Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Roman Catholic Church One who is ordained in the lowest of the former minor orders.
  • noun A church doorkeeper.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In the early church and in the Roman Catholic Church, the doorkeeper of a church.
  • noun The porter of a monastery.
  • noun A mouth of a river.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun rare The mouth of a river; an estuary.
  • noun One who keeps the door, especially the door of a church; a porter.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The mouth of a river; an estuary.
  • noun One who keeps the door, especially the door of a church; a porter.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the lowest of the minor Holy Orders in the unreformed Western Church but now suppressed by the Roman Catholic Church
  • noun someone who guards an entrance

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English hostiary, from Latin ōstiārius, doorkeeper, from ōstium, door, from ōs, mouth; see ōs- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Latin ostium door, entrance. See usher.

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