dozen
Definition from Wiktionary, the free dictionary
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English[edit]
Etymology[edit]
From French douzaine (“a group of twelve”), from douze (“twelve”) + -aine (“-ish”), from Latin duodecim (“twelve”) (from duo (“two”) + decem (“ten”)) + -ana (“-ish”)
Pronunciation[edit]
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Audio (US) (file)
- Rhymes: -ʌzən
Noun[edit]
dozen (plural dozen when used attributively, dozens otherwise)
- (countable) A set of twelve.
- Can I have a dozen eggs, please?
- I ordered two dozen doughnuts.
- There shouldn't be more than two dozen Christmas cards left to write.
- Pack the shirts in dozens, please.
- (as plural only, always followed by of) A large, unspecified number of, comfortably estimated in small multiples of twelve, thus generally implied to be significantly more than ten or twelve, but less than perhaps one or two hundred; many.
- There must have been dozens of examples just on the first page.
- There were dozens and dozens of applicants before the job was posted.
- (metallurgy) An old English measure of ore containing 12 hundredweight.
- 1957, H.R. Schubert, History of the British Iron and Steel Industry, p. 139
- The dozen as a measure for iron ore remained almost completely constant at 12 cwts. during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
- 1957, H.R. Schubert, History of the British Iron and Steel Industry, p. 139
Synonyms[edit]
- (followed by of: a large number of): a great deal of, a lot of, heaps of, hundreds of, loads of, lots of, many, millions of, scores of, scads of, thousands of
Antonyms[edit]
- (followed by of: a large number of): few
Derived terms[edit]
terms derived from dozen
Translations[edit]
twelve
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dozens: a large number
See also[edit]
Anagrams[edit]
Dutch[edit]
Noun[edit]
dozen
