[kapep]

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/myriad

> Usage Note: Throughout most of its history in English myriad was used as a noun, as in a myriad of reasons. In the 1800s, it began to be used in poetry as an adjective, as in myriad dreams. Both usages in English are acceptable, as in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "Myriad myriads of lives." This poetic, adjectival use became so well entrenched generally that many people came to consider it as the only correct use. In fact, however, both uses are acceptable today.

[Jedd]

There are many of reasons why I'm not going to calmly agree with the audacious claim that 'both uses are acceptable today'.

[superplussed]

Of course both are acceptable, why is this an audacious claim?

[Jedd]

Because it invites (not begs) the question 'to whom are they both acceptable?'.

People that contribute to thefreedictionary.com, evidently.

[randallsquared]

And people who contribute to the OED, in both the 1989 and 2003 editions, evidently.

http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/124538

http://www.oed.com/oed2/00154839;jsessionid=AC4DB817EFBADA5F...

I have had similar experiences, though, where I was convinced that some word or phrase usage was just incorrect, and where it turned out that I had just not happened across it. Fortunately, a minute of research can today fix any such misconceptions!

[kapep]

thefreedictionary.com is only one of many dictionaries that use "myriad of" in their examples. Here are some more: http://www.yourdictionary.com/myriad

A quick Google Ngram search supports the claims from thefreedictionary, that "a myriad" or "myriads" was used first and that "myriad" as an adjective was only used later: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=%28myriad_NOUN...

It looks like "myriad of" has been correct in the past and is still used widely.