Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A large body of people organized and trained for land warfare.
  • noun The entire military land forces of a country.
  • noun A tactical and administrative military unit consisting of a headquarters, two or more corps, and auxiliary forces.
  • noun A large group of people or things, especially when organized for a specific cause or purpose: synonym: multitude.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun An armed expedition.
  • noun A large body of men trained and armed for war, and organized in companies, battalions, regiments, brigades, or similar divisions, under proper officers.
  • noun A great number; a vast multitude.
  • Consisting of or abounding in arms or branches; branching; spreading.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A collection or body of men armed for war, esp. one organized in companies, battalions, regiments, brigades, and divisions, under proper officers.
  • noun A body of persons organized for the advancement of a cause.
  • noun A great number; a vast multitude; a host.
  • noun a permanent army of professional soldiers, as distinguished from militia or volunteers.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A large, highly organized military force, concerned mainly with ground (rather than air or naval) operations.
  • noun The governmental agency in charge of a state's army.
  • noun figuratively A large group of people working toward the same purpose.
  • noun figuratively A large group of social animals working toward the same purpose.
  • noun figuratively Any multitude.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a large number of people united for some specific purpose
  • noun the army of the United States of America; the agency that organizes and trains soldiers for land warfare
  • noun a permanent organization of the military land forces of a nation or state

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English armee, from Old French, from Medieval Latin armāta, from Latin, feminine past participle of armāre, to arm, from arma, arms; see ar- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

(1386) Middle English armee, from Old French armee (French armée), from Medieval Latin armata ("armed force"), a noun taken from the past participle of Latin armare ("to arm"), itself related to arma ("tools, arms"), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂er- (“to join, fit together”). Displaced native Old English here.

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Examples

  • ARMY: I was looking at General Abizaid's testimony, and then subsequent to that action, the testimony from the army chief of staff, comments from General George Casey, about the situation in Iraq, in essence saying do not send more troops there.

    CNN Transcript Dec 17, 2006 2006

  • As the matter turned out, the British contingent was really dealing first and last with four army corps, and the essential part of the news conveyed was that the extreme western portion of this large German force _was attempting to turn the flank of the whole army_.

    A General Sketch of the European War The First Phase Hilaire Belloc 1911

  • The question arises: _Whence came this second army of workers to replace the first army_?

    War of the Classes Jack London 1896

  • French army is eminently civic, and nations who take their ideas from the very opposite fact of a _standing army_ are far from understanding how absolutely a French soldier and French citizen are the same thing.

    The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume II Elizabeth Barrett Browning 1833

  • From an American newspaper I find that a certain English intelligence had been propagated through the United States, that, at the head of fifteen hundred officers or non-commissioned officers, I was going to embark for America, and that, with soldiers of your army embodied under them, I wanted to teach military discipline throughout the _American army_.

    Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert Du Motier Lafayette 1795

  • For the operation to be executed, there wasn´t any need for an army, and 50 people do not consist in an ´army´; English Usage is definitely another weak point of the lawless lawyer Kipkorir.

    American Chronicle 2008

  • _confined in wicked places_ (parallel with hell-bendum fäst), 3073. herigean, w.v. w.dat. of pers., _to provide with an army, to support with an army_: pres. sg.

    Beowulf Robert Sharp 1879

  • _confined in wicked places_ (parallel with hell-bendum fæst), 3073. herigean, w.v. w.dat. of pers., _to provide with an army, to support with an army_: pres. sg.

    Beowulf Robert Sharp 1879

  • _army_, there never was any thing of an army _established_ in England till within a hundred years.

    Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. — Volume 3 Henry Hunt 1804

  • "The hypnotism of the army is so artfully applied that the most free-thinking and rational person will, _so long as he is in the army_, always do what is demanded of him.

    Socialism As It Is A Survey of The World-Wide Revolutionary Movement William English Walling

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