ledger

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A book in which the monetary transactions of a business are posted in the form of debits and credits.
2. n. A book to which the record of accounts is transferred as final entry from original postings.
3. n. A slab of stone laid flat over a grave.
4. n. A horizontal timber in a scaffold, attached to the uprights and supporting the putlogs.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. A bar, beam, stone, or other thing that lies flat or horizontal in a fixed position. Specifically— In building, a piece of timber used in forming a scaffolding. Ledgers are fastened to the-vertical bars or uprights; they support the putlogs which lie at right angles to the wall, and carry the boards on which the workmen stand. See cut under putloq.
2. n. The principal book of accounts among merchants and others who have to keep an accurate record of money and other transactions, so arranged as to exhibit on one side all the sums or quantities at the debit of the accounts, and on the other all those at the credit. Formerly also ledger-book.
3. n. A resident; a resident agent; especially, a resident ambassador. For various other spellings, see etymology.
4. n. A commission-agent: a name formerly given to a Londoner who bought coals of the country colliers at so much a sack, and made his chief profit by using smaller sacks, making pretense he was a country collier. This was termed legering.
5. Lying in a certain place; laid; laid up; stationary; fixed.
6. Resident, as an ambassador.
7. See leger.
8. In angling, to fish with ledger-bait.

Wiktionary

1. n. A book for keeping notes, especially one for keeping accounting records.
2. n. accounting A collection of accounting entries consisting of credits and debits.
3. n. construction A board attached to a wall to provide support for attaching other structural elements (such as deck joists or roof rafters) to the building.
4. n. A large flat stone, especially one laid over a tomb.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. A book in which a summary of accounts is laid up or preserved; the final book of record in business transactions, in which all debits and credits from the journal, etc., are placed under appropriate heads.
2. n. A large flat stone, esp. one laid over a tomb.
3. n. A horizontal piece of timber secured to the uprights and supporting floor timbers, a staircase, scaffolding, or the like. It differs from an intertie in being intended to carry weight.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. an accounting journal as a physical object
2. n. a record in which commercial accounts are recorded