Doctor's surgery

So...bearing in mind that an apostrophe suggests a missing letter, how would the possessive have been written in old English before the days of "the hairdresser, his shop"?

I stand corrected?

“The hairdresser, his shop” construction is later than the possessive ‘s as in “the hairdresser’s shop”. In Old English the s ending indicated the possessive, but some people then interpreted it as an abbreviation of ‘his’.

doubt

For a long time people still said “Mistress Majorie, her garden” or whatever, even when they had started using the shortened form of his. Then when that became everyday use it just transferred over to the feminine.

Aided, no doub, by the fact that women could not own shops, houses, animals, anything very much in their own right sometimes things belonged to “his”!!!!

I didn't know that, eglantine.

What if the hairdresser was female? Would it have been : "I'm going to the hairdresser, her shop"? Where would the 's come from?

Ah well. The thing is the ‘s’ is short for ‘his’. A few hundred years ago you would have said “the hairdresser, his shop”. But like all speech it got shortened and then made its way into writing.

So you would never put “I need to go to the hairdresser’s” because you would really be saying I need to go to the hairdresser his....” which you would never do.?

That is where my confusion sets in, Eglantine21, because I see sentences like I need to go to the hairdressers as shorthand for ... to the hairdresser's/hairdressers' shop.

Umm, it doesn’t need an apostrophe at all. The hairdresser is the noun in the sentence as it stands. You would only say hairdressers if you were going to more than one.

I need to go to the hairdressers.

You would only need an apostrophe if “hairdressers” qualifies another noun such as “shop”.

I need to go to the hairdresser’s shop. (One hairdresser)

So do I - but I would still feel obliged to use an apostrophe in your re-worded sentence.

If I am uncertain, I change the wording of the sentence-"I must make an appointment at the GP surgery for tomorrow".

Poor proofreading again!
(Though in my defence, I accidently tapped 'post' this time when I meant to tap 'preview'.)

What is the default position if we genuinely don't know if the word in wuestion should be singular or plural - for example, if I am in a new town and need to get my hair cut.

I might say, "I need to go to the hairdressers", and of course have no need of an apostrophe in speech, but where should it go in the written sentence when I don't know if the place in question will be run by one or several hairdressers?

I'm just glad you didn't include surgery's as a choice.
Your punctuation looks fine - apart from your missing '?' which you spotted by yourself so that doesn't count!

All you have to do is ask the question Who does the surgery-surgeries belong to?” and put the apostrophe immediately after the answer.

Try it. It’s simple.

It works for everything.

I'm pleased about that, Bathsheba.

As someone who was taught no grammar whatsoever in secondary school (1970s), I have had to do a lot of learning since, and still sometimes feel the need to check that what I think I know is correct .

You are right on every count MamaCaz

I don't think I have ever had cause to write any of those in the past, but here on Gransnet there are many references to surgeries in the medical threads, and my eye is drawn to that apostrophe every time. Most people seem to be using the second version, as if there is just one doctor, and that is what got me thinking!

I think you have it spot on.

MawB will sort this one - my English grammar is not that good!

Spot the missing question mark. My proofreading is useless!