Language: en
Meaning: (somewhatdated,idiomatic)Seventy, being the number of years in afulllifetimeof traditionally-expected duration.1842December –1844July,Charles Dickens, chapter 11, inThe Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit, London:Chapman and Hall,[…], published1844,→OCLC:"Why, a man with any feeling ought to be ashamed of being eighty, let alone more. Where’s his religion, I should like to know, when he goes flying in the face of the Bible like that?Threescore-and-ten’s the mark, and no man with a conscience, and a proper sense of what’s expected of him, has any business to live longer."1845,James Fenimore Cooper, chapter 30, inSatanstoe:As for old Capt. Hugh Roger,three-score-and-tenhad exhausted his fluids, pretty much; but he shook me heartily by the hand.1894,George Bernard Shaw,Mrs. Warren's Profession, act 4:Frank:And he won't die until he'sthree score and ten: he hasn't originality enough.1911,Bram Stoker, chapter 16, inThe Lair of the White Worm:"[H]e had over-stayed histhree-score and tenyears by something like twenty years. He must have been ninety!"1942March 30, “Big Red's 25th”, inTime, retrieved18 July 2015:If ever a U.S. horse attains the immortality of Bellerophon's Pegasus or Don Quixote's Rosinante, surely it will be Samuel D. Riddle's Man o' War. This Sunday, at Faraway Farm in Lexington, Ky., "Big Red" reaches the grand old age of 25—an age comparable tothree-score and tenfor a man.2008July 4, Hannah Kuchler, “The 5-minute Interview: Wayne Hemingway, Designer”, inThe Independent, UK, retrieved18 July 2015:In a nutshell, my philosophy is this: You only getthree score and tenso make the most of it.
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