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eleven (Anglo-Saxon, ændlefene, aend = ain, one , lefene = lef, left).
One left or one more after counting ten (the fingers of the two hands). Twelve is Twa lef (two left); all the other teens up to 20 represent 3, 4, 5, etc. + ten. It would seem that at one time persons did not count higher than twelve, but in a more advanced state they required higher numbers, and introduced the "teen" series, omitting eleven and twelve, which would be enteen and twateen.
Brewer: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable.
Eleventh Hour (At the).
Just in time (Matthew 20:6): And about the eleventh hour he went out, and found others standing idle, and saith unto them, Why stand ye here all the day idle?
Nigel Tufnel: The numbers all go to eleven. Look, right across the board, eleven, eleven, eleven and -
Marty DiBergi: Oh, I see. And most amps go up to ten?
Nigel Tufnel: Exactly.
Marty DiBergi: Does that mean it's louder? Is it any louder?
Nigel Tufnel: Well, it's one louder, isn't it? It's not ten. You see, most blokes, you know, will be playing at ten. You're on ten here, all the way up, all the way up, all the way up, you're on ten on your guitar. Where can you go from there? Where?
Marty DiBergi: I don't know.
Nigel Tufnel: Nowhere. Exactly. What we do is, if we need that extra push over the cliff, you know what we do?
Marty DiBergi: Put it up to eleven.
Nigel Tufnel: Eleven. Exactly. One louder.
Marty DiBergi: Why don't you just make ten louder and make ten be the top number and make that a little louder?
Nigel Tufnel: [Pause] These go to eleven.
This Is Spinal Tap
The eleventh commandment: Thou shalt not be found out.
Brewer: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable
``After all, that Eleventh Commandment is the only one that is vitally important to keep in these days.''
B. H. Buxton: Jennie of the Prince's
Universe: According to the Peripatetics, the universe consists of eleven spheres enclosed within each other like Chinese balls. The eleventh sphere is called the empyrean or heaven of the blessed.
Brewer: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable
`And how many hours a day did you do lessons?' said Alice, in a hurry to change the subject.
`Ten hours the first day,' said the Mock Turtle: `nine the next, and so on.'
`What a curious plan!' exclaimed Alice.
`That's the reason they're called lessons,' the Gryphon remarked: `because they lessen from day to day.'
This was quite a new idea to Alice, and she thought it over a little before she made her next remark.
`Then the eleventh day must have been a holiday?'
`Of course it was,' said the Mock Turtle.
Lewis Carroll: Alice In Wonderland
Challenge me the count's youth to fight with him;
hurt him in eleven places
William Shakespeare: Twelfth Night, Act 3, Scene 2
Hear me profess sincerely:
had I a dozen sons, each in my love alike
and none less dear than thine and my good Marcius,
I had rather had eleven die nobly for their country
than one voluptuously surfeit out of action.
William Shakespeare: Coriolanus, Act 1, Scene 3
Ursula, being asked in marriage by a pagan prince, fled towards Rome with her eleven thousand virgins. At Cologne they were all massacred by a party of Huns, and even to the present hour "their bones" are exhibited to visitors through windows in the wall. Maury says that Ursula's handmaid was named Undecimella, and that the legend of her eleven thousand virgins rose out of this name.
Légendes Pieuses
Possession is eleven points in the law.
Colley Cibber: Woman's Wit. Act i.