Dekadë

Dekadë is a unit of time in Albanian that denotes a period of ten years, equivalent to the English word decade. The term is used in formal and academic writing as well as in everyday speech to describe long-term historical, social, or statistical trends.

Etymology and usage

The word dekadë is borrowed from French décade, which itself comes from Latin deca- and Greek deka, all meaning ten. In Albanian, dekadë appears in contexts such as historical periods (for example, referring to a specific decade within the 20th century), demographic or economic analyses, and cultural discussions. It is common to describe time spans like “dekada e 1990-ëve” (the decade of the 1990s).

Relation to other terms

Albanian also uses terms such as dhjetëvjeçar or dhjetëvjeçarë to express a ten-year period, especially in more everyday language. Dekadë tends to be the preferred term in more formal or technical writing, while dhjetëvjeçar is often used in general discussion.

See also

Decade

Notes

Dekadë, with the diacritic ë, reflects Albanian orthography. Its meaning as a ten-year interval is consistent with its cognates in other languages and its use in temporal and historical contexts.