cinquante

Cinquante is the French word for the cardinal number 50. It is used in counting, telling age, pricing, dates, and measurements. The form cinquante can stand alone or appear before units or nouns in phrases such as cinquante euros or cinquante mètres. In French orthography, numbers above twenty are typically hyphenated when combined with other numbers or units, so cinquante-cinq is 55, while cinquante by itself denotes 50.

Etymology and form: The term derives from Latin quinquagintā and entered French through Old French. The word reflects regular sound changes from Latin to the modern French form cinquante. The Roman numeral representation for 50 is L.

Usage and related terms: The word is masculine and does not change with gender when used as a numeral. Related forms include la cinquantaine, meaning roughly fifty years or a group of about fifty; cinquantième, the ordinal form for fifty-eth (the fiftieth); and cinquantièmes, the plural. The adjective and noun forms are used in contexts such as age ranges (une cinquantaine d'années), quantities (cinquante mille), or anniversaries (cinquantième anniversaire).

Cross-linguistic note: The English equivalent is fifty; in other Romance languages, there are cognate forms each with its own orthography and usage. Cinquante thus functions as a basic building block in French numeration and in expressions describing approximate or exact quantities around the number 50.