twenty, numeral a. and n.
(ˈtwɛntɪ)
Forms: 1 twentiᵹ, (tuentiᵹ, tuoentiᵹ, twoeᵹentiᵹ), 2–6 twenti, 3 (Orm.) twenntiᵹ, 3–6 tuenty, 4–5 tuenti, (4 tuent), 5–7 twentie, 6 tuentie, twentye, (Sc. twantie, Sc. dial. twinti, twenti, tuonti, toontie) 4– twenty.
[OE. twentiᵹ, f. twen- two + tiᵹ (= Goth. tigus, ON. tigr decade: see -ty2): = OFris. twintich, -ech, tweintich, -tig (WFris. tweintich, NFris. twuntich), OS. twentig or twēntig, MDu. twintich (Du. twintig), MLG. twentig, twintig (LG. twintig); OHG. zweinzug, -uc, -och (MHG. zweinzec, -ic, zwênzic, -ig, Ger. zwanzig); the first element is variously explained as a nom. plur. (OE. twéᵹen) and as a dative form. Cf. also ON. tuttugu, -ogu (Norw. tjuge, tjug, Sw. tjugo, MDa. tiuge, Da. tyve), and Goth. twai-tigjus (two decades).
Like the other cardinals in -ty, in OE. orig. a neuter n. followed by a genitive plural: e.g.
c 893 K. ælfred Oros. i. i. 18 Næfde he þeah ma ðonne twentiᵹ hryðera, & twentiᵹ sceapa, & twentiᵹ swyna. 971 Blickl. Hom. 231 Onbid her seofon & twentiᵹ nihta. c 1000 ælfric Gen. xxxi. 38 Wæs ic..mid þe nu twentiᵹ wintra. Ibid. xxxii. 14 Twentiᵹ buccena..and twentiᵹ rammena.]
The cardinal number equal to twice ten: represented by the symbols 20 or xx (formerly sometimes xxti = L. viginti).
A. adj.
1. a. In concord with a n. expressed (or in OE. in plural form with implied n.).
| a 900 Elene 830 (Gr.) On twentiᵹum [MS. xx] fotmælum. c 1000 ælfric Numb. xi. 19 Næs to anum dæᵹe, ne to twam,..ne to tynum, ne to twentiᵹum [daᵹum]. a 1225 Leg. Kath. 2502 Twenti dahene ȝong [= journey]. c 1330 R. Brunne Chron. (1810) 282 Wele tuenti ȝere. 1478 W. Paston in P. Lett. III. 237 He seythe ye be xxtis. in hys dette. 1583 T. Stocker Civ. Warres Lowe C. ii. 48 A great multitude of people, who come twentie mile of to this goodly feast. 1637 Decree Star Chamb. § 15 in Milton Areop. (Arb.) 16 There shall be but Twentie Master Printers allowed to haue the vse of one Presse. 1758 R. Brown Compl. Farmer (1759) 71 A hen sits twenty days. 1853 J. H. Newman Hist. Sk. (1873) II. i. ii. 75 In the course of twenty years a new generation would arise. |
b. Combined with the numerals below ten (
one to
nine) to express the numbers between twenty and thirty; formerly (and still occasionally)
one and twenty,
two and twenty, etc. (rarely
twenty and one, etc.); now commonly
twenty-one,
twenty-two, etc.; similarly with the ordinals from
first to
ninth, forming the ordinals corresponding to the above (
twenty-first,
twenty-second, etc.), in modern use substituted for the earlier
one-and-twentieth,
two-and-twentieth, etc. (see
twentieth A. 1 c).
