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epoch

Syllabification: (ep·och)
Pronunciation: /ˈepək/

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Definition of epoch

noun

  • a period of time in history or a person’s life, typically one marked by notable events or particular characteristics:the Victorian epoch
  • the beginning of a distinctive period in the history of someone or something:welfare reform was an epoch in the history of U.S. social policy
  • Geology a division of time that is a subdivision of a period and is itself subdivided into ages, corresponding to a series in chronostratigraphy:the Pliocene epoch
  • Astronomy an arbitrarily fixed date relative to which planetary or stellar measurements are expressed.

Origin:

early 17th century (in the Latin form epocha; originally in the general sense of a date from which succeeding years are numbered): from modern Latin epocha, from Greek epokhē 'stoppage, fixed point of time', from epekhein 'stop, take up a position', from epi 'upon, near to' + ekhein 'stay, be in a certain state'

epoch in other Oxford dictionaries

Definition of epoch in the British & World English dictionary

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