1. Hist. A stick cut into two parts and marked with notches to show what was due between a debtor and creditor.
“The tally, used as a receipt for money or chattels, was a narrow wooden stick with notches of varying dimensions to represent the amount received. After the notches had been cut, the stick was split lengthwise into two unequal pieces. The longer, which contained a stump or handle and was called the ‘stock,’ was given to the person making the payment, and the shorter, a flat strip called the ‘foil,’ to the other party. If the sum involved was disputed, the two pieces could be fitted one to the other to see if they would ‘tally.’ ” C.H.S. Fifoot, History and Sources of the Common Law: Tort and Contract 223 (1949).
“A thousand pounds was marked by cutting out the thickness of the palm of the hand, a hundred by the breadth of the thumb, a score by the breadth of the little finger, one pound by that of a swelling barley-corn …. The terminology has left a permanent imprint on our language. If you lent money to the Bank of England, tallies were cut for the amount: the Bank kept the foil and you received the stock; you thus held ‘Bank Stock’ of the amount recorded upon it. When the form of cheque was adopted, it was not indeed called a foil, but the part retained by the payer is still the counterfoil; and the word ‘cheque’ itself goes back ultimately to the same root as ‘exchequer.’ ” Reginald L. Poole, The Exchequer in the Twelfth Century 86–93 (1912).
“From early times tallies were used in the Exchequer and this lasted until 1826. The burning of a large quantity of old tallies led to the burning down of the old Houses of Parliament.” David M. Walker, The Oxford Companion to Law 1207 (1980).
2. Anything used to record an account.
3. An account; a score.
