the.com/exchequer
The treasury's name since medieval clerks did sums on a checkered tablecloth.
means The treasury or funds of a government, institution, or person — the place (or purse) where the money actually is.
from From Old French 'eschequier,' meaning chessboard, itself from the same root as 'chess' and 'check.' Medieval English royal accountants literally calculated sums on a table covered with a checkered cloth, using counters moved across the squares like an abacus — a visual aid for tallying debts and payments owed to the crown. The room, the table, and eventually the whole department of royal finance took the name from that chequered cloth.
- origin
- Named after a chequered cloth used for counting
- abacus ancestor
- Cloth worked like a giant medieval spreadsheet
- uk role
- Chancellor of the Exchequer runs Britain's finances
- old meaning
- Once simply meant a checkerboard or chessboard