corpus

/ˈkɔrpəs/

/ˈkɔpəs/

Other forms: corpora; corpuses

A corpus is a collection of writings. If you tend to never throw anything away, you might have your entire school corpus, from your first scribbled words to your high school English essays.

The written works of an author, or from one specific time period, can be called a corpus if they're gathered together into a collection or talked about as a group. You could discuss the corpus of Dr. Seuss, for example. Corpus sounds a little like corpse, and that's no coincidence; corpus means "body" in Latin, and though it's come to mean specifically "body of work," the two words are closely related.

Definitions of corpus

1. noun

   a collection of writings
   “he edited the Hemingway corpus”

   type of:

   accumulation, aggregation, assemblage, collection

   several things grouped together or considered as a whole
2. noun

   the main part of an organ or other bodily structure
   type of:

   part, piece

   a portion of a natural object
3. noun

   capital as contrasted with the income derived from it
   synonyms: principal, principal sum

   type of:

   capital

   wealth in the form of money or property owned by a person or business and human resources of economic value