fourscore

See also: four-score and four score

English

Alternative forms

• four score, four-score

Etymology

From four +‎ score.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈfɔːskɔː/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈfɔɹskɔɹ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Numeral

fourscore

1. (now archaic) Eighty.
   • c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene i], page 173:

     Thou ſtick'ſt a dagger in me, I ſhall neuer ſee my gold againe, foureſcore ducats at aſitting, foureſcore ducats.

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Numbers 4:48:

     Euen thoſe that were numbꝛed of them, were eight thouſand, and fiue hundꝛed, and foureſcoꝛe.

   • 1820, [Walter Scott], chapter XI, in The Abbot. […], volume III, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne & Co.] for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and for Archibald Constable and Company, and John Ballantyne, […], →OCLC, page 353:

     “I could be sorry for these men,” he said, “ay, and for that poor Queen, but what avail earthly sorrows to a man of fourscore?—and it is a rare dropping morning for the early colewort.”

   • 1863 November 19, Abraham Lincoln, Dedicatory Remarks (Gettysburg Address)‎^[1], near Soldiers' National Cemetery, →LCCN, Bliss copy, page 1:

     Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

   • 1914, Saki, ‘The Cobweb’, Beasts and Superbeasts:

     Old Martha was standing at a table trussing a pair of chickens for the market stall as she had trussed them for nearly fourscore years.

2. (idiomatic) A full-length life, reckoned as eighty years.

   Synonym: (dated, of biblical origin) three score and ten

   • 1986 November 24, Susan Sontag, “The Way We Live Now”, in The New Yorker‎^[2]:

     […] I know every life is equally sacred, but that is a thought, another thought, I mean, all these valuable people who aren’t going to have their normal fourscore as it is now, these people aren’t going to be replaced, and it’s such a loss to the culture.

Related terms

• four score and seven years ago

Translations

4×20

• Bulgarian: осемдесет (osemdeset)
• Catalan: vuitanta (ca)
• Dutch: tachtig (nl)
• French: quatre-vingts (fr), (Switzerland) huitante (fr)
• German: achtzig (de)
• Irish: cheithre fichid
• Spanish: ochenta (es)
• Welsh: pedwar ugain (cy)

See also

• twoscore

Noun

fourscore (plural fourscores)

1. A quantity or amount of eighty.
   • 1922, James Edward Carruthers, Memories of an Australian Ministry, 1868 to 1921, page 125:

     W. J. Davis, a retired missionary, a veteran in the fourscores of his years.