Huge means extraordinarily large in bulk, quantity, or extent (a huge ship, a huge portion of ice cream). It's also used to describe things that are without limit (the huge genius of Mozart) and things that are very important or popular (the show was huge in Britain). When we describe something as gargantuan, we mean it’s of an extraordinary or astonishing size, dwarfing other things of its kind (a gargantuan whale, a gargantuan serving of pie). The adjective comes from Gargantua, a grotesque giant with an enormous appetite in the works of Rabelais. It’s frequently used with size and other similar nouns (consuming a gargantuan amount of energy, grown to gargantuan proportions). Like huge, gargantuan can also be used to talk about the seriousness or extent of non-material things, particularly problems: a gargantuan task or undertaking requires a gargantuan effort, which is no big deal for a giant, but for the rest of us seems almost impossible.

The nouns crowd and throng both refer to large numbers of people. Crowd suggests people close enough together to jostle each other and be at least slightly uncomfortable: I had to elbow my way through the crowd to get to the restrooms. Crowds gather and disperse, but are generally standing or, in a stadium, sitting. Throng, on the other hand, suggests a crowd that presses together or forward, often with some common aim: The throng pushed forward to see the cause of the excitement. You will convey movement or commotion as well as large numbers If you speak of a throng, rather than a crowd, of shoppers, reporters, fans, or pilgrims.

Summer is upon us, for better or worse, bringing hot days and some sweltering days. By itself, hot is a fairly neutral term and when used of things, like hot coffee, refers to a measurable property belonging to the thing itself. In terms of weather, hot can be used to describe the physical feeling of great heat (I’m hot), or the conditions causing that feeling (a hot July day). Sweltering suggests a greater degree and particular quality of heat. Sweltering heat is oppressively hot and humid. Furthermore, whether it’s used of a thing (a sweltering day, sweltering temperatures) or a person (You must be sweltering in those jeans) it emphasizes the physical effects on us of such heat—the sweatiness, faintness, and suffocating heaviness. The now obsolete verb swelt meant originally “to perish.”