troop

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   an orderly crowd

   a troop of children

2. 2
   verb

   move or march as if in a crowd

   They children trooped into the room

3. 3
   noun

   A collection of people; a number; a multitude (in general).

   That which should accompany old age — / As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends — / I must not look to have.

4. 4
   noun

   A group of soldiers; military forces.

   Ah, knovv you not the Citie fauours them, / And they haue troupes of Souldiers at their beck?

5. 5
   noun

   An individual soldier or member of a military force; a trooper.

   One American M48 was slightly grazed and one American troop lightly wounded.

6. 6
   noun

   A company of actors; a troupe.

   In order to form the new troop to a greater degree of perfection, the four principal actors were placed in the seminary of the cadets

7. 7
   noun

   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, page 6: “It is the Patrol System that makes the Troop, and all Scouting for that matter, a real co-operative effort.”

8. 8
   verb

   To move in numbers; to come or gather in crowds or troops.

   Then everybody once more knelt, and soon the blessing was pronounced. The choir and the clergy trooped out slowly, […], down the nave to the western door. […] At a seemingly immense distance the surpliced group stopped to say the last prayer.

Etymology

Attested in English since 1545, from French troupe, from Back-formation from troupeau, from Middle French trope, troupe, from Old French trope, trupe, of unknown origin. Compare Early Medieval Latin troppus. Doublet of troupe, and possibly also of thorp, dorp, and trip. Cognate with German Dorf (“village”).