Sex age sima (seksajesima)

[Earlier in E. form, ME. sexagesym, sexagesimal (sek-sa-jes'i-mal), a. and n. [L. sex age sim us, sixtieth (see Sex age sima ), + -al. ] I. a. Sixtieth; pertaining to the number sixty. - Sexagesimal or sexagenary arithmetic, a method of computation by sixties, as that which is used in dividing minutes into seconds. It took its origin in Baby i on.-Sexagesimal fractions, or sexagesimals, fractions whose denominators proceed in the ratio of sixty: as, 2. These fractions are also called astro nomical fractions, because formerly there were no others used in astronomical calculations. They are still retained in the division of the circle and of the hour. The circle is first divided into six sex a genes, the sex a gene into sixty degrees, the degree into sixty minutes, the minute into sixty seconds, and so on. The hour is divided like the degree; and in old writers the radius of a circle in the same manner. II. n. A sexagesimal fraction. See I. sexagesimally (sek-sa-jes'i-mal-i), adv . By sixties. So the talent of the 80 grain system was sexagesimally divided for the mina which was afterwards adopted by So- lon. Encyc. Brit ., XXIV. 489. sexagesm (sek'sa-jesm), n. [L. sex age sim us , sixtieth: see Sex age sima .] A sixtieth part of any unit. See sex a gene .