Centurioun

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. An officer in the ancient Roman army who commanded a century, a unit of about eighty to one hundred soldiers
2. A Roman military officer in charge of a company of roughly a hundred legionaries and responsible for their discipline
3. In the Roman legions, the leader of a century who oversaw training, discipline and the men under his command

Etymology: "Centurioun" is a Middle English spelling of "centurion," the commander of a Roman century, a unit of roughly eighty to a hundred soldiers. The word comes from Latin "centurio," formed from "centuria" (a group of a hundred, from "centum," meaning "hundred") plus an agent suffix. Though the Roman unit was nominally a hundred men, actual strengths varied, which is why the number was never precise in practice. Because the Romans organised their legions around these officers, the title carried real weight. Centurions were the backbone of the army, often promoted from the ranks, and they led their men from the front. The English word reached the language through Old English, where it was borrowed directly from Latin, and it appears in the Gospels, where centurions such as the one at Capernaum appear in the New Testament narrative. That biblical use kept the word in common circulation through the medieval period, which is how the Middle English form "centurioun" came to be recorded.