Word
sixteen
Phoneticssix·teen
US/ˈsɪkˈstin/
UK/sɪkstˈiːn/
Definition
n. the number that comes after fifteen and before seventeen. You write it as the number 16.
n. the cardinal number equivalent to the sum of ten and six. Functions as a determiner or a noun depending on the syntactic context.
Examples
“She is sixteen years old today.”
“The bus leaves at sixteen minutes past the hour from the main station.”
“The group was divided into sixteen equal sections to ensure that every participant had a specific area of the garden to maintain during the summer.”
Examples
simple
“She is sixteen years old today.”
contextual
“The bus leaves at sixteen minutes past the hour from the main station.”
complex
“The group was divided into sixteen equal sections to ensure that every participant had a specific area of the garden to maintain during the summer.”
Usage
When used as a noun, it can be pluralized to refer to multiple instances of the number or a set of sixteen items.
Pitfall
sixtyteen
sixteen
Learners sometimes confuse the suffix '-teen' (13-19) with '-ty' (multiples of 10) or try to combine them incorrectly.
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English sextene, sixtene, from Old English sixtīene, from Proto-Germanic *sehstehun. Cognate with West Frisian sechstjin, Dutch zestien, German sechzehn, Danish seksten. Equivalent to six + -teen.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Scan code
englishreference.com/q/sixteen