corps

1. governmentA battlefield formation composed of two or more divisions.
2. An organized group of people united by a common purpose.

   diplomatic corps

   1 more example

   White House press corps

1. A corps de ballet.

   The performers were all creditable dancers as well as comedians […] even the largest of them cavorted about en pointe with wonderful ease, and the corps work was extremely precise in its inaccuracies.

   1981 December 12, David Foushee, “Pushing the Edges”, in Gay Community News, volume 9, number 21, page 6

1. pluralplural of corp

plural corpses

1. obsoleteObsolete spelling of corpse.

   Did I poſſeſs the power of reſuſcitation, I would reanimate thy lifeleſs corps, and cheriſh thee in the warmeſt corner of thy favourite dwelling-place.

   1788, [Vicesimus Knox], Winter Evenings: or, Lucubrations on Life and Letters, volume II, Dublin: […] Messrs. Chamberlaine, Moncrieffe, White, […], page 70

   3 more examples

   How to keep the corps ſeven dayes from corruption by anointing and waſhing, without exenteration, were an hazardable peece of art, in our choiſeſt practiſe.

   1658, Thomas Browne, Hydriotaphia, Urne-Buriall, or, A Discourse of the Sepulchrall Urnes Lately Found in Norfolk […], London: […] Hen. Brome […], page 16

   To mee, who with eternal Famin pine, / Alike is Hell, or Paradiſe, or Heaven, / There beſt, where moſt with ravin I may meet; / Which here, though plenteous, all too little ſeems / To ſtuff this Maw, this vaſt unhide-bound Corps.

   1667, John Milton, “Book IX”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 597–601

   The women looked like dead bodies; and never did I see such a sepulchral appearance as their dress and colourless faces exhibited, they were all dressed alike in drab gowns, white neck kerchiefs, and a cap fitting close over their ears, and fastened under the chin, the same sort as are placed on a corps.

   1818, John Palmer, Journal of Travels in the United States of North America, and in Lower Canada, Performed in the Year 1817: […], London: […] Sherwood, Neely, and Jones, […], page 92