In English and related languages, several terms involving the words "great" or "gross" relate to numbers involving a multiple of exponents of
twelve (
dozen
A dozen (commonly abbreviated doz or dz) is a grouping of twelve.
The dozen may be one of the earliest primitive integer groupings, perhaps because there are approximately a dozen cycles of the Moon, or months, in a cycle of the Sun, or year ...
):
*A gross refers to a group of
144 items (a dozen dozen or a square dozen, 12
2).
*A great gross refers to a group of
1,728 items (a dozen gross or a cubic dozen, 12
3).
[.][.]
*A small gross or a great hundred refers to a group of
120 items (ten dozen, 10×12).
The term can be abbreviated ''gr.'' or ''gro.'', and dates from the early 15th century. It derives from the Old French ''grosse douzaine'', meaning "large dozen”. The continued use of these terms in measurement and counting represents the
duodecimal
The duodecimal system, also known as base twelve or dozenal, is a positional numeral system using twelve as its base. In duodecimal, the number twelve is denoted "10", meaning 1 twelve and 0 units; in the decimal system, this number is i ...
number system. This has led groups such as the
Dozenal Society of America to advocate for wider use of "gross" and related terms instead of the
decimal
The decimal numeral system (also called the base-ten positional numeral system and denary or decanary) is the standard system for denoting integer and non-integer numbers. It is the extension to non-integer numbers (''decimal fractions'') of th ...
system.
[.]
See also
*
Long hundred
The long hundred, also known as the great hundred or twelfty, is the number 120 (in base-10 Hindu-Arabic numerals) that was referred to as ''hund,'' ''hund-teontig,'' ''hundrað'', ''hundrath'', or ''hundred'' in Germanic languages prior to the ...
References
Integers
Units of amount
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