different between beadle vs verger

English

Alternative forms

• bedel, bedell (obsolete)
• bedral, bethral, betherel (Scotland)

Etymology

From Middle English bedel, bidel, from Old English bydel (“warrant officer, apparitor”), from Proto-Germanic *budilaz (“herald”), equivalent to bid +? -le. Cognate with Dutch beul, German Büttel. More at bid.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): [?bi?d??]
• Rhymes: -i?d?l

Noun

beadle (plural beadles)

1. a parish constable, a uniformed minor (lay) official, who ushers and keeps order
2. (Scotland, ecclesiastic) an attendant to the minister
3. a warrant officer

Quotations

• 1789, William Blake, "Holy Thursday"

Twas on a holy Thursday, their innocent faces clean,

The children walking two and two in red and blue and green:

Grey-headed beadles walked before, with wands as white as snow,

Till into the high dome of Paul's they like Thames waters flow.

• 1853, Charles Dickens, Bleak House, ch 11:

  The beadle ... generally understood in the neighbourhood to be a ridiculous institution ... The policeman considers him an imbecile civilian, a remnant of the barbarous watchmen times, but gives him admission as something that must be borne with until government shall abolish him.

• 1929, Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own, Penguin Books, paperback edition, page 8

  His face expressed horror and indignation. Instinct rather than reason came to my help; he was a Beadle; I was a woman.

Derived terms

• beadledom
• beadleism
• beadlery
• beadleship

Translations

Anagrams

• Bedale, bealed, bedeal, belead

English

Alternative forms

• virger

Etymology

From verge (“rod”) +? -er.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?v??d???/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?v?d???/
• Rhymes: -??(?)d??(?)
• Homophone: verdure (one pronunciation)
• Hyphenation: verger

Noun

verger (plural vergers)

1. One who carries a verge, or emblem of office.
2. (chiefly Britain, Christianity) A lay person who takes care of the interior of a church and acts as an attendant during services, where he or she carries the verge (or virge). In the United States, the office is generally combined with that of sexton.
   • 1942, Emily Carr, “The Blessing”, in The Book of Small:^[1]

     As soon as we were all in the night the verger rolled shut the doors and blotted out the chandeliers.

3. (chiefly Britain, Christianity) An usher; also, in major ecclesiastical landmarks, a tour guide.
4. (Britain) An attendant upon a dignitary, such as a bishop or dean, a justice, etc.
   • 1725, John Strype, Annals of the Reformation and Establishment of Religion, and Other Various Occurrences in the Church of England, during Queen Elizabeth’s Happy Reign, Oxford: Clarendon, 1824, Vol. I, Part I, Chapter 23, p. 408,^[2]

     When she came to her place she opened the book, and perused it, and saw the pictures, but frowned and blushed; and then shut it, (of which several took notice,) and calling the verger, bade him bring her the old book, wherein she was formerly wont to read.

French

Etymology

From Middle French vergier, from Old French vergier, from Vulgar Latin *virdiariu, syncopated form of Latin viridi?rium, variant of virid?rium, from viridis.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /v??.?e/

Noun

verger m (plural vergers)

1. orchard

Related terms

• vert

Further reading

• “verger” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).