FUNCTIONARY

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does functionary mean? 

• FUNCTIONARY (noun)
  The noun FUNCTIONARY has 1 sense:

1. a worker who holds or is invested with an office

  Familiarity information: FUNCTIONARY used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• FUNCTIONARY (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A worker who holds or is invested with an office

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Synonyms:

functionary; official

Hypernyms ("functionary" is a kind of...):

skilled worker; skilled workman; trained worker (a worker who has acquired special skills)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "functionary"):

quaestor (any of several public officials of ancient Rome (usually in charge of finance and administration))

licenser (an official who can issue a license or give authoritative permission (especially one who licenses publications))

mace; macebearer; macer (an official who carries a mace of office)

mandarin (any high government official or bureaucrat)

notary; notary public (someone legally empowered to witness signatures and certify a document's validity and to take depositions)

noticer (someone who gives formal notice)

officeholder; officer (someone who is appointed or elected to an office and who holds a position of trust)

agent; federal agent (any agent or representative of a federal agency or bureau)

provincial ((Roman Catholic Church) an official in charge of an ecclesiastical province acting under the superior general of a religious order)

postmaster general (the official in charge of the national postal service)

proconsul (an official in a modern colony who has considerable administrative power)

prosecuting attorney; prosecuting officer; prosecutor; public prosecutor (a government official who conducts criminal prosecutions on behalf of the state)

judge; jurist; justice (a public official authorized to decide questions brought before a court of justice)

recruiter (an official who enlists personnel for military service)

record-keeper; recorder; registrar (someone responsible for keeping records)

regulator (an official responsible for control and supervision of a particular activity or area of public interest)

returning officer (the official in each electorate who holds the election and returns the results)

sealer (an official who affixes a seal to a document)

searcher (a customs official whose job is to search baggage or goods or vehicles for contraband or dutiable items)

teller; vote counter (an official appointed to count the votes (especially in legislative assembly))

town clerk (the official who keeps a town's records)

doorkeeper; usher (an official stationed at the entrance of a courtroom or legislative chamber)

vizier (a high official in a Muslim government (especially in the Ottoman Empire))

weigher (an official who weighs and records the weight)

Comptroller General (a United States federal official who supervises expenditures and settles claims against the government)

appointee (an official who is appointed)

bailiff (an officer of the court who is employed to execute writs and processes and make arrests etc.)

beadle (a minor parish official who serves a ceremonial function)

administrative official; bureaucrat (an official of a bureaucracy)

caretaker (an official who performs the duties of an office temporarily)

censor (a person who is authorized to read publications or correspondence or to watch theatrical performances and suppress in whole or in part anything considered obscene or politically unacceptable)

census taker; enumerator (someone who collects census data by visiting individual homes)

church officer (a church official)

city father (an important municipal official)

civil servant (a public official who is a member of the civil service)

commissar; political commissar (an official of the Communist Party who was assigned to teach party principles to a military unit)

apparatchik (a humorous but derogatory term for an official of a large organization (especially a political organization))

Comptroller of the Currency (a United States federal official who regulates the national banks)

diplomat; diplomatist (an official engaged in international negotiations)

elected official (official who won the office in a free election)

equerry (an official charged with the care of the horses of princes or nobles)

fire marshall (an official who is responsible for the prevention and investigation of fires)

fire warden; forest fire fighter; ranger (an official who is responsible for managing and protecting an area of forest)

hearing examiner; hearing officer (an official appointed by a government agency to conduct an investigation or administrative hearing so that the agency can exercise its statutory powers)

hangover; holdover (an official who remains in office after his term)

incumbent; officeholder (the official who holds an office)

Inquisitor (an official of the ecclesiastical court of the Inquisition)

invalidator; nullifier; voider (an official who can invalidate or nullify)

Derivation:

function (perform duties attached to a particular office or place or function)

 Context examples 

He is a functionary whose existence, in the natural course of things, would have terminated about two hundred years ago.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

She had a turn for traffic, and a marked propensity for saving; shown not only in the vending of eggs and chickens, but also in driving hard bargains with the gardener about flower-roots, seeds, and slips of plants; that functionary having orders from Mrs. Reed to buy of his young lady all the products of her parterre she wished to sell: and Eliza would have sold the hair off her head if she could have made a handsome profit thereby.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)