dozen

Word family

Related topics: Measurement

doz·en /ˈdʌzən/ S2 W3 number (plural dozen or dozens) (written abbreviation doz.)

1 TMtwelve 一打〔12个〕

a dozen eggs

一打鸡蛋

two/three/four etc dozen (=24,36,48 etc) 两打/三打/四打等

The number of deaths has risen to more than two dozen.

死亡人数已增至24人以上。

dozens of people/companies/cars etc (=but not hundreds or thousands) 好几十人/家公司/辆汽车等

Dozens of people were killed.

数十人被杀。

Chris, Helen, and half a dozen others went on holiday together.

克里斯、海伦和其他六个人一起去度假了。

A dozen or so (=about 12) cars were parked near the entrance.

入口附近停了大约十二辆汽车。

2 informalLOT/LARGE NUMBER OR AMOUNT a lot of 许多

a dozen

I’ve heard this story a dozen times before.

这故事我以前听过很多次了。

dozens of something

She’s had dozens of boyfriends.

她交过许多男朋友。

We collected dozens and dozens of shells on the beach.

我们在海滩上捡了很多很多贝壳。

→ baker's dozen, → a dime a dozen at dime(2), → nineteen to the dozen at nineteen(2), → six of one and half a dozen of another at six(4)

Examples from the Corpus

dozen• I had some memorable test drives after buying a dozen 6R4s when they were up for grabs at the factory.• We take two dozen blues and a dozen of their predators, the small green crabs that are never far away.• Prescott, the administration building, looked the same, except that there were a dozen cars parked outside.• There were a dozen feature films made, with filming lasting from one week to four months.• They live, like their ancestors, in packs of a dozen or so.• The mood is relaxed-very advisable if you have a dozen sheep to get through in a day.• Having only one hand, and having that in a dozen things, he has no other to hold out.

half a dozen• Sunday night he was wild on at least a half dozen.• Customer-driven systems also allow individuals to meet their needs in a holistic way, without applying to half a dozen different programs.• half a dozen eggs• He found half a dozen fishermen seated under the palm trees at the foot of the Co-operative quay.• I still do half a dozen or so of these scarlet cross-overs a year, to this day.• Inside the cafe there were half a dozen other people.• He had rewritten the story half a dozen times.• Perhaps half a dozen were Hispanic, and the rest, black.• About half a dozen women and children had appeared and were standing, holding hands, watching me.

dozens and dozens• They collected dozens and dozens of shells on the beach.

From Longman Business Dictionary