multitude
Americannoun
-
a great number; host.
a multitude of friends.
-
a great number of people gathered together; crowd; throng.
- Synonyms:
- mass
-
the state or character of being many; numerousness.
-
the multitude, the common people; the masses.
noun
-
a large gathering of people
-
the common people
-
a large number
-
the state or quality of being numerous
Synonym Usage
See crowd 1.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of multitude
First recorded in 1275–1325; Middle English word from Latin word multitūdō. See multi-, -tude
Explanation
A multitude is a very large number or a huge crowd. If you see a multitude of zombies approaching, you're in trouble. Sometimes the word multitude refers to the common people, or the masses — that is, everyone in a society apart from the political elite. There are a lot of words and phrases for this, like hoi polloi, which is Greek for "the many," and "the great unwashed." Those last two terms are usually used in a disapproving way, but multitudes is generally a positive term. If you were to say that a leader inspired the multitudes to rise up against their oppressor, we'd assume that you sympathized with the multitudes.
Vocabulary lists containing multitude
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Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Combining a multitude of African dance styles, comedy and pure joy, they soon caught the attention of Ugandan musicians including Eddy Kenzo, who asked them to feature in some of his videos.
From BBC ● Jul. 24, 2026
Still, the results are likely to boost the multitude of lawsuits working their way through courts across the country.
From Barron's ● Jul. 16, 2026
That sense of complexity fuels Vecna, the antagonist of “Stranger Things,” whose climactic final season sees the character, played by Jamie Campbell Bower, take on a multitude of faces — some human and some grotesque.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 1, 2026
Mr. Elwes, a mathematical logician and professor at the University of Leeds, enumerates a multitude of such anecdotes—delightful, insightful, informative—to illustrate the bigger picture in “Huge Numbers.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 29, 2026
The young musicians in modern conservatoires, music colleges and universities study in an environment that fosters respect for and engagement with a multitude of genres and traditions.
From "The Story of Music" by Howard Goodall
No single category can contain the Whitmanesque multitudes jockeying for position inside us.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 29, 2026
What’s more, you are also donating to a food bank to put food into the backpacks of multitudes of children.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 20, 2026
In response to her complaints, the filing says, the company "retaliated against her, demonetizing her X account and generating multitudes more images of her".
From BBC ● Jan. 16, 2026
I can say, while at the CIA, we received overtures from industry in multitudes each day.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 29, 2025
Forgive me, Africa, according to the multitudes of thy mercies.
From "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
