Noun: clerk
| Singular | clerk |
| Plural | clerks |
Sample Sentences
-
As office boy I made such a mark
-
That they gave me the post of a junior clerk. [1879, W[illiam] S[chwenck] Gilbert, Arthur Sullivan, composer, “When I Was a Lad”, in H.M.S. Pinafore; […], San Francisco: Bacon & Company, […], →OCLC, page 10:]
-
Thus, when he drew up instructions in lawyer language, he expressed the important words by an initial, a medial, or a final consonant, and made scratches for all the words between; his clerks, however, understood him very well. [1892, Walter Besant, “Prologue: Who is Edmund Gray?”, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC:]
-
clerks; a brand of humanity which, as the literature from Dickens to Gogol makes only too clear, was hardly to be envied except perhaps for the privilege of public service, the security which allowed them to starve at an even rhythm all their lives. [1962, Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolution. 1789-1848, page 193:]
-
God save the King! Will no man say, amen? / Am I both priest and clerk? Well then, amen. [1595 December 9 (first known performance), William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Richard the Second”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act 4, scene 1]:]
-
13th century, Traditional carol,
-
And all was for an appel, an appel that he toke/As clerkès finden written in their boke.
Nouns inflected like clerk
soldier's woundwort,
Nicosian,
whopper,
greypate,
tactile sign language,
chronotrope,
Rosie Lee,
dissentient,
photoinactivator,
sulphonediimine,
coastal waterfall,
residuary devise,
bituminization,
nitrosonaphthol,
smṛiti,
geosphere,
backscreen,
mensuralist,
flocculate,
flocculant, etc. (List truncated at 20 nouns)
Etymology
1. From Middle English clerc, from Old English clerc, from Late Latin clēricus (“priest, clergyman, cleric”, also generally “learned man, clerk”), from Ancient Greek κληρικός (klērikós, “of the clergy”, adj. in church jargon), from κλῆρος (klêros, “lot, inheritance”, originally “shard used in casting lots”). Doublet of cleric.
2. Compare typologically Russian дьяк (dʹjak) (akin to дья́кон (dʹjákon)). See: Old English Nouns '
clerc', Ancient Greek Nouns '
κληρικός'.