late 14c., "formal authorization, official permission, permit, privilege," from Old French
licence
"freedom, liberty, power, possibility; permission," (12c.), from Latin
licentia
"freedom, liberty; unrestrained liberty, wantonness, presumption," from
licentem
(nominative
licens
), present participle of
licere
"to be allowed, be lawful," from PIE root
*leik-
"to offer, bargain, make a bid" (possibly source also of Lettish
likstu
"I come to terms").
Meaning "formal (usually written) permission from authority to do something" (marry, hunt, drive, etc.) is first attested early 15c. Meaning "excessive liberty, disregard of propriety" in English is from mid-15c. In Middle English spelled
licence
,
licens
,
lisence
,
lissens
,
licance
. There have been attempts to confine
license
to verbal use and
licence
to noun use (compare
advise
/
advice
,
devise
/
device
, and see note in OED); in the U.S.,
license
tends to serve as both verb and noun.
Poetic licence
"intentional deviation from recognized form or rule" is from 1733, earlier as
lycence poetycall
(1530). The
licence-plate
is from 1870 (of dogs and wagons before automobiles);
licence-number
is by 1903.