Thieves

How to spell thieves

7 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce thieves

What does thieves mean?

1. nounMore than one person who steals the property of others.

Thieves in a sentence

• The thieves broke into three flats while the residents were away.

• Security cameras helped police identify the thieves who emptied the warehouse.

Where does thieves come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is the plural of thief, which comes from the Old English theof, a word of Germanic origin meaning a person who steals. It has close relatives across the old Germanic languages, including the Old Norse thjofr and the Old High German diob, all carrying the same sense of a robber or stealer. English long ago developed a habit of softening a final f sound to a v sound before a plural ending, which is why we say thieves rather than thiefs, just as we say wolves, leaves, and knives. The interior spelling preserves the old i-before-e pattern that gives the long ee sound, and that ie ordering is the main trap for writers. The shift from thief to thieves, with both the f turning to v and the e and s appearing, is what makes the plural feel less predictable than it really is.

How the word is built

• thiev- (from thief, with f changing to v before the plural ending)
• -es (plural suffix)