Horde
noun, verb ·Moderate ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 A wandering troop or gang; especially, a clan or tribe of a nomadic people (originally Tatars) migrating from place to place for the sake of pasturage, plunder, etc.; a predatory multitude.
- 2 a vast multitude wordnet
- 3 A large number of people or things.
"We were beset by a horde of street vendors who thought we were tourists and would buy their cheap souvenirs."
- 4 a moving crowd wordnet
- 5 a nomadic community wordnet
- 1 to travel en masse, to flock
""What wouldst thou insinuate?" replied Elmuton, sarcastically; “has he not been watched, and secretly discovered hordeing with Christians?"
Example
More examples"Tom was surrounded by a horde of screaming fangirls."
Etymology
Recorded in English since 1555. From Middle French horde, from German Horde, from Polish horda, from Russian орда́ (ordá, “horde", 'clan, troop'”), probably from Kipchak Turkic (compare Tatar урда (urda, “horde”)), ultimately from Proto-Turkic *ordu (“place of staying of the army, ruler etc.”). Cognates include Turkish ordu (“camp, army”), Mongolian орд (ord, “court, castle, royal compound, camp, horde”) and Kalmyk орда (orda). Doublet of orda and Urdu.
Related phrases
More for "horde"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.