Etymologically
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cent

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Pronunciation

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old French cent (“hundred”),[2][3] from Latin centum (“hundred”),[4][2] which is related to hundred.[4][2] Hoad also allows Italian cento as a source of the coin name.[5][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A hundred: before 1375 in Barnhart[2] and the late 14th century in Etymonline;[4] the OED queries the sense and marks it obsolete.[7]

Semantic evolution

Per cent is from 1568,[7][2] and under its influence the meaning moved in the 17th century to “a hundredth part” (1685).[4][2] Robert Morris used it in 1782 in a plan for American currency, in which a cent would have been about a 144th of a dollar.[4][2] On 18 April 1786 a Board of Treasury report adopted it by the Continental Congress as the name of the hundredth part of a dollar;[4] dime first appears as a coin name in the same document.[4] Barnhart thinks the choice was probably influenced by the French centime.[2] The coin name spread to Canada and many Commonwealth countries,[7] and the cent is now a unit of currency in many countries.[8]

Timeline

  • before 1375 – a hundred.[2]
  • 1568 – per cent.[7][2]
  • 1685 – a hundredth part.[7][2]
  • 1782 – proposed by Robert Morris.[4][3]
  • 1786 – adopted as a US coin.[4][2]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A unit of currency equal to one hundredth of a dollar or of other basic units.
  2. A coin worth one cent; a penny.
  3. (informal) A very small sum: not worth a cent.

Word family

  • half cent
  • red cent
  • ten-cent store

Usage notes

A different cent in the OED is an old card game (1532), said to be of Spanish origin.[7]

References

  1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  5. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b c d e f Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  8. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin