Reddit Reddit reviews An Exaltation of Larks: The Ultimate Edition

We found 22 Reddit comments about An Exaltation of Larks: The Ultimate Edition. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.

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An Exaltation of Larks: The Ultimate Edition
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22 Reddit comments about An Exaltation of Larks: The Ultimate Edition:

u/john_stuart_kill · 18 pointsr/todayilearned

Some of my own favourites: "an unkindness of ravens" and "a parliament of owls"

If you're way into this kind of thing, James Lipton (of Actor's Studio fame) wrote a whole book of them, An Exaltation of Larks.

u/DeeWall · 9 pointsr/AskReddit

It's actually an unkindness of ravens. You can have a parliament of owls.

In case you are looking for more. Or just want to know why I know this.

u/wardepartment · 7 pointsr/NoStupidQuestions

If you're interested, James Lipton (yes, the same James Lipton) wrote a book called "An Exaltation of Larks" that researched all the terms of venery and created some new ones.

http://www.amazon.com/An-Exaltation-Larks-Ultimate-Edition/dp/0140170960

u/parl · 5 pointsr/explainlikeimfive

Since no one has said so yet, look up a book called An Exaltation of Larks for more classic and a lot of nouveau ones.

u/son_of_a_gunderson · 4 pointsr/aww

James Lipton (yes, that James Lipton, from Inside the Actor's Studio) wrote a book about terms like these, called An Exaltation of Larks.

u/Fonzoon · 3 pointsr/todayilearned

I have a book that names different groups. It's called An Exaltation of Larks . Apparently a group of cockroaches is an "intrusion of cockroaches." "disagreement of statesmen." "explosion of italians."

An unofficial source has told me: "a carton of retards" .. unsure of veracity

u/TheWalruus · 3 pointsr/HumansBeingBros

> collective nouns

They are also referred to as Terms of Venery or "Company terms" and some of the earliest can be found in the Book of Saint Albans, pub. 1486. A good contemporary compendium of terms of Venery is an Exaltation of Larks pub. 1993.

u/CapnCrunchHarkness · 3 pointsr/wikipedia

If you like that, check out the book An Exaltation of Larks by James Lipton (yes, the "Inside the Actor's Studio" guy.) that is mentioned on the Wikipedia page. It has a great introduction about these "terms of venery" and some of their origins, a really comprehensive list with illustrations, and Lipton himself even gets into creating new ones. Very cool book.

u/Concise_Pirate · 3 pointsr/etymology

Yes, these were the result of a language game that was common a few centuries ago.

http://www.amazon.com/Exaltation-Larks-Ultimate-James-Lipton/dp/0140170960?ie=UTF8&*Version*=1&*entries*=0

u/AerialAmphibian · 3 pointsr/explainlikeimfive

Here's the book he wrote about it:

http://www.amazon.com/An-Exaltation-Larks-Ultimate-Edition/dp/0140170960

> An "exaltation of larks"? Yes! And a "leap of leopards," a "parliament of owls," an "ostentation of peacocks," a "smack of jellyfish," and a "murder of crows"! For those who have ever wondered if the familiar "pride of lions" and "gaggle of geese" were only the tip of a linguistic iceberg, James Lipton has provided the definitive answer: here are hundreds of equally pithy, and often poetic, terms unearthed by Mr. Lipton in the Books of Venery that were the constant study of anyone who aspired to the title of gentleman in the fifteenth century.

u/ares_god_not_sign · 2 pointsr/misc

An Exaltation of Larks is a particularly fun book about the subject.

u/Teotwawki69 · 2 pointsr/todayilearned

Fun fact -- we know a lot of these terms because some guy researched them and published a book. That guy was James Lipton (yes, that one from Inside the Actors Studio), and here's the book.

Note: Lipton found some of the terms and made others up, and the two have become permanently intertwined -- so "pandemonium of parrots" was probably made up by Lipton, while "a murder of crows" was not.

u/SaladFreeway · 2 pointsr/coolguides

Book recommendation: An Exaltation of Larks, by James Lipton. Yes, THE James Lipton. https://www.amazon.com/Exaltation-Larks-Ultimate-James-Lipton/dp/0140170960

It is the book version of this reddit post with a history of terms.

u/glenbolake · 2 pointsr/pics

It's probably more common than the fact that a group of ravens is called an "unkindness."

Source (scanned from my copy of An Exaltation of Larks)

u/KnowsAboutMath · 2 pointsr/aww

> a flock of larks is called an exaltation

From which comes the title of the definitive work on such "terms of venery": An Exaltation of Larks by James Lipton.

u/[deleted] · 1 pointr/pics
u/ArbitraryNoun · 1 pointr/comics

I hope you're referring to this book by James Lipton. I've always wanted a copy myself.

u/devophill · 1 pointr/todayilearned

One of the seminal works in the field of collective nouns was written by James Lipton from Inside The Actors Studio.

u/MarcelProust · 1 pointr/todayilearned

Actually, an exaltation of larks

u/aazav · 1 pointr/bigfoot

We must bring our brethren and sisteren up to speed. (I know that that is not a word, but it is very cromulent to the point at hand.)

https://www.amazon.com/Exaltation-Larks-Ultimate-James-Lipton/dp/0140170960


An "exaltation of larks"? Yes! And a "leap of leopards," a "parliament of owls," an "ostentation of peacocks," a "smack of jellyfish," and a "murder of crows"! For those who have ever wondered if the familiar "pride of lions" and "gaggle of geese" were only the tip of a linguistic iceberg, James Lipton has provided the definitive answer: here are hundreds of equally pithy, and often poetic, terms unearthed by Mr. Lipton in the Books of Venery that were the constant study of anyone who aspired to the title of gentleman in the fifteenth century. When Mr. Lipton's painstaking research revealed that five hundred years ago the terms of venery had already been turned into the Game of Venery, he embarked on an odyssey that has given us a "slouch of models," a "shrivel of critics," an "unction of undertakers," a "blur of Impressionists," a "score of bachelors," and a "pocket of quarterbacks." This ultimate edition of An Exaltation of Larks is Mr. Lipton's brilliant answer to the assault on language and literacy in the last decades of the twentieth century. In it you will find more than 1,100 resurrected or newly minted contributions to that most endangered of all species, our language, in a setting of 250 witty, beautiful, and remarkably apt engravings.