license

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

• noun Official or legal permission to engage in a regulated activity: synonym: permission.
• noun A document, card, plate, or tag that is issued as proof of official or legal permission.
• noun A contract allowing someone to use a proprietary product or service.
• noun Freedom of action or permission to act.
• noun Poetic license.
• noun Lack of due restraint; excessive freedom.
• noun Heedlessness for the precepts of proper behavior, especially with regard to sex.
• noun An excuse or justification to do something wrong.
• transitive verb To give or yield permission to or for.
• transitive verb To grant a license to or for; authorize. synonym: authorize.

from The Century Dictionary.

• noun Authority or liberty to do or forbear some act; the admission of an individual, by proper authority, to the right of doing particular acts, practising a certain profession, or conducting a certain trade; a grant of authorization; a permit.
• noun Specifically— In the law of real property, authority to do an act or series of acts upon the land of the person granting the license, without, however, conferring on the licensee any estate in the land: as, a license to enter and shore up an adjoining building, or to take sand, or bore for oil: distinguished from easement.
• noun In patent and copyright law, permission to use the invention patented, or publish the work copyrighted, without a grant of any proprietary rights therein.
• noun In the law of municipal corporations and police power, permission from government to pursue a vocation or carry on acts which are prohibited to those not taking a license, the object being, by the prohibition and the conditions imposed on the permission, to regulate the extent or manner of doing what is licensed.
• noun In international law, a safe-conduct granted by a belligerent state to its own subjects, to those of its enemy, or to neutrals, to carry on a trade which is interdicted by the laws of war, and operating as a dispensation from the penalties of those laws, with respect to the state granting it.
• noun Eccles., an authority to preach, but not to administer the sacraments, nor to represent the church as a clergyman in its ecclesiastical assemblies, which powers are conferred by ordination. The license is granted, frequently for a limited period only, by an ecclesiastical body, after examination of the candidate as to his fitness. The person licensed is termed a licentiate. In the Anglican Church, a deacon must procure a license from a bishop to enable him to preach, that power not being inherent in his office. A license from the bishop is also necessary to permit a man not in orders to act as lay reader.
• noun A document or certificate conferring such authority or permission.
• noun Unrestrained freedom of thought and action, especially the abuse of such freedom; excess of liberty; undue freedom; freedom misused in contempt of law and decorum; rejection of legal and moral control; libertinism.
• noun An intentional departure from a rule or standard in art or literature; exceptional liberty taken for the sake of a particular purpose or effect: as, poetical or musical license; to use license in painting or sculpture.
• noun Synonyms Liberty, etc. (see leave, n.); laxity.
• To grant authority to do an act which, without such authority, would be illegal or inadmissible; remove restrictions from by a grant of permission; authorize to act in a particular character: as, to license a man to keep an inn; to license a physician or a lawyer. Also licence.
• Generally, to permit to act without restraint; allow; tolerate; privilege: as, a licensed buffoon.
• To permit an action of; grant liberty to for a particular proceeding.
• To dismiss.

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

• noun Authority or liberty given to do or forbear any act; especially, a formal permission from the proper authorities to perform certain acts or to carry on a certain business, which without such permission would be illegal; a grant of permission.
• noun The document granting such permission.
• noun Excess of liberty; freedom abused, or used in contempt of law or decorum; disregard of law or propriety.
• noun That deviation from strict fact, form, or rule, in which an artist or writer indulges, assuming that it will be permitted for the sake of the advantage or effect gained
• transitive verb To permit or authorize by license; to give license to.

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

• noun A legal document giving official permission to do something; a permit.
• noun The legal terms under which a person is allowed to use a product, especially software.
• noun Freedom to deviate deliberately from normally applicable rules or practices (especially in behavior or speech).
• noun Excessive freedom; lack of due restraint.
• noun An academic degree, the holder of which is called a licentiate, ranking slightly below doctorate, awarded by certain European and Latin-American universities.
• verb The act of giving a formal (usually written) authorization.
• verb Authorize officially.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• noun freedom to deviate deliberately from normally applicable rules or practices (especially in behavior or speech)
• noun a legal document giving official permission to do something
• verb authorize officially
• noun excessive freedom; lack of due restraint
• noun the act of giving a formal (usually written) authorization