# decade

Pronunciation: say "DEK-ayd" /ˈdɛkeɪd/

## Noun

1. A period of ten years, especially one that runs from a year ending in 0 to a year ending in 9.
   - Simple: A length of time that lasts ten years.
   - _Fashion trends from that decade still influence designers today._
   - _Scientists studied climate data spanning several decades._
3. A series of prayers counted on a rosary, usually one Our Father, followed by ten Hail Marys, and ending with a Glory Be.
   - Simple: A set of rosary prayers made up of one Our Father, ten Hail Marys, and a Glory Be.
   - _He finished the first decade and moved his fingers to the next bead._
   - _The congregation prayed several decades during the evening service._
4. The interval between two quantities whose ratio is ten to one, as used on logarithmic scales.
   - Simple: The step between two values when one is ten times the other, as on some graphs.
   - _The amplifier's response was measured across several decades of frequency._
   - _Each decade on a logarithmic axis represents a tenfold change._
5. A ten-day period, especially as a division of the month in the ancient Egyptian or French Revolutionary calendar.
   - Simple: A period of ten days, like those used in some old calendars.
   - _Under the Revolutionary calendar, each decade ended with a day of rest._
   - _In the ancient Egyptian calendar, each thirty-day month was made up of three decades._

## Noun

2. A group, set, or series made up of ten members or items taken together. *(rare)*
   - Simple: A group or set of ten things counted together.
6. A division of a literary work consisting of ten parts or books, such as those of Livy's History of Rome. *(archaic)*
   - Simple: A part of a long book made up of ten sections or volumes.
   - _The first decade of Livy runs from the founding of Rome to its wars with the Samnites._
   - _The third decade of Livy tells the story of Hannibal's war against Rome._

## Other meanings

- (noun) Any of the series of ten consecutive braille characters that share a regular pattern, the first covering the letters A through J.
- (noun) A set of resistors, capacitors, or similar components switched to select equal increments of an electrical value, usually zero through nine times a base value.
- (noun) An electronic counting circuit with ten states, representing the decimal digits zero through nine.

## Origin

This word came through Middle English and Old French from Late Latin "decadem" (a set of ten), which goes back to Ancient Greek "dekás," from "déka" meaning "ten." Its sense of a ten-year span began as a clipping of the phrase "decade of years."

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/decade (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).