Secle
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A century. obsolete
"Of a man's age, part he lives in his father's life-time, and part after his son's birth; and thereupon it is wont to be said that three generations make one secle, or hundred years in the genealogies."
- 2 The length of an epoch, believed to be the amount of time that elapsed from the start of one epoch to the time when no one who was alive at that point is still alive (starting at the founding of Rome). Ancient-Rome
"If on this principle we calculate back from this first secular epoch preserved in history, the beginning ot the second secle falls U.C. 78."
Example
More examples"Of a man's age, part he lives in his father's life-time, and part after his son's birth; and thereupon it is wont to be said that three generations make one secle, or hundred years in the genealogies."
Etymology
From Latin saeculum. Compare French siècle. See secular. Doublet of saeculum.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.