indent

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.

noun

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.

verb

1. (transitive) To notch; to jag; to cut into points like a row of teeth
   to indent the edge of paper
2. (intransitive) To be cut, notched, or dented.
3. To dent; to stamp or to press in; to impress
   indent a smooth surface with a hammer
   to indent wax with a stamp
4. (historical) 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. (intransitive, reflexive, obsolete) To enter into a binding agreement by means of such documents; to formally commit (to doing something); to contract.
   The Polanders indented with Henry, Duke of Anjou, their new-chosen king, to bring with him an hundred families of artificers into Poland. , New York, 2001, p.91
   And is this now the Person who is to oblige his Maker? to indent and drive bargains with the Almighty? 1698, Robert South, Twelve Sermons upon Several Subjects and Occasions, London: Thomas Bennet, page 28
   1803, John Browne Cutting, “A Succinct History of Jamaica” in Robert Charles Dallas, The History of the Maroons, London: Longman and Rees, Volume 1, pp. xlii-xliii, […] he accidentally met with the commander of a trading vessel bound to Barbadoes, and being actuated by an adventurous spirit, [he] bargained for a passage by indenting himself to serve a planter for four years after his arrival in that island.
6. (transitive, obsolete) To engage (someone), originally by means of indented contracts.
   to indent a young man to a shoemaker; to indent a servant
7. (typography) 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.
   to indent the first line of a paragraph one em
   to indent the second paragraph two ems more than the first
8. (obsolete, intransitive) To crook or turn; to wind in and out; to zigzag.
9. (military, India, dated) To make an order upon; to draw upon, as for military stores.
   What is the rule observed in India in indenting upon England for military stores ? 1832 May 23, John Byng examining Jasper Nicolls in the House of Commons