Definition of "throng"

Not to know me argues yourselves unknown,The lowest of your throng.

1667, John Milton, “Book IV”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […]; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873,

Perhaps you suppose this throng / Can't keep it up all day long?

1885, Gilbert and Sullivan, The Mikado, act 1

Miss Phyllis Morgan, as the hapless heroine dressed in the shabbiest of clothes, appears in the midst of a gay and giddy throng; she apostrophises all and sundry there, including the villain, and has a magnificent scene which always brings down the house, and nightly adds to her histrionic laurels.

1905, Baroness Emmuska Orczy, chapter 2, in The Affair at the Novelty Theatre‎

Here, mingled with the Persians, who were rushing to the higher ground with the same effort as ourselves, we remained motionless until sunrise of the next day, so crowded together that the bodies of the slain, held upright by the throng, could nowhere find room to fall, and that in front of me a soldier with his head cut in two, and split into equal halves by a powerful sword stroke, was so pressed on all sides that he stood erect like a stump.

1939, Ammianus Marcellinus, John Carew Rolfe, Ammianus Marcellinus, volume 1, Harvard University Press, page 463

I imagine throngs of people – well-dressed, sipping spritzes – in front of a boat that, to me, is a coffin which held 700 people.

2019 May 12, Lorenzo Tondo, “I have seen the tragedy of Mediterranean migrants. This ‘art’ makes me feel uneasy”, in The Guardian‎

Bloody corpses, broken bones reveal / A throng of clashes crushed, our nightmare sealed / Amongst the shadows and the stones

2001, Trivium (lyrics and music), “Amongst the Shadows & the Stones”

By one o'clock the place was choc-a-bloc. […] The restaurant was packed, and the promenade between the two main courts and the subsidiary courts was thronged with healthy-looking youngish people, drawn to the Mecca of tennis from all parts of the country.

1935, George Goodchild, chapter 5, in Death on the Centre Court

[…] I have seen the dumb men throng to see him and / The blind to bear him speak: […]

c. 1608–1609 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Coriolanus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act II, scene i]

Much people followed him, and thronged him.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], Mark 5:24

A third is wroth: ‘Is this an hour⁠For private sorrow’s barren song,⁠When more and more the people throngThe chairs and thrones of civil power?’

1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], canto XXI, page 35

Pulling my hat down over my eyes, so as to hide somewhat the emotions which had thronged my countenance, I took a long look at the man whom I so long had sought.

1861, E. J. Guerin, Mountain Charley, page 24

Earth, sweet Earth, sweet landscape, with leavès throng / And louchèd low grass, heaven that dost appeal / To, with no tongue to plead, no heart to feel; / That canst but only be, but dost that long— […]

1882, Gerard Manley Hopkins, “Ribblesdale”, in Robert Bridges, editor, Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins: Now First Published […], London: Humphrey Milford, published 1918, stanza 1, page 54

Mr Shaw was very civil; he said he was rather throng just now, but if Ernest did not mind the sound of hammering he should be very glad of a talk with him.

1903, Samuel Butler, chapter 59, in The Way of All Flesh

[P]eople were having holidays all round the world, though the Glasgow shops and offices and factories were as throng with business as ever.

1992, Alasdair Gray, Poor Things, Bloomsbury, published 2002, page 200