I thought that debit and credit only existed in double entry accounting and simply identified columns as either Left or Right?
On Wed, Sep 5, 2018 at 2:43 PM Geoff Jankowski via gnucash-user < gnucash-user@gnucash.org> wrote: > David > > I would love to agree with you but….. > > In standard journal notation cr is a debt and dr an asset. This is > because it is nothing to do with credit (+ve) and debit (-ve) in any sense > (or tense) but to do with a creditor (to whom we owe) and a debtor (who > owes us). Hence dr and cr relate to debtor and creditor and not to any > form of debit or credit. > > For example, if I take cash from the cash box and deposit it at the bank I > enter a cr to the cashbook and a dr to the bank account. > > Totally counterintuitive which is why accountancy is a black art and > should be banned. > > I am also an engineer that has been a finance director for many years (but > that does not necessarily give me the right to write what is right). > > > > Geoff > +44 20 7100 1092 > +44 7770 58 48 38 > +33 5 46 97 13 89 > +33 6 22 93 00 53 > > > > > > > > > > > > On 5 Sep 2018, at 17:08, Colin Law <clan...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > Wow, well now we know (or actually don't know), but we know we don't > > know in great depth and detail :) > > > > Colin > > On Wed, 5 Sep 2018 at 16:01, David Cousens <davidcous...@bigpond.com> > wrote: > >> > >> Derek > >> > >> Latin past participles of creditum and debitum are debere and credere > are a possible explanation. Another theory is the > >> Dr stands for debit record and Cr credit record. Another is that Dr is > from debtors and Cr is from creditors. I favour > >> the first because Luca Pacciola who is often attributed (wrongly) with > the first known treatise in 1494 (Summa de > >> Arithmetica, Geometria, Proportioni et Proportionalita) which had a > section on double entry accounting and formulated > >> the first documented use of the accounting equation used the terms > debere (to owe) and credere (to entrust) to describe > >> the two sides of the basic accounting equation but there is also > evidence that Pacciola used Per (from) and A (to) in > >> journal entries. I don't know if any originals of Pacciola's original > treatise have survived and most of the comments > >> are from an English translation in 1633 where Handson used Dr from the > English debtor. Another translator Geejsbeek in > >> 1914 suggested Dr comes from "in dare" (give) and "in havere" > (receive). Pacciola apparently learned his accounting from > >> Arab traders in North Africa where his father was a merchant. Benedikt > Kotruljevic in 1458 also described double entry > >> accounting in a 1458 work on the Art of Trade published in Dubrovnik. I > suspect both were describing methodology used by > >> the Arab traders.There is also evidence that double entry might have > been used in 10th century Muslim tax office but > >> there is no definitive evidence. We will probably never know where the > usage of the notation actually came from and the > >> historians will continue to argue about it forever. > >> David Cousens > >> > >> > >> > >> On Wed, 2018-09-05 at 09:59 -0400, Derek Atkins wrote: > >>> Hi All, > >>> > >>> I'm an Engineer by training; I've picked up a ton of accounting > >>> knowledge just by being involved here for the past few decades, but > >>> there's one thing I've seen recently that I honestly don't underdstand > >>> and would appreciate if a CPA or Accounting Historian could answer. > >>> > >>> Specifically, I've seen people show a transaction as: > >>> > >>> Dr ... / Cr ... > >>> > >>> So CR as an abbreviation for Credit makes sense to me (CRedit). But > why > >>> is Debit abbreviated as DR? There is no "R" in DEBIT. So where does > >>> that come from? I would have expected it to be "Db". > >>> > >>> Just curious. > >>> > >>> -derek > >>> > >> _______________________________________________ > >> gnucash-user mailing list > >> gnucash-user@gnucash.org > >> To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: > >> https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user > >> If you are using Nabble or Gmane, please see > https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Mailing_Lists for more information. > >> ----- > >> Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. > >> You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All. > > _______________________________________________ > > gnucash-user mailing list > > gnucash-user@gnucash.org > > To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: > > https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user > > If you are using Nabble or Gmane, please see > https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Mailing_Lists for more information. > > ----- > > Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. > > You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All. > > _______________________________________________ > gnucash-user mailing list > gnucash-user@gnucash.org > To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: > https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user > If you are using Nabble or Gmane, please see > https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Mailing_Lists for more information. > ----- > Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. > You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All. _______________________________________________ gnucash-user mailing list gnucash-user@gnucash.org To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user If you are using Nabble or Gmane, please see https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Mailing_Lists for more information. ----- Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. 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