different between multitude vs troop

English

Etymology

From Middle English multitude, multitud, multytude (“(great) amount or number of people or things; multitudinous”), borrowed from Old French multitude (“crowd of people; diversity, wide range”), or directly from its etymon Latin multit?d? (“great amount or number of people or things”), from multus (“many; much”) + -t?d? (suffix forming abstract nouns indicating a state or condition). The English word is analysable as multi- +? -tude.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?m?lt?tju?d/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?m?lt??t(j)ud/, /?m?l-/
• Hyphenation: mul?ti?tude

Noun

multitude (plural multitudes)

1. A great amount or number, often of people; abundance, myriad, profusion.

   Synonym: (Northern England, Scotland) hantel, hantle
2. The mass of ordinary people; the masses, the populace.

   Synonym: crowd

   Pilate, wishing to please the multitude, released Barabbas to them.

   • Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil

Derived terms

• multitudinous

Translations

References

Further reading

• multitude on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

French

Etymology

From Old French multitude.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /myl.ti.tyd/

Noun

multitude f (plural multitudes)

1. multitude

Further reading

• “multitude” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Old French

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin multit?d? (“great amount or number of people or things”), from multus (“many; much”) + -t?d? (suffix forming abstract nouns indicating a state or condition).

Noun

multitude f (oblique plural multitudes, nominative singular multitude, nominative plural multitudes)

1. crowd of people
2. diversity; wide range

Descendants

• English: multitude
• French: multitude

English

Etymology

Attested in English since 1545, from French troupe (back-formation of troupeau, diminutive of Medieval Latin troppus "flock") and Middle French trouppe (from Old French trope (“band, company, troop”)), both of Germanic origin from Frankish *thorp (“assembly, gathering”), from Proto-Germanic *þurp? (“village, land, estate”), from Proto-Indo-European *treb- (“dwelling, settlement”). Doublet of troupe, and possibly also of thorp and dorp.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /t?u?p/
• (US) IPA^(key): /t?up/
• Rhymes: -u?p
• Homophone: troupe

Noun

troop (plural troops)

1. (collective) A collection of people; a number; a multitude (in general).
2. (military) A small unit of cavalry or armour commanded by a captain, corresponding to a platoon or company of infantry.
3. A detachment of soldiers or police, especially horse artillery, armour, or state troopers.
4. (chiefly in the plural) A group of soldiers; military forces.
5. (nonstandard) A company of actors; a troupe.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of W. Coxe to this entry?)

6. (Scouting) A chapter of a national girl or boy scouts organization, consisting of one or more patrols of 6 to 8 youngsters each.
   • Lord Baden-Powell of Gilwell (1920) Aids To Scoutmastership?^[1], page 6: “It is the Patrol System that makes the Troop, and all Scouting for that matter, a real co-operative effort.”
7. (collective) A group of baboons.
8. A particular roll of the drum; a quick march.
9. (mycology) Mushrooms that are in a close group but not close enough to be called a cluster.

Derived terms

• troop carrier
• trooper
• troop horse
• troopship
• troop train

Translations

Verb

troop (third-person singular simple present troops, present participle trooping, simple past and past participle trooped)

1. To move in numbers; to come or gather in crowds or troops.
2. To march on; to go forward in haste.
3. To move or march as if in a crowd.

Derived terms

• troop the colour (British, military)

Translations

See also

• Appendix:English collective nouns

References

• “troop” in the Canadian Oxford Dictionary, Second Edition, Oxford University Press, 2004.
• Douglas Harper (2001–2021) , “troop”, in Online Etymology Dictionary

Anagrams

• Porto, Proto, porto, porto-, proot, proto, proto-, tropo, tropo-

Dutch

Pronunciation

Noun

troop f (plural tropen, diminutive troopje n)

1. (music, literature, linguistics) trope