 (accessed May 10, 2026).
Finally, I have a familect from Maggie.
"Hi Grammar Girl, this is Maggie from Vancouver, Washington, and one of my familects is '2020ed' as a verb. This is actually one of our habits of verbing nouns, so we'll say things like 'musicing' and 'anxiusing'. '2020ed' basically means canceled by the pandemic, specifically in 2020. So, like, we'd be like, 'The concert was 2020ed, so we couldn't go.' And I actually kind of also had a question about that. Is it the only example I've heard of where people are using a number as a verb? Is that just our family's thing or is it like an actual thing that other people do?"
Thanks, Maggie! It's not common, but I can think of a few examples of numbers being used as verbs. According to Merriam-Webster, in the restaurant industry, to 86 someone means to ban them from the restaurant or throw them out. In finance, people use numbers to describe increases, so someone might say a company 10x'd its revenue. And in the tech industry, I've heard "404" used as a verb to describe a web page not being available anymore, as in "All the old blog posts got 404'd when they migrated the site."
Thanks for the call.
Grammar Girl is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast. Thanks to Holly Hutchings; Nat Hoopes; Morgan Christianson; Rebekah Sebastian; Dan Feierabend; Maram Elnagheeb; and Steven Schapansky, who met his wife Erika through his Dr. Who podcast.
And I'm Mignon Fogarty, better known as Grammar Girl.
That's all. Thanks for listening.