Dutch reckoning

Noun

Dutch reckoning (uncountable)

1. (archaic, idiomatic, uncommon) A (falsified) bill that is not itemised, and that is unjustifiably high.
   • As if all Light of Reasoning were so shut up in Clavius his Brain, that because he does not see, the rest of Mankind must be blind; and what is that way of Reasoning that he betakes himself to, but by huddling the Principles of Geometry into Confusion, without order of method of Reasoning, to make...1712, Roger Coke, A Detection Of The Court and State Of England During The Four Last Reigns, page 22
   • "You knows we never took Mike's duds till you couldn't pay his charges any longer; and since we comes to that, there's two weeks of three shillings and sixpence due for your lodging in the Star-Chamber, for yourself and Master Lionel Falconer, which I supposes you means to pay with a Dutch...1828, Death on Board-Wages, published in Tales of an Antiquary (volume 2 of 3) by Henry Colburn, New Burlington Street, London
2. A false or incorrect reckoning of position.
3. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see Dutch, reckoning.
   • 1 March 1625 in the Dutch reckoning was, in the English reckoning of the time, 19 February 1624.