the role of the head of a government department; "he holds the portfolio for foreign affairs"
a large, flat, thin case for carrying loose papers or drawings or maps; usually leather; "he remembered her because she was carrying a large portfolio"
a list of the financial assets held by an individual or a bank or other financial institution; "they were disappointed by the poor returns on their stock portfolio"
a set of pieces of creative work collected to be shown to potential customers or employers; "the artist had put together a portfolio of his work"; "every actor has a portfolio of photographs"
a book (or manuscript) consisting of large sheets of paper folded in the middle to make two leaves or four pages; "the first folio of Shakespeare's plays"
a book prepared for use in schools or colleges; "his economics textbook is in its tenth edition"; "the professor wrote the text that he assigned students to buy"
a reference work (often in several volumes) containing articles on various topics (often arranged in alphabetical order) dealing with the entire range of human knowledge or with some particular specialty