Wiktionary

chiffre

See also: Chiffre and chiffré

English

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Etymology

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Borrowed from French chiffre. Doublet of cipher and zero.

Noun

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chiffre (plural chiffres)

  1. (music) A figure or motif (short melodic or lyrical passage that is repeated).
    • 2014, Peter Wegele, Max Steiner: Composing, Casablanca, and the Golden Age of Film Music:
      At the end of the eighteenth century, French opera composers like A. E. Grétry (Richard Coeur de Lion, 1784), L. Cherubini (Medeé, 1797), and J. Fr. Le Cueur (Ossian ou les Bardes, 1804) began to “assign musical chiffres to precise dramatic situations or single figures on the stage, which were played again when these figures appeared again,” according to Bern University professor Anselm Gerhard.

French

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Etymology

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From Medieval Latin cifra (“zero”), from Andalusian Arabic صِفر (ṣifr, “empty”). Doublet of zéro.

Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /ʃifʁ/
  • Audio; “un chiffre”:(file)

Noun

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chiffre m (plural chiffres)

  1. a digit i.e. 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9
  2. (colloquial or dated) a number
  3. figure (number)
  4. cipher (method of transforming a text to conceal meaning)
  5. cipher (code)
  6. (music) figure
  7. monogram

Derived terms

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Descendants

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See also

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Further reading

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Old French

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Alternative forms

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Noun

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chiffre oblique singular, m (oblique plural chiffres, nominative singular chiffres, nominative plural chiffre)

  1. number; digit

Descendants

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References

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