Other forms: courtiers
A courtier is somebody who attends a royal court. A royal courtier, courtiers and advisers, the courtiers whispered.
The word is used now of the officials around any powerful person, and it is faintly hostile, since courtiers are assumed to be managing access. Attendance at a real court was itself the job, since a courtier absent was a courtier forgotten.
1nouncourtierSomebody who attends a royal court.
“The courtiers bowed as the queen entered the hall.”
courtier is an attendant.
Old French cortoiier comes from cort, a court, from Latin cohors, an enclosure.
Old French
cortoiier
Anglo-Norman
corteour
Middle English
courteour
English, today
courtier
Built from
From Middle English courteour, from Anglo-Norman corteour, Old French cortoiier, from cort (“court”). by surface analysis, court + -ier.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA