fourscore, a.
(ˈfɔəskɔə(r))
[f. four a. + score n.]
Four times twenty, eighty. Formerly current as an ordinary numeral; now arch. or rhetorical.
| c 1250 Gen. & Ex. 2911 Fowre score ȝer he was hold. 1297 R. Glouc. (1724) 382 Þo deyde he in þe ȝer of grace of þousend..And four score and seuene. 1340 Hampole Pr. Consc. 754 If in myghtfulnes four score yhere falle, Mare es thair swynk and sorow with-alle. c 1585 R. Browne Answ. Cartwright 58 The fourescore and nynthe Psalme. 1598 Shakes. Merry W. iii. i. 56, I haue liued foure-score yeeres, and vpward. 1600 ― A.Y.L. ii. iii. 74 At seauenteene yeeres, many their fortunes seeke But at fourescore, it is too late a weeke. c 1720 Prior Daphne & Apollo 70 We mortals seldom live above fourscore. 1750 Chesterfield Lett. (1792) II. ccxix. 345 An Italian book..written by one Alberti about fourscore or a hundred years ago. 1870 Bryant Iliad I. ii. 64 Nestor who came To war on Troy with four⁓score ships and ten. 1871 Morley Voltaire (1886) 5 The fourscore volumes which he wrote are the monument..of a new renascence. 1878 O. W. Holmes School-boy (1879) 73 Fourscore, like twenty, has its tasks and toys. |