What does "bce" mean?

Initialism of Before the Common Era, Before the Current Era, or Before the Christian Era.

What is a synonym for "bce"?

Common synonyms include: aev, am, b.c.e., bc, bc.

adv

adv ·Rare ·Advanced level

Adverb

1
Initialism of Before the Common Era, Before the Current Era, or Before the Christian Era. abbreviation, alt-of, initialism, not-comparable
"Socrates was tried and executed in the year 399 BCE."

Adverb

1
of the period before the Common Era; preferred by some writers who are not Christians wordnet

"In about 300 BCE, Greek philosopher Epicurus proposed that the universe's boundaries were limitless and that space was full of other worlds."

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.