Merriam-Webster's Collegiate® Dictionary, 11th Edition
PEOPLE
I. noun (plural people)
Etymology: Middle English peple, from Anglo-French pople, peple, peuple, from Latin populus
Date: 13th century
human beings making up a group or assembly or linked by a common interest, human beings, persons, the members of a family or kinship, the mass of a community as distinguished from a special class , a body of persons that are united by a common culture, tradition, or sense of kinship, that typically have common language, institutions, and beliefs, and that often constitute a politically organized group, lower animals usually of a specified kind or situation, the body of enfranchised citizens of a state, peopleless adjective
II. transitive verb (peopled; peopling)
Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French popler, poeplier, from pople
Date: 15th century
to supply or fill with people, to dwell in ; inhabit