1.A collection, body, or society of persons engaged in common pursuits, or having common duties and interests, and sometimes, by charter, peculiar rights and privileges; as, a college of heralds; a college of electors; a college of bishops. "The college of the cardinals." "Then they made colleges of sufferers; persons who, to secure their inheritance in the world to come, did cut off all their portion in this."
2.A society of scholars or friends of learning, incorporated for study or instruction, esp. in the higher branches of knowledge; as, the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge Universities, and many American colleges. Note: In France and some other parts of continental Europe, college is used to include schools occupied with rudimentary studies, and receiving children as pupils.
3.A building, or number of buildings, used by a college. "The gate of Trinity College."
4.Fig.: A community. (R.) "Thick as the college of the bees in May."
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