groups of things, animals, and people

There are many words which are used in front of `of' and a plural noun to refer to a group of things, animals, or people. The commonest ones are given here.

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Some words can be used to refer to a wide range of things or people:

assortment, batch, battery, cluster, collection, crop, group, host, selection, set, variety

She joined a group of gossiping villagers in the street.

She may have a collection of old toys left from the time her children were young.

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Some words are usually used to refer to people or animals, rather than things:

army, band, crowd, gathering, horde, knot, party, swarm, throng

A large crowd of students gathered to watch the parade.

The couple obliged a horde of journalists with a press conference.

An army of ants crossed the flagstones in two close columns.

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◊ indicating shape

Some words indicate the shape of a group of things or people:

circle, column, heap, jumble, line, mound, mountain, pile, ring, row, scatter, scattering, sprinkling, stack, string

He sat down in the middle of the front row of chairs and waited.

Beside her there was a pile of magazines.

The circle of boys broke into applause.

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◊ indicating movement or occurrence

Some words indicate the movement or occurrence of a group of things or people:

hail, barrage, flood, rash, series, shower, spate, stream, string, tide, trickle, volley

Throughout the evening an unbroken stream of people came in.

After a spate of protests the authorities reacted by bringing many of them to trial.

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◊ typical groups

The following table shows which word is typically used to refer to a group of animals of a particular kind.

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The following table shows which word is typically used to refer to a group of people or things of a particular kind.

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