| c 893 K. ælfred Oros. vi. ii. 256 Þara twa & twentiᵹra monna þe he him to fultume hæfde acoren. a 1131 O.E. Chron. an. 1124 Þes kinges cnihtes..namen..fif and twenti oðre cnihtes. 1297 R. Glouc. (Rolls) 1532 Vif & twenti ȝer. a 1400–50 Alexander 3930 Aȝt & tuenti men of armes. 1526 Proclam. 5 Nov. in Pat. Roll 18 Hen. VIII, ii. m. 2 d, The Soueraygne..shalbe curraunt..for twenty two shillynges and sixe pens. 1596 Dalrymple tr. Leslie's Hist. Scot. ii. xvi. (S.T.S.) I. 150 Four and tuentie cubites hich. 1604 E. G[rimstone] D'Acosta's Hist. Indies iii. xviii. 177, I haue gone ouer twenty and seauen riuers vpon that coast. 1777 Robertson Hist. Amer. (1783) I. ii. 163 In the parallel of twenty-two degrees of latitude. 1794 Stedman Surinam (1813) II. xxv. 224 What he called his Silver⁓feast, being the twenty-fifth anniversary of his marriage. 1820 Southey Wesley I. 53 More than four-and-twenty pounds. 1857 Miller Elem. Chem. (1862) III. 204 Allowing the..mixture to stand for twenty-four hours. |
c. As multiplier before a numeral, usually a higher one, as
† twenty hundred obs. (
= two thousand),
twenty thousand, etc. (often hyperbolically:
cf. d). So
twenty-one thousand, etc.
| c 950 Lindisf. Gosp. Luke xiv. 31 Mið tuoentiᵹum ðusendum [Rushw. twoeᵹentiᵹum ðusenda] cymeð to him. c 1000 Ags. Gosp. ibid., Aᵹen þone þe him aᵹen cymð mid twentiᵹum þusendum. c 1205 Lay. 26824 Twenti hundred cnihten. 1377 Langl. P. Pl. B. xvi. 10, I wolde trauaille..þis tree to se twenty hundreth myle. c 1386 Chaucer Manciple's T. 65 Yet hath this brid by twenty thousand foold Leuere in a fforest..Goon ete wormes. 1500–20 Dunbar Poems l. 16 Off the Glen Quhettane twenti scoir He drawe as oxin him befoir. 1592 Shakes. Ven. & Ad. 775 If loue haue lent you twentie thousand tongues. 1847 Tennyson Princess iv. 83, I would pipe and trill, And cheep and twitter twenty million loves. Mod. Twenty thousand pounds sterling. Twenty million dollars. |
d. Used vaguely or hyperbolically for a large number.
† a twenty devil way: see
devil n. 19.
| c 1470 Golagros & Gaw. 970 His scheild he chopit hym fra In tuenty pecis and ma. 1513 Douglas æneis i. Prol. 260 A twenty devill mot fall his werk at anis. 1592 Shakes. Ven. & Ad. 575 Were beautie vnder twentie locks kept fast. 1622 Bacon Hen. VII 228 Vpon Twentie respects hee could not haue beene the Man. 1748 Richardson Clarissa II. xxviii. 164, I only came..to sit and talk of twenty and twenty fond things, as I used to do. 1848 Buckley Iliad 412 Not even if they should place ten-fold and twenty-times such ransoms. |
e. Phr.
twenty-four hours a day, all the time, incessantly.
| 1914 G. B. Shaw Misalliance p. xl, If we were habitually underworked and overfed, our notion of heaven would be a place where everybody worked strenuously for twenty four hours a day and never got anything to eat. 1942 R.A.F. Jrnl. 13 June 15 The least useful man..is the..type, who is belligerent 24 hours a day. 1951 W. Faulkner Requiem for Nun ii. i. 143 Shut up in that room twenty-four hours a day. 1980 J. Barnett Palmprint xiv. 149 There are American military planes over the Caribbean twenty-four hours a day. |
2. a. With ellipsis of
n. (which may usually be supplied from the context). So
twenty-one,
twenty-first, etc.
