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Spanish Word of the Day Archive
Sunday January 6, 2008
cien, adjective, pronoun:
a hundred
Cien is the shortened version of ciento and both mean a hundred. Which one you need to use depends on the words that come before or after.
You use cien in front of a noun, as in the title of the famous novel by García Márquez, Cien Años de Soledad A Hundred Years of Solitude and as in the following examples:
Esta película es cien veces mejor que la anterior.
This film is a hundred times better than the last one.
a unos cien metros de aquí
about a hundred metres from here
or in front of mil a thousand and millones millions:
cien mil personas
a hundred thousand people
cien millones de dólares
a hundred thousand dollars
In front of other numbers, you use ciento.
ciento once
a hundred and eleven
en la página ciento treinta
on page one hundred and thirty
Remember that there is no y between ciento and the numbers following it.
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