indent

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) IPA^(key): /ˈɪndɛnt/, /ɪnˈdɛnt/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• (verb) IPA^(key): /ɪnˈdɛnt/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛnt

indent (plural indents)

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.

indent (third-person singular simple present indents, present participle indenting, simple past and past participle indented)

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.
   • 1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed by John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC:
     , New York, 2001, p.91:

     The Polanders indented with Henry, Duke of Anjou, their new-chosen king, to bring with him an hundred families of artificers into Poland.

   • 1698, Robert South, Twelve Sermons upon Several Subjects and Occasions‎, London: Thomas Bennet, page 28:

     And is this now the Person who is to oblige his Maker? to indent and drive bargains with the Almighty?

   • 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.
   • c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iii]:

     Seeing Orlando, it vnlink'd it selfe,
     And with indented glides, did slip away

9. (military, India, dated) To make an order upon; to draw upon, as for military stores.
   • 1832 May 23, John Byng examining Jasper Nicolls in the House of Commons:

     What is the rule observed in India in indenting upon England for military stores ?

• (antonym(s) of “typography”): unindent
• (antonym(s) of “typography”): outdent

• hanging indent

• Dinnet, dentin, dinnet, intend, tinned

indent

1. third-person plural future active indicative of indō