† and twenty, used as an intensive.
| c 961 æthelwold Rule St. Benet xxii. 47 (Gr.) [Let them sleep] tynum and twentiᵹum on anum inne ætgædere. [c 1000 ælfric Gen. xviii. 31 God cwæð: Ne do ic hit, ᵹif þær beoð twentiᵹ.] c 1205 Lay. 3387 We mine fader habbet vnderfon mid þirtti cnihten,..Do we awai þane twenti. 13.. Cursor M. 16906 (Cott.) A mikel stan, to turn i-nogh had tuent [rime monument]. 1535 Coverd. Gen. xviii. 31 Peraduenture there might be twentie founde therin. 1601 Shakes. Twel. N. ii. iii. 52 In delay there lies no plentie, Then come kisse me sweet and twentie: Youths a stuffe will not endure. 1605 Rowley When you see me, etc. D ij, Godyegodnight and twentie syr. 1607 Middleton Five Gallants i. i, As in one pie twenty may dip their sippits. 1735 Johnson Lobo's Abyssinia, Descr. xii. 115 The ordinary Dose is six of these Rinds, and I had devour'd twenty. 1897 M. Kingsley W. Africa 550 The first man to reach the summit was Sir Richard Burton... He went up, as did the succeeding twenty-five (mostly Germans) from Babundi. 1902 O. Wister Virginian xxiii, His thermometer..registered twenty below zero. |
b. spec. with ellipsis of
years (of age); so
twenty-one, etc.
| 1773 Goldsm. Stoops to Conq. iii, What will repair beauty at forty, will certainly improve it at twenty. 1836–9 Dickens Sk. Boz, Steam Excurs., He..was smart, spoffish, and eight-and-twenty. 1849 E. B. Eastwick Dry Leaves 83 A young man of twenty. 1898 B. M. Croker Peggy of Bartons xxix, I shall be twenty-one in April. |
c. The ordinals
twenty-first,
twenty-second, etc. are ordinarily used with ellipsis of
day (of the month), also
year (of a reign). Also
twenty-first with ellipsis of
birthday;
cf. twenty-firster.
| 1669 F. Vernon Let. 19 June in Lang Valet's Trag., etc. (1903) 51 My last of the 26{supt}{suph} Currt. 1711 Lond. Gaz. No. 4902/2 The King..was to embark on the Twenty-seventh. 1777 Robertson Hist. Amer. (1783) I. ii. 141 He set sail..on the twenty-fifth of September. 1873 C. M. Yonge Pillars of House I. xi. 229 Here was his twenty-first not very far off. 1879 E. Waterton Pietas Mariana Brit. 78 In the twenty-second of Henry the Seventh. 1886 Stevenson Kidnapped xxvi, The house..where we slept the twenty-first of the month. 1937 ‘M. Innes’ Hamlet, Revenge! i. i. 23 Celebrating a daughter's twenty-first by dressing her in white satin. 1975 ‘J. Lymington’ Spider in Bath vii. 121 My daughter's twenty-first tomorrow. I should have collected a watch from the jeweller. |
d. the twenty (at Rugby School): see
quot. a 1894.
the twenty-four, a body of 24 men having some special office (at various times and places: see
quots.).
| 1440 in Glew Hist. Walsall (1856) 105 The Masters..shall not make gift or graunt of eny donacion of eny Chantrey..withoute the assent of the xxiiij. 1736 Drake Eboracum i. vi. 184 These citizens are commonly called by the name of the twenty four; though they may be more or less than that number. 1857 Hughes Tom Brown ii. viii, How well I remember the day we were put out of the twenty [into the sixth form]. 1890 Gross Gild Merch. II. 347 The governing body is no longer [after 1622] called ‘the twenty-four’..but simply the ‘probi homines’. a 1894 C. H. Pearson in Stebbing Life (1900) 23 Scholarship at Rugby was picked up in the Twenty, a sort of lower sixth. |
e. Phr.
