Noun

Singular dozen

Plural dozen when used attributively, dozens otherwise

dozen (plural dozen when used attributively, dozens otherwise)

  1. (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.
  2. (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.
  3. (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.

Synonyms

Antonyms

  • (followed by of: a large number of): few

Derived terms

terms derived from dozen

From Wiktionary under the GNU Free Documentation License.
Thu Mar 4 06:44:29 2010

Dozen is another word for the number twelve. The dozen may be one of the earliest primitive groupings, perhaps because there are approximately a dozen cycles of the moon or months in a cycle of the sun or year. The dozen is convenient because its multiples and divisors are convenient: 12 = 2 × 2 × 3, 3 × 4 = 2 × 6, 60 = 12 × 5, 360 = 12 × 30. The use of twelve as a base number, known as the duodecimal system (also as dozenal), probably originated in Mesopotamia (see also sexagesimal). Twelve dozen (12 = 144, the duodecimal 100) are known as a gross; and twelve gross (12 = 1,728, the duodecimal 1,000) are called a great gross, a term most often used when shipping or buying items in bulk. A great hundred, also known as a small gross, is 120 or ten dozen (a dozen for each finger on both hands). A baker's dozen, also known as a long dozen, is thirteen.

The English word dozen comes from the old form of the French word douzaine, meaning "a group of twelve" ("Assemblage de choses de même nature au nombre de douze" - (translation: A group of twelve things of the same nature as defined in the eighth edition of the Dictionnaire de l'Académie française). This French word [4] is a derivation from the cardinal number douze ("twelve", from Latin duodĕcim) and the collective suffix -aine (from Latin -ēna), a suffix also used to form other words with similar meanings such as quinzaine (a group of fifteen), vingtaine (a group of twenty), centaine (a group of one hundred), etc. These French words have synonymous cognates in Spanish: docena [5] [6] [7], quincena, veintena, centena, etc. English dozen, French douzaine, German Dutzend, Dutch dozijn and Spanish docena, are also used as indefinite quantifiers to mean "about twelve" or "many" (as in "a dozen times", "dozens of people").

From Wikipedia under the GNU Free Documentation License
Mon Feb 22 15:16:45 2010

Use generating functions to find the number of ways to choose a dozen bagels from three varieties?
Q. Use generating functions to find the number of ways to choose a dozen bagels from three varieties egg, salty, and plain if at least two bagels of each kind but no more than three salty bagels are chosen. Please show your work. Thanks in advance!
Asked by Jean-Francois - Sat Jan 26 23:22:21 2008 - - 1 Answers - 0 Comments

A. Hi, since there must be 2 bagels of each kind, the maximum number of egg and plain bagels are 8. so their generating functions are x^2 + x^3 + ... + x^8. on the other hand, the generating function for salty bagel is just x^2 + x^3. So you want to find the coefficient of x^12 in f(x) = (x^2 + x^3 + ... + x^8)^2 * (x^2 + x^3). (x^2 + x^3 + ... + x^8)^2 is easy to expand since it follows a symmetric pattern. (x^2 + x^3 + ... + x^8)^2 = x^4 + 2x^5 + 3x^6 + 4x^7 + 5x^8 + 6x^9 + 7x^10 + 6x^11 + 5x^12 + ... 2x^15 + x^16 so f(x) = (x^4 + 2x^5 + 3x^6 + 4x^7 + 5x^8 + 6x^9 + 7x^10 + 6x^11 + 5x^12 + ... + 2x^15 + x^16) * (x^2 + x^3) you can then distribute the expansion to x^2 + x^3. f(x) = x^2 (x^4 + 2x^5 + 3x^6 + 4x^7 + 5x^8 + 6x^9 + 7x^10 +… [cont.]
Answered by Derek C - Sun Jan 27 00:07:43 2008

How much should I charge for a dozen homemade cookies?
Q. My mom is making them for a bake sale at her work and they usualy sale real well, but for some reason we have got very few orders this year. We are charging 5 bucks for a dozen and we were wondering if that is just too much and thats why noboby wants to order them.
Asked by Karaokaholic - Thu Nov 15 14:25:48 2007 - - 7 Answers - 0 Comments

A. Look heres the secret. Add a little "secret ingredient" Im in Colombia you know what that would be.. Be creative... Id personally add cannabis sativa so they would be hungry for more.
Answered by Anyone but Obama in 2012! - Thu Nov 15 14:29:38 2007

10 Double Egg Yolks out of a Dozen?
Q. I bought a dozen caged eggs as they were the only ones available( damn it ) and 10 of the eggs had double yolks.What's happening to caged chickens? Their food must have hormones or something put back in the grain? I know this type of industry is supposed to keep watch on these things, but i have a feeling there's something going wrong here.?.What do you think? Any suggestions?
Asked by angels - Mon Mar 17 08:31:49 2008 - - 4 Answers - 0 Comments

A. That hardly ever happens to me. When it does I get so excited. I think you got lucky on that. There should be nothing wrong with that.
Answered by brandie b - Mon Mar 17 10:30:56 2008

From Yahoo Answer Search: "dozen"
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From Google News Search: "dozen"
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no that s not me that s a pic of my cousins my puppy he s so pretty my first rose from ryan thanks baby a dozen white roses then he asked me out And another one from my baby yea for me

From Yahoo Image Search: "dozen"
Thu Feb 4 22:58:09 2010

A DOZEN THINGS I HATE ABOUT POLITICS | reelman's Diary
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hu, 04 Mar 2010 02:13:25 GM

A . DOZEN. things i hate about politics 1.. Watching the elected avoid microphones, meetings or respect for their constituents 2.. Watching the elected point at.

Nike One Vapor Dozen Golf Balls | Golf Travel Insurance Online
golftravelinsuranceonline.com
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hu, 04 Mar 2010 00:31:44 GM

Ultimate tour-level performance, distance, accuracy, control and feelFeaturing 4-piece construction, seamless urethane cover and power transfer.

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Earlier this month, we wrote about some of the mammoth venture deals that helped add up to $355 million worth of investments in Massachusetts startups in.

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