Politics & SocietyGreek → English
Clerk
/klɜːrk/noun
An employee who keeps records or handles routine office and counter work.
The Greek roots
κληρικός
klērikós
of the allotted portion
Literally: “one of the allotted share”
Follow a root:κληρικός2 words
The story of the word
When the clergy held a near-monopoly on literacy, the man who could read was the clerc, and the word slid from churchman to anyone who writes for a living. Benefit of clergy let a convicted man escape the gallows by reading out a verse of Latin, which put a startling value on the label. The Greek behind it is κλῆρος, the lot cast to assign a share; cleric is the same word borrowed a second time, direct from Latin.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Ecclesiastical Latin → Old French → English
- First recorded
- Old English
Same family
clericclergyclerical
In a sentence
The clerk stamped the form twice and pushed it back under the glass.