† twenty in the hundred, a 20 per
cent. rate of interest on loans;
transf. a usurer.
twenty to one, twenty chances to one; an expression of very strong probability.
| 1591 Shakes. Two Gent. i. i. 72 Twenty to one then, he is ship'd already. 1602 B. Jonson Poetaster (Qo.) iii. i, Thou art an honest twenty in the hundred. Mod. Ellington won the Derby in 1856 at 20 to 1. |
3. Used for the ordinal
twentieth; so
twenty-one (
one and twenty) for
twenty-first, etc. Now only after a
n. in such collocations as
chapter twenty,
verse twenty-one, etc.
| a 1100 O.E. Chron. (Laud MS.) an. 1086 On þam an & twentiᵹan ᵹeare þæs þe Willelm weolde & stihte Engle land. 1297 R. Glouc. (Rolls) 7105 In þe ȝer of is kinedom tuenty & tuo. c 1375 Sc. Leg. Saints xviii. (Egipciane) 208 One [= on] þe twenty day At þe sexte oure. c 1380 Wyclif Last Age Ch. in Todd 3 Treat. p. xxxv, As Dauiþ seiþ, þe on and twenty Salme. 1544 tr. Littleton's Tenures (1574) 73 Thoughe the horse.. bee not the twentye parte woorth in value of the summe of money. 1567 Gude & Godlie B. 2 The ten commandementis..in Exodus the twentie Chapter. |
B. n. (with plural
twenties).
1. a. The abstract number 20; a symbol representing this. So
twenty-one, etc.
| c 1425 Craft of Nombryng (E.E.T.S.) 22 Take 12 out of twenty, and þere schal leue 8. 1688 R. Holme Armoury iii. 141/1 Country People..reckon..their numbers..by..Scores or Twenty's. 1725 Watts Logic ii. v. §5 Some Things..almost as certain..as that..five Twenties make a Hundred. 1845 Encycl. Metrop. I. 384 The numeral language is constructed in conformity with the Phœnician numerals, proceeding by twenties as far as 100. Mod. Twenty is an even number. A twenty is printed thus: xx, 20. |
b. A person or thing distinguished by this number, usually as the twentieth in a series; so
twenty-one,
twenty-two, etc.
| 1888 H. Morten Sk. Hospital Life 18, I..heard her ask..‘Who is {oqq}Twenty-two{cqq}?’—one of the detestable habits of the place being to call you by the number of your bed. |
2. a. A group or set of twenty persons or things. So (rarely)
a twenty-five, etc.
| 1637 Gillespie Eng. Pop. Cerem. iv. vi. 26 Many societies conveened to the eating of the Paschall Supper by Twenties. 1725 Swift Upright Judge iii. Wks. 1755 IV. i. 64 My grand-dame had gallants by twenties. 1878 Athletic World 6 Dec. 430/1 The game lasting two twenties. 1879 Browning Ned Bratts 34 A twenty-five were tried, rank puritans caught at prayer In a cow-house. |
b. Something equivalent to twenty of some unit,
e.g. a twenty-pound bank-note.
| 1839 Spirit of Times 8 June 162/2 We had the gratification of seeing it [sc. his jockeyship] rewarded by more presents of odd fifties and twenties than probably Daniel ever saw in his lifetime. 1850 Househ. Words 21 Sept. 620/1 There were two twenties, were there not? 1977 Transatlantic Rev. lx. 140 ‘God knows neither of you can call me ungrateful.’ He put a twenty in front of each of them. |
c. A sheet (of a book) folded into 20 leaves (4 × 5), or each leaf of such a sheet. (
Cf. twentymo.)
| 1771 Luckombe Hist. Printing 418 A Sheet of Twenties. 1824 J. Johnson Typogr. II. vii. 172 [headed *28] A Half Sheet of Twenties. |
3. Something characterized in some way by the number twenty. So the compound numerals, as
twenty-four (a flower-pot of which there are 24 in a cast, etc.) See also (in special senses)
twenty-five,
twenty-four.
| 1842 Loudon Suburban Hort. 515 Those that have the strongest roots re-pot into twenty-fours. 1851 Glenny Handbk. Fl. Gard. 251 In June, the potted ones will bear shifting to a size twenty-four. 1895 Daily News 22 Feb. 4/6 From twenties to twenty-fours, that is, from cotton with twenty hanks in the pound to the finer sort of cotton with twenty-four hanks in the pound. |
4. pl. The numbers from 20 to 29; the years in a century or of one's life, or the degrees of any scale (
e.g. of a thermometer) so numbered.
