Meanings
plural centals
- historicalA weight of one hundred avoirdupois pounds.
Thin native steers, dressing 56 pounds per cwt., $10.50 per cental;
1873 April, Monthly Report of the Department of Agriculture, page 2062 more examples
The practice of buying or selling grain by the 100 pounds, or the cental system, is becoming almost universal, and has many advantages over the old practice of selling grain by the bushel.
1888, C. Frusher Howard, Howard's Anglo-American art of reckoning, page 75John Hudson & Co. are prepared to undertake the business at a ½d. per cental advance on the price of wheat on 4th July 19000, which is 6s. 5½d. per cental, thus obtaining 6s. 6d. per cental as the contract price.
1901 July 6, Arthur F. Dodd, “Corn Options and Cotton Futures: Their Object and Effect upon Commercial Transactions”, in The Accountant, page 783Synonyms: hundredweight
- not comparableRelating to a hundred.
- not comparablePertaining to a cent (unit of currency, typically worth 1/100 of the base unit of currency).
cental coins
3 more examples
Cental coin will be exchanged at the rate of two cents of a shilling for one cent of a rupee or florin .
1930, Tanganyika, “East African Rupee and Florin Currency”, in Official Gazette, page 470The one shilling pieces and all denominations of notes, Shs. 1/-, 5/-, 10/-, 20/-, 100/-, and 1000/- are legal tender up to any amount, while fifty cent pieces and cental coin are legal tender up to Shs. 20/- and Shs. 1/- respectively.
1947, Saben's Commercial Directory and Handbook of Uganda, page 302Harald joined a short queue, handed over a 13- cental coin , and took his pentagonal pink ticket .
2015, John Meaney, Dark Blood
Synonyms & antonyms
nounA weight of one hundred avoirdupois pounds.
More synonyms by meaning
nouna United States unit of weight equivalent to 100 pounds
Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.
Origin
- Latincentum“a hundred”
- Englishcental
From Latin centum (“a hundred”) + -al, perhaps modeled after quintal.
More words from Latin
Full word history & related roots →Rhymes & wordplay
Rhymes with cental
Anagrams
Cite this entry
cental. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cental
“cental.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cental. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “cental,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cental.
Source: cental on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.