Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A group of five.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A period of five days, introduced by Dove for use in climatological study. The pentads begin January 1–5, and continue in groups of five days each throughout the ordinary year. The twelfth pentad, from February 25-March 1, may be increased by one day, namely, February 29th, without disturbing the calendar dates of the subsequent pentads.
  • noun The number five, in the abstract: a set of five things considered together: as, the Pythagorean pentad: correlated with monad, dyad, triad, tetrad, etc.
  • noun Specifically A period of five consecutive years.
  • noun In chem., an element one atom of which will combine with five univalent atoms or radicals; a pentavalent element.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective (Chem.) Having the valence of a pentad.
  • noun (Chem.) Any element, atom, or radical, having a valence of five, or which can be combined with, substituted for, or compared with, five atoms of hydrogen or other monad.
  • noun Any grouping of five things.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun a group or series of five things

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the cardinal number that is the sum of four and one

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Greek pentas, pentad-, group of five, from pente, five; see penkwe in Indo-European roots.]

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Examples

  • Are we then to take it that the monads in the pentad and decad differ while the unity in the pentad is the same as that in the decad?

    The Six Enneads. Plotinus 1952

  • Colours may best be expressed by a heptad, the largest possible formula for things finite, as the pentad is the smallest possible form.

    Specimens of the Table Talk of Samuel Taylor Coleridge Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1803

  • Completing this pentad of games are ‘Cool Buck’ with 6,000 credits and finally ‘Triple Magic’ which has 1,600 worth of credits where payouts do ‘exactly what it says on the tin’.

    New from All Bingo! Thatsnews 2008

  • Completing this pentad of games are ‘Cool Buck’ with 6,000 credits and finally ‘Triple Magic’ which has 1,600 worth of credits where payouts do ‘exactly what it says on the tin’.

    Archive 2008-09-01 Thatsnews 2008

  • She is partially responsible for my success in graduate school: One of two scholarly essays of mine to capture honors in my second year of study there concerned JCO, and part of my oral defense concerned Oates and the Burkean pentad.

    Still reading M-mv 2006

  • Graph that, then add them up to make a single point on a pentad graph thirty storms for the five years.

    USCCSP: Temperature Trends in the Lower Atmosphere « Climate Audit 2006

  • As I have written elsewhere, Joyce Carol Oates or, more accurately, my admiration of her work was partially responsible for my success in graduate school: One of two scholarly essays of mine to capture honors in my second year of study concerned JCO, and part of my oral defense involved examining her work within the framework of the Burkean pentad.

    Joyce Carol Oates: (Woman) Writer M-mv 2006

  • If it is missing, it would affect both an annualized graph and the pentad graph, so again how is it *the use of pentads as such* is hiding something?

    USCCSP: Temperature Trends in the Lower Atmosphere « Climate Audit 2006

  • As I have written elsewhere, Joyce Carol Oates or, more accurately, my admiration of her work was partially responsible for my success in graduate school: One of two scholarly essays of mine to capture honors in my second year of study concerned JCO, and part of my oral defense involved examining her work within the framework of the Burkean pentad.

    Archive 2006-09-01 M-mv 2006

  • She is partially responsible for my success in graduate school: One of two scholarly essays of mine to capture honors in my second year of study there concerned JCO, and part of my oral defense concerned Oates and the Burkean pentad.

    Archive 2006-08-01 M-mv 2006

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