Other forms: chancellors
A chancellor is a high state or university official. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, the German chancellor, university chancellor.
The job differs entirely by country: in Germany the chancellor is head of government, in Britain the Chancellor runs the Treasury, and in a university it is usually ceremonial while the vice-chancellor does the work. The word comes from a court doorkeeper.
1nounchancellorA high state or university official.
“The chancellor of the university handed out degrees at the graduation ceremony.”
chancellor is an official.
Anglo-Norman chanceler comes from Latin cancellarius, an usher who stood at the lattice or bar of a court, from cancelli, a grating.
Latin
cancellārius
Old French
cancelier
Anglo-Norman
chaunceler
Middle English
chaunceler
English, today
chancellor
Built from
From Middle English chaunceler, from Anglo-Norman chaunceler, from Old French cancelier, from Latin cancellārius. From Anglo-Norman - or Middle English chaunceler, chanceler, canceler (“chief administrative or executive officer of a ruler; chancellor, secretary; private secretary, scribe; Lord Chancellor of England; officer of the ruler's exchequer; a high administrative or executive officer (for example, a deputy or representative of a bishop; the head of a university)”), from Old French cancelier, chancelier (“chancellor”), from Latin cancellārius (“secretary; doorkeeper, porter; usher of a court of law stationed at the bars separating the public from the judges”), from Latin cancellī (plural of cancellus (“grate; bars, barrier; railings”), diminutive of cancer (“grid; barrier”), from Proto-Italic karkros (“enclosure”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European (s)ker- (“to bend, turn”)) + -ārius. Equivalent to chancel + -or. canceler. The word was present as Late Old English canceler, cancheler, from Norman cancheler, but was displaced in the 13th century by the Old French and Anglo-Norman forms mentioned above.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA