3:14am -0000 03/05/26 Peter West <[email protected]> wrote:

>Yes, but... 

>The existence of an Exchequer in England is first recorded in 1110. (Wikipedia)

>exchequer(n.)
>c. 1300, "a chessboard, checkerboard," from Anglo-French escheker "a 
>chessboard," from Old French eschequier, from Medieval Latin scaccarium "chess 
>board" (see check <https://www.etymonline.com/word/check#etymonline_v_11208> 
>(n.1); also see checker 
><https://www.etymonline.com/word/checker#etymonline_v_47185> (n.2)). The 
>governmental sense of "department of the royal household concerned with the 
>receipt, custody, and disbursement of revenue and with judicial determination 
>of certain causes affecting crown revenues" began under the Norman kings of 
>England and refers to a cloth divided in squares that covered a table on which 
>accounts of revenue were reckoned by using counters, and which reminded people 
>of a chess board. Respelled with an -x- based on the mistaken belief that it 
>originally was a Latin ex- word.

Good find! They were doing "New Latin" nonsense even back to the
beginning of Middle English!

>Hence: "a counter-register as a token of ownership used to check against, and 
>prevent, loss or theft" (as in hat check, etc.), 1812. Hence also the 
>financial use for "written order for money drawn on a bank, money draft" 
>(1798, often spelled cheque), which was probably influenced by exchequer 
><https://www.etymonline.com/word/exchequer>.

>Etymonline

This stuff is fascinating. Thank you.
_______________________________________________
gnucash-user mailing list
[email protected]
To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe:
https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user
-----
Please remember to CC this list on all your replies.
You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.

Reply via email to