Obs. Forms: 1 þrymm, 1–2 þrym, 3–4 þrum, 4 þrom, 4–5 throm, throme, 5 thrumme. [app. OE. þrymm a host, a great body of people, a multitude (also strength, might, majesty, glory); cf. OS. thrumme in mid heruthrummeon ‘with hostile power or strength’; cf. OS. thrimman to swell; also Flemish drommen in THRUM v.1]
1. A company or body of people (or animals); a band, troop, crowd; on a thrum, in a body, in a crowd. Also, a bundle (of arrows, quot. c. 1450). Also attrib. † þrum-ferd (FERD sb.1 3).
a. 800. Cynewulf, Christ (Cod. Exon.), 1063. Se engla þrym.
c. 1000. Ælfric, Saints’ Lives, xxv. 841. Se hundredes ealdor … com on ærne merʓen mid mycclum þrymme.
c. 1205. Lay., 1356. Þer heo leof folc funden feower þrum ferden.
c. 1330. Arth. & Merl., 211. Whiles þou were in our þrome, No were we neuer ouercome.
a. 1350. St. Andrew, 209, in Horstm., Altengl. Leg. (1881), 6. Þe folk thrang efter al on a þrum.
c. 1400. Laud Troy Bk., 13236. Thei schal alle dye on a throme.
c. 1430. Syr Gener. (Roxb.), 2949. A hundred houndes on a throm He saw that were thider com.
c. 1450. Ball. Death Robin Lyth, 48 (Ritson). Fowre and twenty goode arwys Trusyd in a thrumme.
2. Magnificence, splendor.
971. Blickl. Hom., 77. Emb þone þrym and þa fæʓernesse ðæs temples.
c. 1175. 12th Cent. Hom., 130. Þenne beoð þa welæn & þa glengæ aȝotene, & þe þrym tobrocen.