| 1874 Miss Mulock My Mother & I xiv. 301 In their twenties girls feel differently from what they do in their teens. 1886 Athenæum 16 Oct. 495/2 Little Claude Ramsay..in his twenties is always thinking about ‘the draught’. 1886 Seeley Short Hist. Napoleon 262 Had Louis XV died in childhood..there would certainly have been in the twenties a war of the French Succession. 1893 L. Twining Recoll. 242 A temperature in the twenties for some days. 1893 G. Hill Hist. Eng. Dress II. 235 Arrayed in the costume of the twenties. 1894 Voice (N.Y.) 22 Feb., In age I judged them to be near the middle of the twenties. 1898 Kipling in W. Nicholson Almanac of Twelve Sports July, The child of the Nineties..in pursuit of a girl whom The Twenties will dub a ‘last-century heirloom’. 1930, etc. [see roaring twenties s.v. roaring ppl. a. 4]. 1956 A. S. C. Ross in M. Black Importance of Lang. (1962) 97 At Oxford in the late twenties the use of the surname..was a known gaucherie. 1969 Listener 26 June 903/1 A scandalous title, or course, for a book which was, in the Twenties manner, meant to scandalise. 1976 J. Grenfell Joyce Grenfell requests Pleasure (1977) i. 21, I see us now,..our peculiar Twenties figures forced flat by bust-bodices. |
5. attrib. (and
ellipt.) as in
twenty (twenty-two, etc.) port, port wine of the year 1820 (1822, etc.).
| 1860 All Year Round No. 54. 87 Acquainted with 'Twenty port, and comet vintages. 1891 S. Mostyn Curatica 10 Mostyn likes the 22 Port very much. |
C. Combinations.
a. Adjs. or
attrib. phrases formed by
twenty with a
n. (
= measuring, containing, weighing, etc. twenty of the things named), as
twenty-centimetre,
twenty-cubit,
twenty-foot (
† twenty-foot worm, a centipede),
twenty-grain,
twenty-gun,
twenty-inch,
twenty-knot,
twenty-man,
twenty-mark,
twenty-mile,
twenty-minute,
twenty-penny,
twenty-plume (applied to a small species of moth,
Alucita polydactyla),
twenty-pound,
twenty-round,
twenty-shilling,
twenty-yard,
twenty-year; so with compound numerals, as
twenty-five-foot;
twenty-four-feet,
twenty-thread;
twenty-one-inch;
twenty-thousand-ton;
twenty-two-mile, etc. Also
twenty-bore,
twenty-two-gauge, etc. (of a gun: cf
twelve-bore s.v. twelve III. c).
b. Parasynthetic
ns. (see
-er1 1), as
twenty-footer,
twenty-knotter,
twenty-pointer,
twenty-pounder; so with the compound numerals, as
twenty-eight (-four, -five, -six, -thousand, etc.) -pounder,
twenty-one-gunner, etc.
c. Parasynthetic
adjs., as
twenty-breeched,
twenty-coloured.
