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hoard

Pronunciation: /hɔːd/

Translate hoard | into French | into German | into Italian | into Spanish
Definition of hoard

noun

  • a stock or store of money or valued objects, typically one that is secret or carefully guarded:he came back to rescue his little hoard of gold
  • an ancient store of coins or other valuable artefacts:a hoard of Romano-British bronzes
  • an amassed store of useful information, retained for future use:a hoard of secret information about his work

verb

[with object]
  • accumulate (money or valued objects) and hide or store away:thousands of antiques hoarded by a compulsive collector
  • keep in one’s mind for future use: (as adjective hoarded)a year’s worth of hoarded resentments and grudges

Origin:

Old English hord (noun), hordian (verb), of Germanic origin; related to German Hort (noun), horten (verb)

The words hoard and horde have some similarities in meaning and are pronounced the same, so it is unsurprising that they are sometimes confused. A hoard is ‘a secret stock or store of something’, as in a hoard of treasure, while a horde is a disparaging word for ‘a large group of people’, as in hordes of fans descended on the stage. Instances of hoard being used instead of horde are not uncommon: around a quarter of citations for hoard in the Oxford English Corpus are for the incorrect use.

hoard in other Oxford dictionaries

Definition of hoard in the US English dictionary
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