Tally

How to spell tally

5 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce tally

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does tally mean?

1. nounA current count or record of an amount, score, or number of things.
2. verbTo count up a number of items, or for two sets of figures to correspond and agree.

Tally in a sentence

• noun

  The final tally showed forty votes in favour of the motion.

• verb

  The clerks will tally the ballots once the polling station closes.

• noun

  She kept a running tally of the household expenses in a notebook.

• verb

  Their sales figures do not tally with the bank statements.

Where does tally come from?

Language of origin: Latin

Tally goes back to the Latin word talea, which literally meant a cutting, rod, or stick, the kind of slender twig you might snap from a branch. In medieval Europe such sticks were notched to record debts and payments, then split lengthwise so each party kept a matching half; reuniting the two halves proved the account. English took the word from Anglo-Norman French tallie in the 1400s, keeping the sense of a stick marked with cuts to register a count. From there it broadened naturally to mean any running score or record, and then to the verb 'to count up' and 'to correspond', since two split halves had to fit together exactly. The same talea root also lies behind 'tailor' and 'detail', through the idea of cutting; the doubled l in the modern spelling simply reflects the short vowel and the French form.

How the word is built

• tall- (from Latin talea: a stick, rod, or notched twig used for counting)
• -y