BURSA, or BURSER, (Bursarius), is used in middle age writers for a treasurer or cash-keeper. In this sense we meet with bursars of colleges. Conventual bursars were officers in monasteries, who were to deliver up their account yearly on the day after Michaelmas. The word is formed from the Latin bursa, whence also the English word purse; hence also the officer, who in a college is called bursar, in a ship is called purser.