Word.ws English Dictionary

censes

censes is the plural of cense.

Meaning of cense

Noun

cense (plural censes)

  1. (obsolete) A census.
    • [I]n the year 1636, King Charles ſending to the Lord Mayor [of London], to make a ſcrutiny, vvhat number of Roman Catholiques and ſtrangers, there vvere in the City, he took occaſion thereby, to make a Cenſe of all the people; and there vvere of Men, VVomen, and Children, above ſeven hundred...1657, Jam. Howel [i.e., James Howell], “A Parallel, by Way of Corollary, betwixt London, and Other Great Cities of the World”, in Londinopolis; an Historicall Discourse or Perlustration of the City...
  2. (obsolete) A public rate or tax.
    • as moneys a sum in name of a cense so returneda. 1626, Francis Bacon, A Certificate to His Majesty […] Touching the Penal Laws
  3. (obsolete) condition; rank
    • if you write to a man, whose estate and cense as senses, you are familiar with, you may the bolder (to let a taske to his braine) venter on a knot1641, Ben Jonson, Discoveries Made upon Men and Matter

See all 4 meanings of cense

Questions about censes

What is censes the plural of?
Censes is the plural of cense.

Words near censes in the dictionary

  1. censal
  2. cense
  3. censed
  4. censer
  5. censers
  6. censes
  7. censi
  8. censing
  9. censitary
  10. censive
  11. censives

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: censes (page history and authors); cense (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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