bevy
English
WOTD – 11 August 2012
Etymology
From Middle English bevey, of uncertain origin, possibly Anglo-Norman.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ˈbɛvi/
Audio (AU) (file) - Homophone: bevvy
Noun
bevy (plural bevies)
- (collective) A group of animals, in particular quail.
- (collective) A small group of persons, especially of girls and women.
- 1849, Thomas Babington Macaulay, The History of England from the Accession of James II, volume II, London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, OCLC 1069526323, page 365:
- The same messenger who summoned the whole bevy of renegades, Dover, Peterborough, Murray, Sunderland, and Mulgrave, could just as easily have summoned Clarendon.
- 1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d’Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented […], volume I, London: James R[ipley] Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., […], OCLC 13623666, phase the first (The Maiden), pages 22–23:
- The two elder of the brothers were plainly not intending to linger more than a moment, but the spectacle of a bevy of girls dancing without male partners seemed to amuse the third, and make him in no hurry to move on.
- 2013 June 7, David Simpson, “Fantasy of navigation”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 26, page 36:
- For every dedicated scientist patiently recording atmospheric pressure and wind speed while shivering at high altitudes, there is a carnival barker with a bevy of pretty girls willing to dangle from a basket or parachute down to earth.
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- (collective) A large group or collection.
- 2017 January 12, Brian Fung, “Why AT&T’s top execs visited Trump Tower”, in The Washington Post:
- Thursday's session makes AT&T the latest high-profile company to meet with Trump after the president-elect's series of job-related talks with firms such as Softbank, Carrier and a bevy of tech companies including Google, Facebook and Apple.
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Translations
large group of birds
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large group or collection
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Further reading
- bevy in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911