Troupe

How to spell troupe

6 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce troupe

What does troupe mean?

1. nounA company of actors, dancers, or other entertainers who work and often tour together.

Troupe in a sentence

• The dance troupe rehearsed the new routine every evening before the tour.

• A travelling theatre troupe performed the play in three different towns.

Where does troupe come from?

Language of origin: French

This word came into English in the early nineteenth century directly from the French troupe, meaning a company or band of people, and especially a group of stage performers who travel and work together. The French noun is the same word that English had already borrowed centuries earlier in the more military form troop, both tracing back to a Late Latin word troppus, meaning a flock or herd. The underlying idea in every form is a gathered group moving together, whether soldiers, cattle, or actors. English kept the unaltered French spelling troupe specifically to mark the theatrical sense and to separate it from troop, the soldiers and the scout group. That deliberate split is the whole spelling trap: the silent French -e and the ou both survive precisely because the word stayed close to its French theatre origins.

How the word is built

• troupe (a company; French borrowing, related to troop, a band or group)

Words that sound like troupe

They sound the same but mean different things, so the meaning decides which spelling to write.

• troop: A body of soldiers, especially a unit of cavalry or armoured forces.