Masses to tell you

 

It doesn’t often happen in Spanish that you find the same word with two totally dissimilar meanings but turba is one of them. It means peat (as in bog) or the horde or a mob of people on the brink of rioting or rampaging that is the opposite of a mass that goes calmly about its business.

The masses referred to by sociologists and dictators are las masas but both a mass or masses of people is una multitud or, more colloquially, a mountainous-sounding but still singular montón de gente. 

Apart from that, masses of anything become muchos or, in the presence of outright abundance muchísimo (which remains singular, though): muchos libros – masses of books or muchísima comida – masses of food.  You can continue to aim high with montones de libros, montones de quejas or montones de comida. 

The English en masse (which in any case is French) is en masa but mass culture is cultura de masas and a mass meeting is una concentración. 

Mass media is los medios de comunicación although the adjective mass can be translated not only as masivo: apoyo masivo – massive support but also colectivo: histeria colectiva – mass hysteria.

To mass-produce is fabricar or producir en serie but to mass in the sense of to meet, gather together is concentrarse. 

An English amass is a Spanish amasar: amasó una gran fortuna – he amassed a great fortune but amasar also means to knead, the action of appreciative cats as they knead their paws and cooks who, appreciative or otherwise, knead masa - dough.

Catalina kneading

Masa means dough as well as pastry but isn’t slang for money whose Spanish equivalent is the carb-laden pasta which, as in English, covers everything from vermicelli to lasagne.  Ser pillado con las manos en la masa is that international embarrassment of to be caught red-handed, literally with your hands in the dough.

The mass that is a church service is misa and although only a small proportion of Spaniards now go to mass regularly, if you hear eso va a misa it means something is set in stone.  ¡Que digan misa! is less than compliant and is the same as let them say what they like!

No puedes estar en misa y repicando – literally you can’t be in Mass and ring the bells too - is the Spanish version of you can’t have your cake and eat it.