Collective Nouns

Collective Nouns :

The collective noun is the noun used to indicate a group of people or things or places or items or animals.

This type of noun denotes a group or collection of similar individuals, considered as one complete whole. For instance, there may be many sheep in a field, but only one flock. Here the word of noun sheep is a Common Noun. Because it may indicate any and every sheep. But the noun FLOCK is a Collective Noun. Because, it means collectively all the sheep at once and not for any one sheep taken separately.

This type of noun is also a kind of Common Noun. Thus the term FLOCK may stand for many different flocks (or groups of sheep).

CLASS may stand for many classes (or groups of students).

The noun GROUP may indicate a collection of people or animals or stars that has more than one thing.

There are many such nouns which indicate that group.

1. Committee
2. Police
3. Galaxy
4. Flock
5. Crowd
6. Choir
7. Team
8. Organisation
9. Company
10. Fleet

These are the common nouns of this type used for People

1. A band of musicians
2. A Band of Robbers
3. A Board of Chess Players
4. A board of directors
5. A Board of trustees
6. A Brood of Chess Players
7. A choir of singers
8. A class of students
9. A Conglomerate of Geologists
10. A crowd of people
11. A Faculty of professors
12. A Flock of tourists
13. A Formation of Geologists
14. A Galaxy of girls
15. A gang of thieves
16. A House of Senators
17. A Mass of Catholics
18. A pack of thieves
19. A panel of experts
20. A team of players
21. A troupe of dancers
22. A Troupe of Gymnasts

These are the common nouns of this type used for Things

1. A bouquet of flowers
2. A bunch of flowers
3. A library of books
4. A Clutch of eggs
5. A Cluster of diamonds
6. A Deck of cards
7. A Hand of cards
8. A Pack of cards
9. A Bunch of grapes
10. A Pencil of lines
11. An autumn of leaves
12. A Ring Of keys
13. A Wealth of information
14. A Round of drinks
15. A packet of Cigarettes
16. A fleet of ships
17. A forest of trees
18. A galaxy of stars
19. A pack of cards
20. A pack of lies
21. A pair of shoes
22. A range of mountains
23. A wad of notes

These are the common nouns of this type used for Animals

1. An army of ants
2. A herd of Antelope
3. A Herd of reindeers
4. A of Drove of asses
5. A flock of birds
6. A Coalition Of cheetahs
7. A Troop of Kangaroos
8. A flock of sheep
9. A herd of deer
10. A hive of bees
11. A litter of puppies
12. A murder of crows
13. A pack of hounds
14. A pack of wolves
15. A school of fish
16. A swarm of locusts
17. A team of horses
18. A School of whales
19. A pride of lions
20. A pack of Wolves

There is no separate rule to form this type of noun. Over the period of time, people who used English language formed new words to denote the collection of people or things. Those new words were added to the dictionary of English language for the uses of the following generations.

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