Does the expression “one dozen eggs” take singular or plural verb?

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This is a great question as a lot of language learners are confused by this aspect of the English grammar.
 
The noun dozen acts as a collective noun. A collective noun is a name for a group or a number of things or people such as family, class, audience, gang, team. A collective noun can be treated as singular or as plural.
 
When we refer to a group of things that are identical such as a deck of cards or a dozen eggs, we treat these collective nouns as singular.
 
However, when we want to talk about a group of individuals or things that aren’t the same, the collective noun is treated as plural.
 
Seeing as there isn’t much of a variety in eggs, treating “one dozen eggs” as a singular is more widely accepted. On the other hand, if you wanted to talk about six duck eggs and six hen eggs then you could treat the “dozen” as plural.
 
For example:

  • One dozen (of identical) eggs was delivered to Mrs. Greene yesterday.
  • Mrs. Gardner ordered six duck eggs and six hen eggs. The one dozen eggs were delivered to her this morning.
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