Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Exchequer

Ex·cheq′uer (ĕks·chĕk′ẽr), n. [OE. escheker, OF. eichekier, fr. LL. scaccarium. See Checker, Chess, Check.] 1. One of the superior courts of law; — so called from a checkered cloth, which covers, or formerly covered, the table. [Eng.]

☞ The exchequer was a court of law and equity. In the revenue department, it had jurisdiction over the proprietary rights of the crown against subjects; in the common law department, it administered justice in personal actions between subject and subject. A person proceeding against another in the revenue department was said to exchequer him. The judges of this court were one chief and four puisne barons, so styled. The Court of Exchequer Chamber sat as court of error in which the judgments of each of the superior courts of common law, in England, were subject to revision by the judges of the other two sitting collectively. Causes involving difficult questions of law were sometimes after argument, adjourned into this court from the other courts, for debate before judgment in the court below. Recent legislation in England has abolished the Court of Exchequer and the Court of Exchequer Chamber, as distinct tribunals, a single board of judiciary, the High Court of Justice, being established for the trial of all classes of civil cases. Wharton.

2. The department of state having charge of the collection and management of the royal revenue. [Eng.] Hence, the treasury; and, colloquially, pecuniary possessions in general; as, the company's exchequer is low.

Barons of the exchequer. See under Baron. — Chancellor of the exchequer. See under Chancellor. — Exchequer bills or bonds (Eng.), bills of money, or promissory bills, issued from the exchequer by authority of Parliament; a species of paper currency emitted under the authority of the government, and bearing interest.

Ex·cheq′uer (ĕks·chĕk′ẽr), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Exchequered; p. pr. & vb. n. Exchequering.] To institute a process against (any one) in the Court of Exchequer.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.