Q: I always enjoy and appreciate your publications. There is one correction I’d like to suggest, which shows I read the footnotes. This has to do with the word “schematas.” I believe “schemata” is already plural and “schema” is the singular form. I hate to be a stickler about this, but you are always so cautious and exact about your writing. “Schematas” is like “cannellonis.”
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A: Ahh, you indeed have a careful eye. I wish the same were true of those who wrote the schemas/schemata/schematas. My footnotes reflect exactly the word that appears at the head of each document. Sometimes it’s in the singular. Sometimes in the plural. I don’t ever recall the writers using the word “schemata” as a plural, even though it is. While researching my book Eucharistic Reservation, I found the widest discrepancy in the use of the word, so I just shrugged my shoulders and footnoted what I saw.