| 1892 Greener Breech-Loader 43 The *20-bore has been strenuously advocated by writers in the sporting papers, but there are very few sold. 1908 Outlook 29 Aug. 280/1 The light twelve-bores now built especially for ladies' use..weigh no more than sixteen- or even twenty-bore guns of average weight. |
| 1819 Scott Leg. Montrose ii, A soldier of honour shall be dragged..before a base mechanical burgomaster,..as if he were one of their own mean, amphibious, *twenty-breeched boors. |
| 1904 Daily Chron. 28 May 5/4, *20-centimetre guns. |
| 1600 Fairfax Tasso xvi. xxiv, Nor golden Iris so bendes in the aire Her *twentie colour'd bow. |
| 1877 Tennyson Harold iii. i, Golden cherubim With *twenty-cubit wings. |
| 1684 J. Peter Siege Vienna 109 *Twenty eight pounders. |
| 1897 Outing (U.S.) XXX. 355/2 Two twenty-seven-footers,..Rocky John, as the Commodore's *twenty-five-foot craft was dubbed. |
| a 1944 K. Douglas Alamein to Zem Zem (1946) 10, *25-pounders and quads, Bofors guns in pits with their crews lying beside them. 1983 J. Masters Man of War xx. 264 Now came the first shell from the 25-pounders. |
| c 1475 Pict. Voc. in Wr.-Wülcker 766/28 Hic multipes, a *tuentifot-wurme. 1910 Encycl. Brit. X. 258/1 Several large feeding-drains were dug, including the Forty Foot,..the Sixteen Foot river,..and the Twenty Foot river. |
| 1899 Daily News 18 Nov. 4/5 A twenty-foot snake..had a quarrel with a fourteen-foot snake. The fourteen-footer was eating a chicken, which the *twenty-footer coveted. |
| 1825 J. Nicholson Operat. Mechanic 82 The superior velocity of the *24 feet wheel. |
| c 1850 Rudim. Navig. (Weale) 135, *24, 30, and 40-penny nails. |
| 1825 J. Neal Bro. Jonathan III. 380 A few *twenty four pound shot. |
| 1684 J. Peter Siege Vienna 108 *Twenty four pounder. 1769 Falconer Dict. Marine (1789) I iv, A piece that discharges a ball of twenty-four pounds, is called a twenty-four-pounder. |
| 1903 Daily Chron. 30 May 5/1 A light rod and *24-thread line. |
| 1890 Anthony's Photogr. Bull. III. 40 A *twenty-grain solution of gelatine. |
| 1757 J. Lind Lett. Navy i. 34 Captains of *20, 40, and 50 gun ships. |
| 1849 Noad Electricty 92 A *twenty-inch cylinder electrical machine. |
| 1903 Daily Chron. 3 July 8/2 The *twenty-knot wind blowing here to-day. |
| 1898 Harper's Mag. XCVI. 830 They [ships] are to be *twenty-knotters. |
| 1905 Daily Chron. 24 July 7/1 A member of the English *twenty-man team. |
| 1788 J. Skinner Eccl. Hist. Scot. II. 588 These itinerant preachers were..called the ‘*Twenty Merk Men’. 1908 Daily Chron. 4 Aug. 1/2 The Kaiser..rewarded him with a twenty mark piece. |
| 1902 Ibid. 10 May 10/1 Come down to the country and take *twenty-mile walks. 1905 Westm. Gaz. 4 Aug. 6/3 Districts within the twenty-mile radius of London. |
| 1898 Ibid. 27 July 1/1 The *twenty-minute sitting [of the House of Lords]. 1939 Wodehouse Uncle Fred in Springtime xi. 150 No matter how suave her manner for the nonce, she is at heart a twenty-minute egg. |
| 1900 Daily Chron. 31 Aug. 5/1 The Gaekwar is a ‘*twenty-one gunner’—one of the three Indian Princes who alone are entitled to the royal salute. |
| 1794 W. Hutchinson Hist. Cumberld. I. 175 note, 3l. a year customary rent..with a *twenty-penny fine. |
| 1908 Westm. Gaz. 11 Sept. 10/1 Some remarkably fine heads have been secured in Highland deer forests... A *twenty-pointer was killed by Lord Burton..fifteen years ago. |
| 1761–2 Hume Hist. Eng. (1806) III. 800 The small proprietors, or *twenty-pound men. 1822 Galt Provost xxx, I received a twenty-pound note. |
| 1861 W. F. Collier Hist. Eng. Lit. 403 A silver-scaled *twenty-pounder [salmon]. 1891 S. C. Scrivener Our Fields & Cities 39 Persons paying rates on twenty pounds... These twenty-pounders. |
| 1899 Daily News 12 Jan. 7/5 A *twenty-round glove fight. |
