We talked about the word egregious and its change in usage last week. It comes from the Latin ex grege, meaning “rising above the flock,” so its use as a word for excellent or extraordinary, which are not the same thing, makes sense. This word grex or gregis is Latin for “a flock” or “gathered into a flock” and has given us a, uh, small herd of words.
Gregarious derives from this word alone, no stir-ins, no additional flavors. We use it to describe someone who loves to be around other people. He enjoys running with the flock.
Segregate means to separate from the flock.
Aggregate means “to collect or unite as a mass or sum,” similar to congregate, which also means “to bring together.” Coleridge said, “cold congregates all bodies,” making them appear united when they are spiritually indifferent.
Allegory does not come to us from grex, but it does comes from the related Greek word agora. Agora means “assembly” or “place of assembly.” “To speak in an assembly” or “to speak publicly” is the Greek word agoreuein. If you add allos or “other” to that, you get “to speak other in an assembly.” Tell the truth but tell it slant. This is the root of the Greek word allegoria, “the description of one thing under the image of another.”
Yes, I see that hand! How did we get from grex to flock? That’s a thoughtful question. Thank you.
As words are wont to do, our word flock comes from completely different root words. On the one hand, flock (from Middle English flokke and earlier from Old French and Latin) means “a lock of wool or hair.” It can describe cotton or woolen rejects used to stuff a bed. You can use it as a verb to mean “to stuff a bed with flock” or “to give something a fibrous appearance.” If you didn’t know, and I didn’t, you can flock almost anything and could have been doing this for a good long time, allowing for a now obsolete meaning of this verb, “to treat contemptuously.” Considering today’s high levels of vulgarity, I don’t recommend attempting to fit this into daily conversation.
On the other hand, flock (from Anglo-Saxon flocc, related to Old Norse flokkr) means “a group of people.” If you say flocks, you’re going to indicate a large number of people from several sizable groups. Etymonline appears to say this word sprang from the ground of its own will, because it isn’t found in other Germanic languages beyond the Middle Low German vlocke, meaning “crowd, flock (of sheep).”
Can you use flock for any group? Webster’s New International Dictionary offers a usage list of synonyms.
- Flock refers to sheep, goats, and geese and also has the connotation of care and guidance.
- Herd refers to cattle or large animals gathered together.
- Drove refers to cattle or swine driven as a group.
- Pack refers to dogs and wolves.
The above four words are also used contemptuously to refer to people. From The Comedy of Errors, “… thou art false in all; and art confederate with a damned pack to make a loathsome abject scorn of me.” - Bevy “literally of quails, roes, or larks”
- Covey of partridges
- Flight of any birds
These three words, though primarily the first one, have been used to describe a group of ladies. - Swarm of insects
- Shoal of fish. These two imply a churning mass within the group.
And in the flow of the above list Webster’s throws in the word galaxy without explanation. Galaxy is “an assemblage of brilliant or noted persons or things.”
(For this post I have leaned on my large, unabridged volume of Webster’s New International Dictionary, 2nd Edition, published in 1954, as well as the Online Etymology Dictionary. Photo by Maria Orlova from Pexels)