Horde

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /hɔːd/

Definitions

1. A large group or multitude of people or animals moving or gathered together in a disorganized or overwhelming manner
2. A substantial crowd or throng of individuals or creatures that congregates or advances in an unruly and overpowering fashion
3. A significant assembly of beings or entities that tends to swarm or gather in a chaotic and overpowering way

Etymology: The English word first appears in 1555, but its roots stretch across the Eurasian steppe. The word in its earliest form, Proto-Turkic "ordu," meant the place where an army or ruler stayed, a camp or court rather than a mob. Turkish "ordu" still means "camp, army," and Mongolian "ord" meant "court, castle, royal compound," so the sense of a settled, organized center came first. The word passed into Russian as "orda," where it came to mean a horde, clan, or troop, probably through a Kipchak Turkic intermediary. From there it moved west through Polish and German into Middle French, and finally into English. Along the way the sense of a royal camp narrowed into that of a mass of warriors on the move. English also borrowed the same root separately as "orda," and it gave us "Urdu," the language whose name began as "zaban-i-urdu," meaning the speech of the camp. The two words are doublets, two English forms from one ancestor that arrived by different routes.

Synonyms: crowd, throng, mob, multitude, swarm

Antonyms: individual, solitary, single, lone, singleton