beadle

name

1. A surname originating as an occupation for a court official.

noun

Etymology: From Middle English bedel, bidel, from Old English bydel (“warrant officer, apparitor”), from Proto-West Germanic *budil, from Proto-Germanic *budilaz (“herald”), equivalent to bid + -le. Cognate with Dutch beul, German Büttel. More at bid.

1. A parish constable, a uniformed minor (lay) official, who ushers and keeps order.

   “Twas on a holy Thursday, their innocent faces clean, The children walking two and two in red and blue and green: Grey-headed beadles walked before, with wands as white as snow, Till into the high dome of Paul's they like Thames waters flow.”

   “The beadle […] generally understood in the neighbourhood to be a ridiculous institution […] The policeman considers him an imbecile civilian, a remnant of the barbarous watchmen times, but gives him admission as something that must be borne with until government shall abolish him.”

2. An attendant to the minister.
3. A warrant officer.