twenty

A1 Topic:Numbers & Quantity

US /ˈtwɛnti/ UK /ˈtwɛnti/ See IPA manual

Freq #2393

Meanings

1

num
The number 20, which comes after nineteen and before twenty-one.

There were twenty students in the classroom.
2

noun
The number twenty, equal to nineteen plus one.

Count to twenty before you open your eyes.
3

noun
A banknote worth twenty dollars or pounds.

The waiter's face lit up when I gave him a twenty.

Thesaurus

Word family

Forms twenties

Appears in

Proverbs (1)

See all

Hindsight is 20-20
Matching variant: Hindsight is twenty-twenty

Simplified etymology

Twenty is inherited from Old English and comes from the same ancient source as two. It is historically related to such native words as twelve, twain, twilight, and twin.

Etymology

From Middle English twenty, twenti, from Old English twēntiġ (“twenty”, literally “two tens”), from Proto-Germanic *twaintigiwiz, *twai tigiwiz, an old compound of *twain- (“two”) + *-tigaz (“group of ten”), equivalent to two + -ty, or twain + -ty. Cognate with Scots twenty, tuenty (“twenty”), West Frisian tweintich (“twenty”), Dutch twintig (“twenty”), German zwanzig (“twenty”), Danish tyve.

twenty Middle English twēntiġ Old English *twaintigiwiz Proto-Germanic

View etymology graph ->

Topics

Numbers & Quantity

External links

# twenty

**Type:** Word
**Level:** A1
**Part of speech:** num, noun
**IPA (US):** /ˈtwɛnti/
**IPA (UK):** /ˈtwɛnti/
**Frequency rank:** 2393

## Meanings
1. The number 20, which comes after nineteen and before twenty-one.
2. The number twenty, equal to nineteen plus one.
3. A banknote worth twenty dollars or pounds.

## Examples
- There were twenty students in the classroom.
- Count to twenty before you open your eyes.
- The waiter's face lit up when I gave him a twenty.

## Roots and Affixes
- Root: twenty
- Root: twēntiġ
- Root: *twaintigiwiz

## Etymology
From Middle English twenty, twenti, from Old English twēntiġ (“twenty”, literally “two tens”), from Proto-Germanic *twaintigiwiz, *twai tigiwiz, an old compound of *twain- (“two”) + *-tigaz (“group of ten”), equivalent to two + -ty, or twain + -ty. Cognate with Scots twenty, tuenty (“twenty”), West Frisian tweintich (“twenty”), Dutch twintig (“twenty”), German zwanzig (“twenty”), Danish tyve.

## AI Etymology
Twenty is from Middle English twenty, twenti, from Old English twēntiġ (“twenty”, literally “two tens”), from Proto-Germanic *twaintigiwiz, *twai tigiwiz, an old compound of *twain- (“two”) + *-tigaz (“group of ten”), equivalent to two + -ty, or twain + -ty. Cognate with Scots twenty, tuenty (“twenty”), West Frisian tweintich (“twenty”), Dutch twintig (“twenty”), German zwanzig (“twenty”), Danish tyve. In present-day use, it can mean the number 20, which comes after nineteen and before twenty-one, or the number twenty, equal to nineteen plus one.

## Topics
- Numbers & Quantity

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