What does account mean?

What does account mean?. The world's largest and most trusted free online dictionary: definitions, synonyms, word origins, example sentences, word games, and more.

What does account mean? - The Free Dictionary

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[n] a record or narrative description of past events(a history of France he gave an inaccurate account of the plot to kill the president the story of exposure to lead)[v] be the sole or primary factor in the existence, acquisition, supply, or disposal of something(Passing grades account fo

account

account - The Free Dictionary

[n] a record or narrative description of past events
(a history of France he gave an inaccurate account of the plot to kill the president the story of exposure to lead)

[v] be the sole or primary factor in the existence, acquisition, supply, or disposal of something
(Passing grades account for half of the grades given in this exam)

[n] a short account of the news
(the report of his speech the story was on the 11 o'clock news the account of his speech that was given on the evening news made the governor furious)

[v] keep an account of

[n] a formal contractual relationship established to provide for regular banking or brokerage or business services
(he asked to see the executive who handled his account)

[v] to give an account or representation of in words
(Discreet Italian police described it in a manner typically continental)

[n] a statement that makes something comprehensible by describing the relevant structure or operation or circumstances etc.
(the explanation was very simple I expected a brief account)

[v] furnish a justifying analysis or explanation
(I can't account for the missing money)

[n] grounds
(don't do it on my account the paper was rejected on account of its length he tried to blame the victim but his success on that score was doubtful)

[n] importance or value
(a person of considerable account he predicted that although it is of small account now it will rapidly increase in importance)

[n] a statement of recent transactions and the resulting balance
(they send me an accounting every month)

[n] the act of informing by verbal report
(he heard reports that they were causing trouble by all accounts they were a happy couple)

[n] an itemized statement of money owed for goods shipped or services rendered
(he paid his bill and left send me an account of what I owe)

[n] the quality of taking advantage
(she turned her writing skills to good account)

Other vocabulary

a, a battery, a bit, a capella singing, a cappella, a cappella singing, a couple of, a few, a fortiori, a good deal, a great deal, a horizon, a hundred times, a kempis, a la carte, a la mode, a level, a little, a lot, a million times, a posteriori, a priori, a trifle, a'man, a-bomb, a-horizon, a-line, a-list, a-ok, a-okay, c, c and w, c battery, c clef, c compiler, c horizon, c major, c major scale, c program, c-clamp, c-horizon, c-note, c-ration, c-reactive protein, c-section, c. d. gibson, c. diphtheriae, c. h. best, c. k. ogden, c. northcote parkinson, c. p. snow, c. psittaci, c. s. forester, c. s. lewis, c. trachomatis, c. vann woodward, c. w. post, c.e., c.o.d., c.p.u.

Dictionary

A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by consonantal root for Semitic languages or radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologies, pronunciations, translation, etc. It is a lexicographical reference that shows inter-relationships among the data.

A broad distinction is made between general and specialized dictionaries. Specialized dictionaries include words in specialist fields, rather than a complete range of words in the language. Lexical items that describe concepts in specific fields are usually called terms instead of words, although there is no consensus whether lexicology and terminology are two different fields of study. In theory, general dictionaries are supposed[citation needed] to be semasiological, mapping word to definition, while specialized dictionaries are supposed to be onomasiological, first identifying concepts and then establishing the terms used to designate them. In practice, the two approaches are used for both types. There are other types of dictionaries that do not fit neatly into the above distinction, for instance bilingual (translation) dictionaries, dictionaries of synonyms (thesauri), and rhyming dictionaries. The word dictionary (unqualified) is usually understood to refer to a general purpose monolingual dictionary.

There is also a contrast between prescriptive or descriptive dictionaries; the former reflect what is seen as correct use of the language while the latter reflect recorded actual use. Stylistic indications (e.g. "informal" or "vulgar") in many modern dictionaries are also considered by some to be less than objectively descriptive.

The first recorded dictionaries date back to Sumerian times around 2300 BCE, in the form of bilingual dictionaries, and the oldest surviving monolingual dictionaries are Chinese dictionaries c. 3rd century BCE. The first purely English alphabetical dictionary was A Table Alphabeticall, written in 1604, and monolingual dictionaries in other languages also began appearing in Europe at around this time. The systematic study of dictionaries as objects of scientific interest arose as a 20th-century enterprise, called lexicography, and largely initiated by Ladislav Zgusta. The birth of the new discipline was not without controversy, with the practical dictionary-makers being sometimes accused by others of having an "astonishing" lack of method and critical-self reflection.