twentieth
n. countablen. one of twenty equal parts of a whole. You also use this word for the person or thing that comes after number nineteen in a series.
n. one of twenty equal parts into which something is divided; the ordinal number matching the cardinal number twenty. Often used in dates or to denote a specific position in a sequence.
I only ate a twentieth of the cake.
The athlete finished in twentieth place, which was still a great achievement in such a large race.
By the time the twentieth person had entered the small room, the air had become noticeably warm and the noise level was almost deafening.
From earlier twenteth, twentith, from Middle English twentithe, twentiþe, from Old English twēntigoþa. Equivalent to twenty + -eth. Etymological notes twentith, twenteth is the expected development from Middle English twentithe, but in time, the opaque twent- was replaced by a more transparent twenty-, resulting in modern twentieth (in the speech varieties this occurred in, the weak vowel in the final syllable of twenteth, twentith was clearly distinct from that in twenty); similar processes explain the modern pronunciation of thirtieth, fourtieth, etc. This analogy was assisted by synizetic pronunciations of words such as carrying, which allowed twenteth, twentith to be interpreted as contractions of twentieth.
Often preceded by the definite article 'the' when referring to a specific position in a sequence.
on the twenty of Mayon the twentieth of MayOrdinal numbers, not cardinal numbers, are used for specific dates in English.