Forms: 4 centener, 6 eontenyer, sentener, 6–7 centiner, -ere, 7 centinier, 6– centenier. [a. F. centenier:—L. centēnārius (see CENTENARY), in 4th c. used for ‘a centurion.’]

1

  † 1.  A centurion. Obs.

2

a. 1300.  Cursor M., 19907. A centener, Cornelius.

3

1523.  Ld. Berners, Froiss., I. cccxlix. 559. He … ordayned and made secretely capitayns of the whyte hattes, as Senteners, and Muquateners.

4

1577.  Hellowes, Gueuara’s Gold. Ep., 178. Pilate … sent … a Centenier to discouer a truth.

5

1580.  North, Plutarch, 961. Cornelius the Centiner, chief of this Legation.

6

1603.  Florio, Montaigne, II. xxxiv. (1632), 415. His [Cæsar’s] Centeniers offered him … to find him a man at Armes.

7

  † 2.  = CENTURIAN. Obs.

8

Time’s Store House, 19 (L.). They are an hundred, chosen out of every town and village, and thereon were termed centeniers or centurians.

9

  3.  A police-officer in Jersey.

10

1862.  Ansted, Channel Isl., IV. xxiii. (ed. 2), 521. Each parish has also two centeniers, except St. Helier’s, where there are six.

11

1880.  Jersey Weekly Express, 13 Nov., 3/2. Charged by Centenier George C. Godfray with having been picked up dead drunk in the Royal Hall, Peter-street.

12