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'Dozen' is another word for the number twelve. The dozen may be one of the earliest primitive groupings, perhaps because there are approximately a dozen cycles of the moon or months in a cycle of the sun or year. The dozen is convenient because its multiples and divisors are convenient: 12 = 2 × 2 × 3 = 3 × 4 = 2 × 6, 60 = 12 × 5, 360 = 12 × 30. The use of twelve as a base number, known as the duodecimal system (also as ''dozenal''), probably originated in Mesopotamia (see also sexagesimal). Twelve dozen (12² = 144, the duodecimal 100) are known as a gross; and twelve gross (12³ = 1,728, the duodecimal 1,000) are called a great gross, a term most often used when shipping or buying items in bulk. A great hundred, also known as a small gross, is 120 or ten dozen (a dozen for each finger on both hands). A baker's dozen, also known as a long dozen, is thirteen (one extra for the baker to taste-test).
The English word ''dozen'' [1] [2] [3] comes from the old form of the French word ''douzaine'', meaning "a group of twelve" (''"Assemblage de choses de même nature au nombre de douze"'' as defined in the eighth edition of the Dictionnaire de l'Académie française). This French word [4] is a derivation from the cardinal number ''douze'' ("twelve", from Latin ''duodĕcim'') and the collective suffix ''-aine'' (from Latin ''-ēna''), a suffix also used to form other words with similar meanings such as ''quinzaine'' (a group of fifteen), ''vingtaine'' (a group of twenty), ''centaine'' (a group of one hundred), etc. These French words have synonymous cognates in Spanish: ''docena'' [5][6][7], ''quincena'', ''veintena'', ''centena'', etc. English ''dozen'', French ''douzaine'' and Spanish ''docena'', are also used as indefinite quantifiers to mean "about twelve" or "many" (as in "a dozen times", "dozens of people").
Some historians believe that the base twelve was important because it counts things relating to the marks on the fingers on each hand aside the thumbs. Each finger except for the thumb is divided in three parts, four fingers makes twelve possibilities of counting, and two hands makes possible the acounting of twenty four objects. Using the decimal base for counting only allows ten possibilities with the both hands, one visual option for each finger. This method for accounting was introduced by the Babylonians and its still in use today. Scientists and some astronomers also believe that the year has twelve months, and the day has two sets of twelve hours related to this fact, as the moon cycles arent really twelve cycles as some people may believe.

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See also

See also

★ Base twelve

★ Number 12

★ Baker's dozen