Liberal Dictionary English Dictionary
noun
- Anne (Harvey),1928–74, U.S. poet.
noun
- a person employed to act as caretaker of a church and its contents and graveyard, and often also as bell-ringer, gravedigger, etc
- another name for the burying beetle
c.1300, sekesteyn, “person in charge of the sacred objects of a church,” from Old French segrestien, from Medieval Latin sacristanus (see sacristan). Sense of “custodian of a church” first recorded 1580s. