Decennaries

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A period of ten years; a group of ten-year intervals treated together; the numerical representation of a time span that is established in decades
2. A span of time lasting ten years; multiple decades considered as a collective time frame; a unit of temporal measurement encompassing ten-year increments
3. The duration of ten years; a series of ten-year periods viewed collectively; an interval that refers to a specific length of time defined by decades

Etymology: "Decennaries" is simply the plural of "decennary," a noun for a span of ten years. The singular comes from Medieval Latin "decennārius," a variant of "decanarius," meaning something containing ten items or related to the number ten. That Medieval Latin form drew on the older Latin "decennis," meaning "of ten years," which is built from "decem" (ten) and "annus" (year). The English ending "-ary" is the same suffix found in words like "dictionary" and "anniversary," marking something connected with a set number. The word therefore carries its arithmetic on its face: a decennary is a ten-year period, and its Latin ancestors were counting the same thing. The plural form simply applies this unit to more than one stretch of time, as in histories organised into several decennaries.

Synonyms: decades, ten-year periods