''number'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260830165823-00-⌔

number - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

Noun

number (countable and uncountable, plural numbers)

• Quantity of countable things.
  • ✤ Any number of people can be reading from a given repository at a time.
  • ✤ There are, in addition to all the red socks, a number that don’t suit me either.
  • ✤ The number of malnourished children has decreased.
  • ✤ From the ground, Colombo’s port does not look like much. […] But viewed from high up in one of the growing number of skyscrapers in Sri Lanka’s capital, it is clear that something extraordinary is happening: China is creating a shipping hub just 200 miles from India’s southern tip.¹
  • ✤ * Number itself importeth not much in armies where the people are of weak courage.*²
• (countable) An abstract entity used to describe quantity.
  • ✤ Zero, one, −1, 2.5, and pi are all numbers.
• (countable) A numeral: a symbol for a non-negative integer.
  • ✤ Synonyms: scalar, (obsolete) rime
  • ✤ The number 8 is usually made with a single stroke.
  • ✤ The former FBI director James Comey has said it did not occur to him that that the numbers 8647 – which he spotted spelled out in seashells on a beach, and posted on social media – could be interpreted as a call to assassinate the president, as many supporters of Donald Trump have claimed.³
• (countable, mathematics) An element of one of several sets: natural numbers, integers, rational numbers, real numbers, complex numbers, and sometimes extensions such as hypercomplex numbers, etc.
  • ✤ The equation eiπ+1=0 includes the most important numbers: 1, 0, π, i, and e.
• (Followed by a numeral; used attributively) Indicating the position of something in a list or sequence. Abbreviations: No or No., no or no. (in each case, sometimes written with a superscript “o”, like Nº or №). The symbol ”#” is also used in this manner.
  • ✤ Horse number 5 won the race.
• A sequence of digits and letters used to register people, automobiles, and various other items.
  • ✤ Her passport number is C01X864TN.
  • ✤ You can take the number 8 (bus) all the way to the airport.
• (countable, informal) A telephone number.
  • ✤ Let’s give her a call. Do you have her number handy?
  • ✤ I’m definitely interested. Here’s my number. Call me back anytime.
  • ✤ Rikki, don’t lose that number/You don’t wanna call nobody else/Send it off in a letter to yourself⁴
  • ✤ “[…] I wonder if you could get hold of him and have him call me here at Interior. I’m in my office, do you have my number?”⁵
  • ✤ When I agreed to go surfing with him he said, “Great, can I have your number?” Well, I don’t give my number to guys I don’t know.⁶
  • ✤ Marsha’s work number is 555-8986.⁷
• (grammar) Of a word or phrase, the state of being singular, dual or plural, shown by inflection.
  • ✤ Adjectives and nouns should agree in gender, number, and case.
• (now rare, in the plural) Poetic metres; verses, rhymes.
  • ✤ Griefe brought to numbers cannot be ſo fierce,/For, he tames it, that fetters it in verſe.⁸
  • ✤ As yet a Child, nor yet a Fool to Fame,/I liſp’d in Numbers, for the Numbers came.⁹
• (countable) A performance; especially, a single song or song and dance routine within a larger show.
  • ✤ For his second number, he sang “The Moon Shines Bright”.
• (singular only, formal) A group of people.
  • ✤ I include myself in their number.
  • ✤ As an association, we demonstrate near-Olympic sang-froid. As I write, the gods are smiling upon us, but in the past decade – not to mince words – two of our number have got divorced, one of us checked into rehab, and all of us have had distressful troubles with teenage kids.¹⁰
• (countable, informal) A person.
  • ✤ I laughed. “Don’t doubt that. She’s a saucy little number.”¹¹
  • ✤ “Signorina Jessica,” says the maid, a saucy little number, “your father has gone to his prayers and demands that you come to the synagogue at once […]”¹²
  • ✤ He had to focus on the mission, staying alive and getting out, not on the sexy number rubbing up against him.¹³
• (countable, informal) An outfit, particularly a stylish one.
  • ✤ The trouble was I was wearing my backless glittering number from the night before underneath, so unless I could persuade the office it was National Fancy Dress Day I was doomed to sweat profusely in bottle blue.¹⁴
  • ✤ “I doubt the sexy number you wore earlier tonight fell from the sky.”¹⁵
• (slang, chiefly US) A marijuana cigarette, or joint; also, a quantity of marijuana bought from a dealer.
  • ✤ These were the two that Tommy had chosen to collect a debt owed to his family by a dude named Heath who ran numbers out of a grocery store on 131st and Lenox.¹⁶
  • ✤ Back at his place again, Doc rolled a number, put on a late movie, found an old T-shirt, and sat tearing it up into short strips […]¹⁷
• (dated) An issue of a periodical publication.
  • ✤ the latest number of a magazine
  • ✤ When, in July, 1897, my father brought home the first number of The Railway Magazine, I little thought that, sixty years later, I should still be reading it, without having missed a single number.¹⁸
• A large amount, in contrast to a smaller amount; numerical preponderance.
  • ✤ Despite last week’s woes, the Braves still sport numbers that would make Christie Brinkley blush.¹⁹
• An activity; assignment; job, as in cushy number.

