century
UK /ˈsɛn.t͡ʃʊɹ.i/ · US /ˈsɛn.(t)ʃ(ə.)ɹi/ noun, proper noun
Forms centuries Centurys
- noun A period of one hundred consecutive years; often specifically a numbered period with conventional start and end dates, e.g., the twentieth century, which stretches from (strictly) 1901 through 2000, or (informally) 1900 through 1999. The first century AD was from 1 to 100.
- noun A unit in ancient Roman army, originally of one hundred army soldiers as part of a cohort, later of more varied sizes (but typically containing sixty to seventy or eighty) soldiers or other men (guards, police, firemen), commanded by a centurion.
- noun A political division of ancient Rome, meeting in the Centuriate Assembly.
- noun A hundred things of the same kind; a hundred.
- noun (cricket) A hundred runs scored either by a single player in one innings, or by two players in a partnership. “He has scored 44 limited-overs centuries.”
- noun (snooker) A score of one hundred points. “That was his tenth professional century.”
- noun (sports) A race a hundred units (as meters, kilometres, miles) in length.
- noun (US, informal) A banknote in the denomination of one hundred dollars.
- proper noun A surname.
Synonyms
age centennium yearhundred centenary centuria hundred 100 C one C
Etymology
From Middle English centurie (“a count of one hundred (of anything); a division of the Roman army; century; a division of land”), from Old French centurie, from Latin centuria, from centum (“one hundred”). The most common modern use is an ellipsis of century of years.
Webster’s 1913
- noun A hundred; as, a century of sonnets; an aggregate of a hundred things. [Archaic.]
- noun A period of a hundred years; as, this event took place over two centuries ago.
Etymology [L. centuria (in senses 1 & 3), fr. centum a hundred: cf. F. centurie. See Cent.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “century”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details