What is accounting? Here’s what Wikipedia has to say:
Accounting or Accountancy is the measurement, processing and communication of financial information about economic entities. It was established by the Italian mathematician Luca Pacioli, in 1494. Accounting, which has been called the “language of business”, measures the results of an organization’s economic activities and conveys this information to a variety of users including investors, creditors, management, and regulators. Practitioners of accounting are known as accountants. The terms accounting and financial reporting are often used as synonyms.
Accounting can be divided into several fields including financial accounting, management accounting, auditing, accounting information system and tax accounting. Accounting information systems are designed to support accounting functions and related activities. Financial accounting focuses on the reporting of an organization’s financial information, including the preparation of financial statements, to external users of the information, such as investors, regulators and suppliers; and management accounting focuses on the measurement, analysis and reporting of information for internal use by management.[1][8] The recording of financial transactions, so that summaries of the financials may be presented in financial reports, is known as bookkeeping, of which double-entry bookkeeping is the most common system.
History
The history of accounting is thousands of years old and can be traced to ancient civilizations.[12][13][14] The early development of accounting dates back to ancientMesopotamia, and is closely related to developments in writing, counting and money;[12]there is also evidence for early forms of bookkeeping in ancient Iran,[15][16] and early auditing systems by the ancient Egyptians and Babylonians.[13] By the time of the Emperor Augustus, the Roman government had access to detailed financial information.[17]
Double-entry bookkeeping developed in medieval Europe,[18] and accounting split into financial accounting and management accounting with the development of joint-stock companies. The first work on a double-entry bookkeeping system was published in Italy, by Luca Pacioli.[19] Accounting began to transition into an organized profession in the nineteenth century,[20] with local professional bodies in England merging to form the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales in 1880.[21]
Accounting and accountancy
Accounting has variously been defined as the keeping or preparation of the financial records of an entity, the analysis, verification and reporting of such records and “the principles and procedures of accounting”; it also refers to the job of being an accountant.[25][26][27]
Accountancy refers to the occupation or profession of an accountant,[28][29][30] particularly in British English.
See also