| 1797 Chron. 4 Mar., in Ann. Reg. 14/1 *Twenty shilling Notes were issued by the Bank of England. 1855 Macaulay Hist. Eng. xxii. IV. 698 The ministers at one time resolved to issue twentyshilling bills..for the payment of the troops. |
| 1684 J. Peter Siege Vienna 109 *Twenty six pounders. |
| 1756 Connoisseur No. 121 ¶6 A careful old gentleman came..to marry his son, and was recommended..to a *twenty thousand pounder. |
| 1909 Daily Chron. 25 Sept. 5/5 The nineteen or *twenty-thousand ton Dreadnoughts. |
| 1840 D. P. Blaine Encycl. Rur. Sports §2430 The higher the number of bullets [to the pound], the smaller is the caliber... Mr. Joseph Manton..recommends two-feet-eight and *twenty-two gauge as a general sporting length and bore of gun-barrel. |
| 1902 Westm. Gaz. 7 Nov. 2/1 A *twenty-two-mile bridge across the Great Salt Lake. |
| 1903 Ibid. 23 Oct. 3/1 You practically never see a *twenty-yard putt go ten yards off the line of the hole. |
| 1902 Ibid. 2 Sept. 8/2 Rated..heavily upon the *twenty-year endowment plan. |
d. Special
Comb.:
twenty-first century attrib. or as adj., living in the twenty-first century; characteristic of the imagined conditions of the twenty-first century;
twenty-four carat a. colloq., (
a) thoroughgoing, unalloyed, out-and-out; (
b) genuine, flawless, trustworthy;
twenty-four-hour attrib., (
a) lasting twenty-four hours; (
b) of or pertaining to a system of reckoning the time whereby the hours of the day are numbered from one to twenty-four; (
c) operating all day and all night, round-the-clock;
twenty questions, a parlour game in which one party is allowed twenty questions (answered by either ‘yes’ or ‘no’) to discover the object of the other's thoughts;
spec. the name of a popular radio panel game;
Twenty-six Counties, the counties which by the Irish peace agreement of 1921–2 formed the Irish Free State, now the Republic of Ireland;
cf. Six Counties s.v. six a. 1 d;
twenty-twenty (also
20/20)
Ophthalm., the Snellen fraction for normal visual acuity, expressed in feet;
colloq. used to denote good eyesight; also
fig.;
twenty-two carat a. colloq. = twenty-four carat (
b) above; also
ellipt. as
twenty-two.
| 1964 D. Francis Nerve iii. 37 He was what I pictured *twenty-first century man should be—intensely alive, curiously innocent. 1979 D. Brierley Cold War v. 49 The computer{ddd}it's very big, very expensive, very twenty-first century. 1980 Jrnl. R. Soc. Arts July 467/2 Everyone in the country must adapt to twentyfirst-century living and working patterns. |
| 1900 Sarah Grand Babs lxxxi, A regular *twenty-four carat cad—without alloy. 1965 D. Francis Odds Against iii. 40 It is you..who is the dyed-in-the-wool, twenty-four carat, unmitigated bastard. 1968 Times 21 Dec. 2/3 The legs in thigh-length boots are still lissom, 24 carat. 1974 G. Jenkins Bridge of Magpies v. 71 I'd accepted her story as 24-carat. 1984 Times 7 Mar. 28 The rest..had to work up real 24-carat grins. |
| 1908 Westm. Gaz. 25 May 5/2 The *twenty-four-hour trip across the country. 1919 in Cook's Continental Time-Table (1973) Mar. p. vi/2 Cook's Continental Time-Table...Based on the 24-Hour System. 1947 Crowther & Whittington Science at War 7 A continuous twenty-four-hour watch for strange aircraft started. 1975 C. Egleton Skirmish xvii. 169 He had located a twenty-four hour service station and had had the tyre repaired. 1978 H. Kemelman Thursday the Rabbi walked Out (1979) xxix. 141, I got sick. It was this twenty-four-hour bug. 1978 G. Vaughan Belgrade Drop i. 11 A clipboard..contained dates, 24-hour clock times, and a short, neatly typed entry against each. |
