Noun

(dozens)

(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.

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.

*{{quote-magazine, date=2012-03

, author=Lee A. Groat , title=Gemstones , volume=100, issue=2, page=128 , magazine=(American Scientist) citation , passage=Although there are dozens of different types of gems, among the best known and most important are diamond, ruby and sapphire, emerald and other gem forms of the mineral beryl, chrysoberyl, tanzanite, tsavorite, topaz and jade.}}

(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.

Noun

(en noun)

A series or group of ten things.

a decade of soldiers

A period of ten years.

*

The repeated exposure, over decades , to most taxa here treated has resulted in repeated modifications of both diagnoses and discussions, as initial ideas of the various taxa underwent—often repeated—conceptual modification.

* {{quote-magazine

, year=1979 , date=December , title=Museums , magazine=Texas Monthly , volume=7 , issue=12 , page=22 citation , passage=Thru May: 1920s — The Decade That Roared. New exhibition portraying historical events and everyday life during the Roaring Twenties.}}

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-03

, author=David S. Senchina , title=Athletics and Herbal Supplements , volume=101, issue=2, page=134 , magazine=(American Scientist) citation , passage=Athletes' use of herbal supplements has skyrocketed in the past two decades .}}

* 2002 , , The Great Nation , Penguin 2003, p. 481:

The year was divided up into twelve months renamed after the seasons [...]; each month comprised three ‘decades ’ of ten days – with the décadi replacing Sundays as a day of rest; and each day was reconsecrated to a natural product or farming tool or technique.

(Roman Catholicism) A series of ten Hail Marys in the rosary.

(physics, engineering) The interval between any two quantities having the ratio 10 to 1.

There are decades between 1.8 and 18, between 25 and 250 and between 0.03 and 0.003.