There are many words which are used in front of 'of' and a plural noun to refer to a group of things, animals, or people. The commonest ones are given here.
Some words can be used to refer to a wide range of things or people:
assortment, batch, battery, cluster, collection, crop, group, host, selection, set, variety
She joined a group of gossiping villagers in the street.
She may have a collection of old toys left from the time her children were young.
Some words are usually used to refer to people or animals, rather than things:
army, band, crowd, gathering, horde, knot, party, swarm, throng
A large crowd of students gathered to watch the parade.
The couple obliged a horde of journalists with a press conference.
An army of ants crossed the flagstones in two close columns.
◊ indicating shape
Some words indicate the shape of a group of things or people:
circle, column, heap, jumble, line, mound, mountain, pile, ring, row, scatter, scattering, sprinkling, stack, string
He sat down in the middle of the front row of chairs and waited.
Beside her there was a pile of magazines.
The circle of boys broke into applause.
◊ indicating movement or occurrence
Some words indicate the movement or occurrence of a group of things or people:
hail, barrage, flood, rash, series, shower, spate, stream, string, tide, trickle, volley
Throughout the evening an unbroken stream of people came in.
After a spate of protests the authorities reacted by bringing many of them to trial.
◊ typical groups
The following table shows which word is typically used to refer to a group of animals of a particular kind.
The following table shows which word is typically used to refer to a group of people or things of a particular kind.
