noun

• (historical, plural phalanxes) An ancient Greek and Macedonian military unit that consisted of several ranks and files (lines) of soldiers in close array with joined shields and long spears.
• (historical sociology) A Fourierite utopian community; a phalanstery.
  "[Charles Fourier] calculated that if precisely 1,620 men, women and children were collected in a 6,000-acre phalanx, they would — all by merrily following their individual passions — end up satisfying all the phalanx’s essential needs."
• (plural phalanxes or (rare) phalanges) A large group of people, animals or things, compact or closely massed, or tightly knit and united in common purpose.
  "The monarch hath gone, but his rocky throne Still rests on its frowning base; Its motionless guards rise in phalanx lone, And nought save the winds through their helmets that moan, And none but those bosoms and hearts of stone Sigh o'er a fallen race."
• (anatomy, plural phalanges) One of the bones of the finger or toe.