Verb

number (third-person singular simple present numbers, present participle numbering, simple past and past participle numbered)

• (intransitive) To total or count; to amount to.
  • ✤ I don’t know how many books are in the library, but they must number in the thousands.
  • ✤ Do they number in the hundreds, do they number in the thousands? Do they number in the tens of thousand?²⁰
• (transitive, passive voice) To limit to a certain number; to reckon (as by fate) to be few in number.
  • ✤ The old man knew that his days were numbered.
  • ✤ THE DAYS OF ENGLAND NOT “NUMBERED.” REPLY TO SIR ARCHIBALD ALISON.²¹
  • ✤ To conclude this book, we will let Lange’s photo and its three layers guide us. Each layer invites us to explore a different answer to this book’s title question—how did our days become numbered?²²
• (transitive, literary or archaic) To count; to determine the quantity of.
  • ✤ The king ordered that all his subjects be numbered.
  • ✤ Who can number all the stars and who can count the desert sands?
  • ✤ From twentie yeare old and above, all that go forth to the warre in Iſrael, thou and Aaron ſhall number them, throughout their armies.²³
• (transitive) To label (items) with numbers; to assign numbers to (items).
  • ✤ * Number the baskets so that we can find them easily.*
  • ✤ “Public Health Service Numbered Publications – A Catalog, 1950-1962” and contains those numbered publications issued during the period 1963-64.²⁴
  • ✤ Most of the remaining records in the War Department Collection of Revolutionary War Records were designated “miscellaneous” records, consecutively numbered, and placed in a fourth large series of records that came to be known as […]²⁵
  • ✤ The remainder of the valley is laid off into cute little squares and streets, with everything named and numbered, ready to be listed in the brokers’ offices.²⁶
• (transitive, with off) To call out and assign a series of numbers (usually to people), either for the sake of dividing into groups or for counting.
  • ✤ Shelley numbered off the group into two teams for the baseball game.
  • ✤ I counted them and numbered them off, and I found about three hundred and seventy or three hundred and seventy-five.²⁷
  • ✤ At my entrance, the Sergeant called them to attention, numbered them off smartly, and presented two Companies for my instruction.²⁸
• (transitive, with off) To enumerate or list, especially while assigning numbers to.
  • ✤ I numbered them off on my fingers as I stated them. “First, I would redeem a small amount of my investment assets to pay off the cleared lot and come up with a down payment for the ten acres. Second, I would seek to obtain an open […]²⁹
• (transitive, usually with among) To classify or include (in a group of things).
  • ✤ Alexander the Great’s army numbered an elite cavalry among its ranks.
  • ✤ We fools counted their life madness, and their end to be without honour: how are they numbered among the children of God, and their lot is among the Saints!³⁰
  • ✤ They number among them men of intelligence and education, fitted in almost every respect to share in the responsibilities of government as well as receive a part of its benefits.³¹
  • ✤ We certainly endorse the essential purpose of S. 708 — namely, that an applicant should not obtain a grant simply because it numbers among its stockholders a Member of Congress […]³²
  • ✤ Unite them to Your Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, and number them with Your chosen flock. That with us they may glorify Your all-honorable and majestic name: of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, now and ever and ever.³³
• (intransitive, usually with among) To be classified or included (in a certain group or category of things).
  • ✤ Her horses number among the fastest in her country.
  • ✤ They number among our best people, particularly when we realise that they are models for what the rest of us might also achieve.³⁴
  • ✤ If they number among those who abuse their wives, they, just like abusing leaders, should stop.³⁵

Adjective

number

• comparative form of numb: more numb

Noun

number (plural numbers)

• Something that numbs.

Etymology 1

Inherited from Middle English number, nombre, numbre, noumbre, from Anglo-Norman noumbre, Old French nombre, from Latin numerus (“number”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European ﹡nem- (“to distribute, to give, to take”). Compare Saterland Frisian Nummer, Nuumer, West Frisian nûmer, Dutch nummer (“number”), German Nummer (“number”), Danish nummer (“number”), Swedish nummer (“number”), Icelandic númer (“number”). Displaced Middle English ȝetæl and rime; more at tell, tale and rhyme. Distantly related (via Proto-Indo-European) to obsolete English nim (“to take, seize”) and its Germanic cognates (e.g. German nehmen), hence also to numb.

Pronunciation

• enPR: nŭmʹbər, IPA: /ˈnʌmbər/
  • (Received Pronunciation) IPA: [ˈnʌmbə]
  • (US, Canada) IPA: [ˈnʌ̟mbɚ]
  • Audio (US): 🔊
  • (Australia) IPA: [ˈnɐmbɐ]
  • (Scotland) IPA: [ˈnʌmbəɾ]
• (Northern England) enPR: no͝omʹbər, IPA: /ˈnʊmbə/
• Rhymes: -ʌmbə(ɹ)
• Hyphenation: num‧ber

Etymology 2

From numb (adjective) + -er.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: nŭm’ə, IPA: /ˈnʌmə/
• (US) enPR: nŭm’ər, IPA: /ˈnʌmɚ/
• Audio (US); “number” (adjective): 🔊
• Hyphenation: numb‧er

Etymology 3

Equivalent to numb (verb) +‎ -er

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: nŭm’ə, IPA: /ˈnʌmə/
• (US) enPR: nŭm’ər, IPA: /ˈnʌmɚ/
• Hyphenation: numb‧er

Printed 2026-08-30.

