eleventy

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English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

eleven +‎ -ty, from Old English hundendleftiġ (also spelled hund-endleofantiġ, hund-endlyftiġ, and hund-ælleftiġ). Popularized in the 20th century by J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

Pronunciation[edit]

  • IPA(key): /ɪˈlɛvənti/
  • Audio (UK)(file)

Numeral[edit]

eleventy

  1. (informal) The number 110, 11 × 10.
    Compounds with other numerals: eleventy-one (111), eleventy-six (116), eleventy first (one-hundred and eleventh), etc.
    • 1955 (1974), JRR Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring, pages 43, 54:
      [Bilbo] announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday
      […]
      “Today is my one hundred and eleventh birthday: I am eleventy-one today!”
    • 1980, Janet Caudle, State and Interstate Fishery Jurisdiction: Problems and Progress : Proceedings of a Conference in Raleigh, North Carolina, 1979 : October 29-31, 1979, page 149:
      without having to go back through the thousand and eleventy-three days to alter the plan
    • 2007, Doug Lowe, Networking for Dummies, page 174:
      Eight-Oh-Two-Dot-Eleventy Something [= 802.11a, 802.11b, etc.]
  2. (colloquial) An indefinite large number.
    • May 1921, Margaret Wilson, “A Little Boy's Utopia”, in The Atlantic Monthly, page 670:
      No grown-up people, no babies, no girls. It was a world of boys, eleventy and a hundred strong.
    • 2005, Robert M Sapolsky, Monkeyluv: And Other Essays on Our Lives as Animals, page 19:
      People used to think that the first eleventy letters of the DNA message would comprise Gene 1.
    • 2012 July 3, Marina Hyde, “A lesson in Olymp-o-nomics”, in The Guardian:
      According to a study by me, this generates a multibillion facepalm for the UK economy, making everyone who considers it at least eleventy hundred pounds unhappier.

Related terms[edit]

Translations[edit]

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