bc

¹

abbreviation for

1. Music. basso continuo.
2. blind copy: used as a notation on the copy of a letter or other document sent to a third person without the addressee's knowledge. Also

BC

²

abbreviation for

1. Scuba Diving. buoyancy compensator.
2. British Columbia, Canada (approved for postal use).

B/C

³

1. bills for collection.

b.c.

⁴

or B.C.

abbreviation for

1. before Christ (used in indicating dates).

B.C.

⁵

abbreviation for

1. Bachelor of Chemistry.
2. Bachelor of Commerce.
3. bass clarinet.
4. battery commander.
5. British Columbia.

BC

abbreviation for

1. See AD
   AlsoB.C. (indicating years numbered back from the supposed year of the birth of Christ) before Christ Compare AD

   in 54 bc Caesar came

2. British Columbia

Usage Note

The abbreviation b.c. “before Christ” is always placed after a date or century: Cleopatra lived from 69 to 30 b.c. The war took place in the first century b.c. a.d. ¹

Example Sentences

The story (and some DNA evidence) goes, the locals are the descendants of a band of Roman soldiers from 36 B.C.

From The Daily Beast

The mosaic too looks to her eyes more like a work of the 1st than the 4th century B.C.

From The Daily Beast

Romans first cultivated vines there in the 2nd century B.C., and viticulture flourished.

From The Daily Beast

You can be a pretty good Jew and still doubt that God flooded the world in 2034 B.C.

From The Daily Beast

A truly original approach might be to portray the second-century B.C. Maccabees speaking like rappers.

From The Daily Beast

Its period of greatest comparative importance was the 2nd-1st century b.c.

From Project Gutenberg

Through the influence of the aristocracy Marius was defeated for both the dileships, but was finally elected prtor in 115 B.C.

From Project Gutenberg

Aristarchus had seen the truth, though he could not establish it, in the third century B.C.

From Project Gutenberg

As examples we turn to the parallel afforded by the Icelandic sagas and their pictures of houses of the eleventh century B.C.

From Project Gutenberg

Anaximander, the disciple of Thales, invented maps and globes; born about 610 B.C.

From Project Gutenberg