par

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• noun An amount or level considered to be average; a standard.
• noun An equality of status, level, or value; equal footing.
• noun The established value of a monetary unit expressed in terms of a monetary unit of another country using the same metal standard.
• noun Sports The number of golf strokes considered necessary to complete a hole or course in expert play.
• transitive verb To score par on (a hole or course) in golf.
• adjective Equal to the standard; normal.
• adjective Of or relating to monetary face value.
• idiom (par for the course) Usual; typical.

from The Century Dictionary.

• noun An inclosed place for domestic animals.
• To inclose.
• To fix an equality between; arrive at or establish an equivalence in the values of; agree upon the commercial or financial par of: said of the agreement between two or more countries as to the value of the coins of one in those of the other, or of the others, etc.
• noun A pair; in anatomy, a pair (of nerves): now only in one phrase.
• noun See parr.
• noun A young leveret.
• noun Equality in value or in circumstances.
• noun The norm; a standard, fixed either by natural conditions or by consent and agreement.
• noun Specifically In banking and com., the state of the shares of any business, undertaking, loan, etc., when they are neither at a discount nor at a premium—that is, when they may be purchased at the original price (called issue par), or at their face-value (called nominal par).
• noun Same as arbitrated par. See the quotation.
• Normal; standard.
• Strictly equivalent value, as pound for pound or dollar for dollar.
• noun A French preposition, meaning ‘by,’ ‘through,’ etc., occurring in some phrases occasionally used in English, as par excellence. See per and per-.
• noun A form of per- in some words from Old French, as parboil, pardon etc. See per-.
• noun A form of para- before a vowel or h.
• noun An abbreviation of parallel
• noun of parish.
• noun An abbreviation for paragraph and parenthesis.
• noun In golf: Perfect play.
• noun At each hole, the number of perfectly played strokes from tee to green (two putts being added). The par of a 320-yard hole, for instance, is usually fixed at 4 strokes.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

• noun (Zoöl.) See parr.
• preposition By; with; -- used frequently in Early English in phrases taken from the French, being sometimes written as a part of the word which it governs
• noun Equal value; equality of nominal and actual value; the value expressed on the face or in the words of a certificate of value, as a bond or other commercial paper.
• noun Equality of condition or circumstances.
• noun engraving An amount which is taken as an average or mean.
• noun (Golf) The number of strokes required for a hole or a round played without mistake, two strokes being allowed on each hole for putting. Par represents perfect play, whereas bogey makes allowance on some holes for human frailty. Thus if par for a course is 75, bogey is usually put down, arbitrarily, as 81 or 82. If par for one hole is 5, a bogey is 6, and a score of 7 strokes would be a double bogey.
• noun at the original price; neither at a discount nor at a premium; -- used especially of financial instruments, such as bonds.
• noun at a premium.
• noun less than the expected or usual quality; -- of the quality of objects and of the performance of people.
• noun on a level; in the same condition, circumstances, position, rank, etc..
• noun See under Exchange.
• noun nominal value; face value; -- used especially of financial instruments, such as bonds.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

• abbreviation paragraph
• abbreviation parallel
• abbreviation parenthesis
• abbreviation parish
• preposition By; with.
• noun Equal value; equality of nominal and actual value; the value expressed on the face or in the words of a certificate of value, as a bond or other commercial paper.
• noun Equality of condition or circumstances.
• noun golf, mostly uncountable The allotted number of strokes to reach the hole.
• noun golf, countable A hole in which a player achieves par