herd

English Wikipedia has an article on:

herd

Wikipedia

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /hɜːd/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /hɚd/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)d
• Homophone: heard

From Middle English herde, heerde, heorde, from Old English hierd, heord (“herd, flock; keeping, care, custody”), from Proto-West Germanic *herdu, from Proto-Germanic *herdō (“herd”), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱerdʰ- (“file, row, herd”). Cognate with German Herde, Danish hjord, Swedish hjord. Non-Germanic cognates include Albanian herdhe (“nest”) and Serbo-Croatian krdo.

herd (plural herds)

1. A number of domestic animals assembled together under the watch or ownership of a keeper.

   a herd of cattle

   a herd of sheep

   a herd of goats

   • 1768, Thomas Gray, Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard:

     The lowing herd wind slowly o’er the lea.

2. Any collection of animals gathered or travelling in a company.
   • 2007 March, J. Michael Fay, “Ivory Wars: Last Stand in Zakouma”, in National Geographic, section 47:

     Zakouma is the last place on Earth where you can see more than a thousand elephants on the move in a single, compact herd.

3. (now usually derogatory) A crowd, a mass of people or things; a rabble.
   • 1681, [John Dryden], Absalom and Achitophel. A Poem. , 3rd edition, London: J T and are to be sold by W. Davis , published 1682, →OCLC, page 15:

     But far more numerous was the Herd of ſuch, / Who think too little, and who talk too much.

   • 1833 June 8, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Table Talk:

     You can never interest the common herd in the abstract question.

   • 2001, Jonathan Franzen, The Corrections:

     There were herds of leather sofas and enough computers to ensure that no prospective matriculant or visiting parent could enter a room and not see at least one available keyboard, not even in the dining hall or field house.

• (group of elephants): parade

herd (third-person singular simple present herds, present participle herding, simple past and past participle herded)

1. (intransitive) To unite or associate in a herd; to feed or run together, or in company.

   Sheep herd on many hills.

   • 1953, Janice Holt Giles, The Kentuckians:

     The women bunched up in little droves and let their tongues clack, and the men herded together and passed a jug around and, to tell the truth, let their tongues clack too.

   • 1983, Richard Ellis, The Book of Sharks, Knopf, →ISBN, page 167:

     Any predator that preys on animals that herd or school, has to be able to single out one individual to attack.

2. (transitive) To unite or associate in a herd
3. (transitive) To manage, care for or guard a herd

   He is employed to herd the goats.

4. (intransitive) To associate; to ally oneself with, or place oneself among, a group or company.
   • 1712 (date written), [Joseph] Addison, Cato, a Tragedy. , London: J Tonson, , published 1713, →OCLC, Act III, scene i, pages 39–40:

     I’ll herd among his Friends, and ſeem
     One of the Number, […]

   • 1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:

     "[W]hy, I say, oh stranger, dost thou think that I herd here with barbarians lower than the beasts?"

5. To move, or be moved, in a group. (of both animals and people)

   On alighting at the station, we were all herded over the footbridge and through a side exit.

• herd together

From Middle English herde, from Old English hirde, hierde, from Proto-West Germanic *hirdī, from Proto-Germanic *hirdijaz. Cognate with German Hirte, Swedish herde, Danish hyrde.

herd (plural herds)

1. (now rare) Someone who keeps a group of domestic animals.

   Synonyms: herder, herdsman

   • 1902, John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide:

     John Dodds, the herd who bode in the place, was standing at the door, and he looked to see who was on the road so late.

   • 2000, Alasdair Grey, The Book of Prefaces, Bloomsbury, published 2002, page 38:

     Any talent which gives a good new thing to others is a miracle, but commentators have thought it extra miraculous that England's first known poet was an illiterate herd.

herd (third-person singular simple present herds, present participle herding, simple past and past participle herded)

1. (intransitive, Scotland) To act as a herdsman or a shepherd.
2. (transitive) To form or put into a herd.
3. (transitive) To move or drive a herd.

   I heard the herd of cattle being herded home from a long way away.

• Appendix:English collective nouns
• drove
• gather
• muster
• round up
• ride herd on

herd

1. Alternative form of herde (“herd”)

herd

1. Alternative form of herde (“herder”)

herd

1. Alternative form of hird (“household”)

herd

1. imperative of herde

From Old Norse herðr.

• hær, hør

• IPA^(key): /hæːr/

herd f (definite singular herda, indefinite plural herdar or herder, definite plural herdane or herdene)

1. shoulder

   Synonyms: skulder, aksel

• herda

herd (neuter herdt, definite singular and plural herde)

1. past participle of herde

• “herd” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.
• Ivar Aasen (1850) “Hær”, in Ordbog over det norske Folkesprog‎ (in Danish), Oslo: Samlaget, published 2000

From Proto-West Germanic *herþ.

herd m

1. hearth

• Middle High German: hert
  • Cimbrian: hèart
  • German: Herd
  • Luxembourgish: Häerd