(echo:: @ ⌗)

Footnotes

1. 2013 June 8, “The new masters and commanders”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8839, page 52: ↩

2. 1625, Francis[Bacon], “Of the True Greatness of Kingdoms and Estates”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC: ↩

3. 2025 May 16, Edward Helmore, “What does ‘8647’ really mean? Not what Trump’s supporters are saying”, in The Guardian ‎${}^{[1]}$: ↩

4. 1974, “Rikki Don’t Lose That Number”, performed by Steely Dan: ↩

5. 2001, E. Forrest Hein, The Ruach Project,, Xulon Press, page 86: ↩

6. 2007, Lindsey Nicole Isham, No Sex in the City: One Virgin’s Confessions on Love, Lust, Dating, and Waiting, Kregel Publications, page 111: ↩

7. 2016, VOA Learning English (public domain) ↩

8. a. 1631 (date written), J[ohn] Donne, “The Triple Foole”, in Poems, […] with Elegies on the Authors Death, London: […] M[iles] F[lesher] for Iohn Marriot, […], published 1633, →OCLC, page 204: ↩

9. 1735 January 13 (Gregorian calendar; indicated as 1734), [Alexander] Pope, An Epistle from Mr. Pope, to Dr. Arbuthnot, London: […] J[ohn] Wright for Lawton Gilliver […], →OCLC, page 7, lines 124–125: ↩

10. 2020 August 22, Robert McCrum, “For ever and a day: why we turn to Shakespeare at times of crisis”, in The Observer ‎${}^{[2]}$: ↩

11. 1968, Janet Burroway, The dancer from the dance: a novel,, Little, Brown, page 40: ↩

12. 1988, Erica Jong, Serenissima,, Dell, page 214: ↩

13. 2005, Denise A. Agnew, Kate Hill, Arianna Hart, By Honor Bound,, Ellora’s Cave Publishing, page 207: ↩

14. 2007, Cesca Martin, Agony Angel: So You Think You’ve Got Problems…,, Troubador Publishing Ltd, page 134: ↩

15. 2007, Lorelei James, Running with the Devil, Samhain Publishing, Ltd, page 46: ↩

16. 2005, K’wan, Hoodlum, St. Martin’s Press, →ISBN, page 1: ↩

17. 2009, Thomas Pynchon, Inherent Vice, Vintage, published 2010, page 12: ↩

18. 1957 July, M. D. Greville, “A Diamond Jubilee of Railway Memories”, in Railway Magazine, page 458: ↩

19. 1980 May 10, Al King, “Braves travel to New England with reputation”, in The Indiana Gazette: ↩

20. 1977, United States Congress. House. Committee on the Judiciary. Subcommittee on Crime, Federal Role in Criminal Justice and Crime Research, page 107: ↩

21. 1867, The Days of England Not “numbered”: Reply to Sir Archibald Alison, page 1: ↩

22. 2018 February 6, Dan Bouk, How Our Days Became Numbered: Risk and the Rise of the Statistical Individual, University of Chicago Press, →ISBN, page 209: ↩

23. 1610, The Bible: That Is, the Holy Scriptures Contained in the Olde and New Testament, Numbers 1:3: ↩

24. 1964, Education U.S. Department of Health (and Welfare), United States. Public Health Service, Public Health Service Numbered Publications: Supplement: ↩

25. 1972, United States. National Archives and Records Service, Miscellaneous Numbered Records (the Manuscript File) in the War Department Collection of Revolutionary War Records, 1775-1790’s, page 3: ↩

26. 2022 September 4, Francis Lynde, The City of Numbered Days, DigiCat: ↩

27. 1870, USA House of Representatives, House Documents, page 532: ↩

28. 2014 March 3, Flora Johnston, War Classics: The Remarkable Memoir of Scottish Scholar Christina Keith on the Western Front, The History Press, →ISBN: ↩

29. 2019 January 11, Mark G. Turner, We Both Shall Row, My Love And I, FriesenPress, →ISBN, page 367: ↩

30. 1839, Saint Cyprian (Bishop of Carthage.), The Treatises of S. Caecilius Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, and Martyr, page 298: ↩

31. 1879, United States. Bureau of Indian Affairs, Report, page 76: ↩

32. 1963, United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Commerce, Hearings, page 69: ↩

33. 2019 August 6, Fr. Joseph Irvin, The Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom: Orthodox Service Books - Number 1, Lulu Press, Inc, →ISBN: ↩

34. 2010 September 3, Catherine Tizard, Cat Among the Pigeons: A Memoir, Penguin Random House New Zealand Limited, →ISBN: ↩

35. 2020 October 1, Elizabeth Koepping, Spousal Violence Among World Christians: Silent Scandal, Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN: ↩