| 1786 H. More Lett. (1925) 107 Mrs Fielding and I..diverted ourselves with teaching Sir Joshua and Lord Palmerston the play of *twenty questions. 1846 R. Bell Life of Rt. Hon. George Canning x. 255 Canning proposed that they should play at ‘Twenty Questions’. They had never heard of this game. 1930 ‘Hay’ & Wodehouse Baa, Baa, Black Sheep i. ii. 21 All right, a vicarage garden. What are we playing at? Twenty Questions, or something? 1979 E. H. Gombrich Sense of Order iv. 104 This can be done by a simple series of yes or no answers which allows a questioner to locate an item on a given grid as in the game of Twenty Questions. |
| 1922 Times 6 June 16/2 The requirement that Ulster shall deliberately ‘contract out’ of the arrangements made between Great Britain and the *twenty-six Southern counties. Ibid., If Mr. Griffith is right in claiming all but two per cent. of the population in the twenty-six counties as supporters of the Treaty. 1949 C. Graves Ireland Revisited viii. 102 The Bantrymen have always provided a strong contingent in the Government of the Twenty-six Counties ever since 1922. 1978 [see south n. 2 a]. 1979 W. Nelson Minstrel Code vi. 45 The garage..belonged to a brother-in-law of one of the Sinn Fein leaders in the Twenty-Six Counties... O'Hagan explained that, within the IRA, no one talked of the ‘Irish Republic’ by any term other than this. |
| 1875 T. Longmore Man. Instructions Army testing Vision (ed. 2) iii. 46 The 20-feet types are read at 20 feet, the 30-feet types at 30 feet; then V. = *20/20 or 30/30, and the acuteness of vision is normal. 1945 L. Shelly Jive Talk Dict. 35 Twenty twenty, excellent. 1951 E. F. Tait Textbk. Refraction ii. 16 The visual acuity of healthy corrected eyes may be much better or considerably worse than that represented by the 6/6 or 20/20 standard. 1956 ‘E. McBain’ Cop Hater (1958) iii. 21 Having 20/20 vision without glasses..he..had been appointed a patrolman. 1962 Flight International LXXXI. 426/2 Perfect eyesight is denoted as 20/20 vision, and the newest expression in the US air transport business—ruefully coined, we believe, by somebody in Convair—is 20/20 hindsight. Hindsight, of the 20/20 kind, abounds in plenty. But the aviation business is more interested in 20/20 foresight, because it can prevent people from losing a lot of money. 1977 H. Greene FSO-1 ix. 83 We're looking back with twenty-twenty hindsight, now. 1981 P. Turnbull Deep & Crisp & Even ix. 162 He had 20:20 vision... He glimpsed a black shape. |
| 1962 R. Cook Crust on its Uppers iv. 45 You come out *twenty-two carat. Ibid. 47, I tell you they're absolutely twenty-two. 1974 W. J. Burley Death in Stanley Street ii. 46 I've got a twenty-two carat alibi. 1981 J. Barnett Firing Squad vi. 61 Lady Lowderton was no nutter and her title was twenty-two carat. |
______________________________
Add:
[B.] 6. Citizens' Band Radio slang. [Shortened
f. 10–20 in the ‘ten-code’ (see
ten a. D. 2).] (One's) location or position.
orig. and chiefly
U.S.| 1975 Heavy Duty Trucking May 31/2 Twenty, location. Ibid. 33/1 One never hears them giving their ‘Home 20’ (address). 1976 CB Mag. June 114 (caption) My twenty is the super market parking lot. 1981 Times 5 Mar. 16/8 What is your rough twenty? 1985 Citizens' Band May 17/2 Thank you Silver Fox for your excellent work in what is a very important area, with..all the fender-benders that occur around that twenty. |
[C.] [d.] twenty-pence piece, a cupro-nickel heptagonal coin worth twenty (new) pence, introduced in the
U.K. in 1982; also, the corresponding coin in the Republic of Ireland.
| [1971 Final Rep. Decimal Currency Board iii. 5, in Parl. Papers 1971–2 IX. 917 The Board's view is that, if an additional coin is provided at some future date, it should be a 20p rather than a 25p.] 1981 Economist 21 Mar. 91/3 The 20 pence piece also finds a predecessor in the old double-florin. 1982 Times 27 Jan. 4/4 The Government shortly hoped to issue a 20 pence piece. 1990 N.Y. Times 27 May v. 17/2 Ireland even features the horse on its currency, on the 20-pence piece. |