Plural form of "Mr." and "Mrs."

It's odd, but there is no common plural form for the titles Mr. and Mrs. in English.

Other titles easily become count nouns:

Justice Sandra Day O'Connor/Three of the justices recused themselves.

Professor Harold Bloom/Ask your professors if you can have extra help.

Captain Richard Sharpe/The regiment's captains all gathered for dinner.

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But for Mr. and Mrs. there is no common plural form. The plural forms for these titles are only used in formal, official, or otherwise self-conscious writing. They are almost always used when naming people who have already been identified.

The plural for Mr.: Messrs. 

The plural for Mrs.: Mesdames

For example:

Messrs. Smith and Jones were named to the company's board at the last general meeting.

Bush's foreign policy would have been better off examining [...] the informal Republican meetings on Capitol Hill in the late 1990s (in which Messrs. Cheney and Rumsfeld were key participants).

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Self-conscious use of these titles tends to be mock-serious and for a gently comic effect. This is because the titles in plural form seem a bit formal and old-fashioned. This is almost the only way Mesdames is used in English. Here are examples:

[The following sentence is from an article about fashion and draws attention to the names Dolce & Gabbana, which is the name of a fashion brand.]

The artist's fame inspired Messrs. Dolce and Gabbana to invite Ms. McGrath, with whom they have worked for years, to interpret their ideas.

[The following sentence is from an article about male ballet dancers pretending to be ballerinas.]

It was danced by Mesdames Proboskovna, Sakitumi and Sonia Leftova, in her quiet way one of the company's most interesting performers.

Learn more about words related to this entry: 

• Mr.
• Mrs.
• Messrs.
• Mesdames