Definitions

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

  • noun A group of persons or things organized into successive ranks or grades with each level subordinate to the one above.
  • noun Categorization or arrangement of a group of people or things into such ranks or grades.
  • noun A body of persons having authority.
  • noun A group of animals in which certain members or subgroups dominate or submit to others.
  • noun One of three main divisions of angels in traditional Christian angelology.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The power or dominion of a hierarch; hallowed or consecrated authority in what concerns religious order or government.
  • noun Government by ecclesiastical rulers; an ecclesiastical or priestly form of government. —
  • noun An order of holy beings regarded as employed in divine government.
  • noun A body of persons organized in ranks and orders for the exercise of rule oversacred things; hence, an organized body of ecclesiastics intrusted with government of either church or state; also, a similarly organized body of officials in other systems of government: as, the Roman Catholic hierarchy.
  • noun In science, a series of successive terms of different rank. The terms kingdom, order, suborder, family, genus, and species constitute a hierarchy in zoölogy.

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

  • noun Dominion or authority in sacred things.
  • noun A body of officials disposed organically in ranks and orders each subordinate to the one above it; a body of ecclesiastical rulers.
  • noun A form of government administered in the church by patriarchs, metropolitans, archbishops, bishops, and, in an inferior degree, by priests.
  • noun A rank or order of holy beings.
  • noun (Math., Logic, Computers) Any group of objects ranked so that every one but the topmost is subordinate to a specified one above it; also, the entire set of ordering relations between such objects. The ordering relation between each object and the one above is called a hierarchical relation.

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

  • noun A body of authoritative officials organized in nested ranks.
  • noun Any group of objects ranked so that every one but the topmost is subordinate to a specified one above it.

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

  • noun a series of ordered groupings of people or things within a system
  • noun the organization of people at different ranks in an administrative body

Etymologies

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

[Middle English ierarchie, from Old French, from Medieval Latin hierarchia, from Greek hierarkhiā, rule of a high priest, from hierarkhēs, high priest; see hierarch.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English ierarchie from Latin hierarchia, from Ancient Greek ἱεραρχία (hierarkhia, "rule of a high priest"), from ἱεράρχης (hierarkhēs, "high priest"), from ἱερεύς (hiereus, "priest") and ἀρχή (arkhē, "rule"). Compare French hiérarchie.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word hierarchy.

Examples

  • The label hierarchy couldn't have been that disgruntled.

    Drowned In Sound // Feed 2009

  • And the hierarchy is a "self-perpetuating elite," he continued.

    Cara McDonough: Why I'm (Still) Catholic Cara McDonough 2010

  • In less austere terms, a hierarchy is a collection of parts with ordered asymmetric relationships inside a whole.

    A Disclaimer for Behe? 2009

  • And the hierarchy is a "self-perpetuating elite," he continued.

    Cara McDonough: Why I'm (Still) Catholic Cara McDonough 2010

  • The features are pretty self explanatory, with Nested Labels, you will be able to create a label hierarchy, like you could with folders, and Message Sneak Peek allows you to see a preview of the email without actually opening it.

    Softpedia - Windows - All Lucian Parfeni 2010

  • Our agreed definition of a nested hierarchy is an ordered set such that each subset is strictly contained within its superset.

    A Disclaimer for Behe? 2009

  • Here's Wikipedia on the Nested Hierarchy: A nested hierarchy is the name given to the classification of objects into a hierarchical structure of "groups within groups" or "branches from a trunk".

    A Disclaimer for Behe? 2009

  • Zachriel sez to screw those priniciples a nested hierarchy is what I say it is.

    A Disclaimer for Behe? 2009

  • A nested hierarchy is just a mathematical structure as defined above.

    A Disclaimer for Behe? 2009

  • Our agreed definition of a nested hierarchy is an ordered set such that each subset is strictly contained within its superset.

    A Disclaimer for Behe? 2009

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.