Dignitary
['dɪgnɪt(ə)rɪ] or ['dɪɡnɪtɛri]
Definition
(n.) One who possesses exalted rank or holds a position of dignity or honor; especially, one who holds an ecclesiastical rank above that of a parochial priest or clergyman.
Typed by Geoffrey
Examples
- Now, the supervising dignitary, the Archbishop of Greenwich, knew this as well as if he had performed the nuptial ceremony. Charles Dickens. Our Mutual Friend.
- Imagine a poor Frenchman ignorantly intruding upon a public rostrum sacred to some six-penny dignitary in America. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- The Turkish dignitary yawns and expresses signs of weariness and idleness. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- Among the latter was the Prior of Jorvaulx, in the most gallant trim which a dignitary of the church could venture to exhibit. Walter Scott. Ivanhoe.
- At the end were the signatures of the high dignitaries who had signed it. Arthur Conan Doyle. The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.
- This in itself was not a bad thing for the lower clergy in France, who were often scandalously underpaid in comparison with the richer dignitaries. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- A number of great dignitaries of the Empire, in undress unit forms, came with them. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- It had to assume a severely technical form because the dignitaries of the church, ignorant and intolerant, were on the watch for heresy. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
Editor: Natasha