mob

[mob] /mɒb/
noun
1.
a disorderly or riotous crowd of people.
2.
a crowd bent on or engaged in lawless violence.
3.
any group or collection of persons or things.
4.
the common people; the masses; populace or multitude.
5.
a criminal gang, especially one involved in drug trafficking, extortion, etc.
6.
the Mob, Mafia (def 1).
7.
Sociology. a group of persons stimulating one another to excitement and losing ordinary rational control over their activity.
8.
a flock, herd, or drove of animals:
a mob of sheep.
adjective
9.
of, pertaining to, or characteristic of a lawless, irrational, disorderly, or riotous crowd:
mob rule; mob instincts.
10.
directed at or reflecting the lowest intellectual level of the common people:
mob appeal; the mob mentality.
verb (used with object), mobbed, mobbing.
11.
to crowd around noisily, as from curiosity or hostility:
Spectators mobbed the courtroom.
12.
to attack in a riotous mob:
The crowd mobbed the consulate.
13.
Fox Hunting. to chop (a fox).
Origin
1680-90; short for Latin mōbile vulgus the movable (i.e., changeable, inconstant) common people
Related forms
mobber, mobbist, noun
mobbish, adjective
mobbishly, adverb
mobbishness, noun
mobbism, noun
unmobbed, adjective
Examples from the web for mob
  • Take a few of these gentle people, throw them in with a mob and then watch out.
  • One mob recently killed two people that it said had written about the group's activities online.
  • There was a whole mob of people staring at their shoes.
  • If you manage to see anything besides a mob of other people, you will glimpse the bulls for about three seconds.
  • But it can cause ego damage if the mob of students in his course on personal finance gets disorderly online.
  • Some of the violence has in fact been set off by removing mob bosses.
  • It wasn't a rainstorm that residents battened down for, but mob reprisals.
  • Through a series of implausible events, the good brother falls afoul of the bad brother's mob friends.
  • But it was the mob that helped do for her in the end.
  • Then there's the misconception that if you don't pay your debts, the mob will break your legs.
British Dictionary definitions for mob

mob

/mɒb/
noun
1.
  1. a riotous or disorderly crowd of people; rabble
  2. (as modifier): mob law, mob violence
2.
(often derogatory) a group or class of people, animals, or things
3.
(Austral & NZ) a flock (of sheep) or a herd (of cattle, esp when droving)
4.
(often derogatory) the masses
5.
(slang) a gang of criminals
verb (transitive) mobs, mobbing, mobbed
6.
to attack in a group resembling a mob
7.
to surround, esp in order to acclaim: they mobbed the film star
8.
to crowd into (a building, plaza, etc)
9.
(of a group of animals of a prey species) to harass (a predator)
See also mobs
Derived Forms
mobber, noun
mobbish, adjective
Word Origin
C17: shortened from Latin mōbile vulgus the fickle populace; see mobile

MOB

abbreviation
1.
mobile phone
Word Origin and History for mob
n.

1680s, "disorderly part of the population, rabble," slang shortening of mobile, mobility "common people, populace, rabble" (1670s, probably with a conscious play on nobility), from Latin mobile vulgus "fickle common people" (the phrase attested c.1600 in English), from mobile, neuter of mobilis "fickle, movable, mobile" (see mobile (adj.)). In Australia and New Zealand, used without disparagement for "a crowd." Meaning "gang of criminals working together" is from 1839, originally of thieves or pick-pockets; American English sense of "organized crime in general" is from 1927.

The Mob was not a synonym for the Mafia. It was an alliance of Jews, Italians, and a few Irishmen, some of them brilliant, who organized the supply, and often the production, of liquor during the thirteen years, ten months, and nineteen days of Prohibition. ... Their alliance -- sometimes called the Combination but never the Mafia -- was part of the urgent process of Americanizing crime. [Pete Hamill, "Why Sinatra Matters," 1998]
Mob scene "crowded place" first recorded 1922.

v.

"to attack in a mob," 1709, from mob (n.). Meaning "to form into a mob" is from 1711. Related: Mobbed; mobbing.

Slang definitions & phrases for mob

mob

modifier

: mob infiltration/ a mob boss

noun
  1. Any group, gathering, class, etc; bunch: as a member of the ruling mob (1688+)
  2. An underworld grouping; organized-crime family •The older instance refers to ''a number of thieves working together''; the organized-crime sense is found by 1927: a narcotics mob/ the Genovese mob (1839+)

mob

noun

Organized crime; the Mafia; the syndicate: I heard it's controlled by the mob (1927+)


Related Abbreviations for mob

MOB

  1. medical office building
  2. mother of the bride