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Posse started out in English as part of a term from common law, posse comitatus, which in Medieval Latin translates as “power or authority of the county.” Posse comitatus referred to a group of citizens summoned by a reeve (a medieval official) or sheriff to preserve the public peace as allowed for by law. “Preserving the public peace” so often meant hunting down a supposed criminal that posse eventually came to refer to any group organized to make a search or embark on a mission, and today one may read about posses organized for search and rescue efforts. In even broader use it can refer to any group, period. Sometimes nowadays that group is a gang or a rock band but it can as easily be any group—of politicians, models, architects, tourists, children, or what have you—acting together for some shared purpose.
Examples of posse in a Sentence
Brian Tallerico, Vulture, 7 May 2025
Sure, this group’s name is a punchline, lifted from a peewee soccer team that never won a game (the title doesn’t appear until the very end, immediately followed by a different name for this posse).
—Peter Debruge, Variety, 29 Apr. 2025
A lot of other people died, and no one — including Ellie — was in any kind of shape to form a posse.
—Kimberly Roots, TVLine, 27 Apr. 2025
Some of the side plots bog the film down and take away from the core of seeing Rust and Lucas staying one step ahead of those trailing them including a posse formed by Helm along the way, and an encounter with a widow and her son that pads Fimmel’s role.
—Pete Hammond, Deadline, 1 May 2025
See All Example Sentences for posse
Cite this Entry
“Posse.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/posse. Accessed 25 May. 2025.
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posse
noun
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