indent

Meanings

1. A cut or notch in the margin of anything, or a recess like a notch.
2. A stamp; an impression.
3. A certificate, or intended certificate, issued by the government of the United States at the close of the Revolution, for the principal or interest of the public debt.
4. A requisition or order for supplies, sent to the commissariat of an army.

1. To notch; to jag; to cut into points like a row of teeth
2. To be cut, notched, or dented.
3. To dent; to stamp or to press in; to impress
4. To cut the two halves of a document in duplicate, using a jagged or wavy line so that each party could demonstrate that their copy was part of the original whole.
5. To enter into a binding agreement by means of such documents; to formally commit (to doing something); to contract.
6. To engage (someone), originally by means of indented contracts.
7. To begin (a line or lines) at a greater or lesser distance from the margin. See indentation, and indention. Normal indent pushes in a line or paragraph. "Hanging indent" pulls the line out into the margin.
8. To crook or turn; to wind in and out; to zigzag.
9. To make an order upon; to draw upon, as for military stores.

Etymology

Partly from Middle English indenten (“to dent in”), equivalent to in- + dent (see dent); partly from Middle English indenten, endenten, from Old French endenter (“to provide with teeth”), from en- (“in-, en-”) + dent (“tooth”), from Latin dēns.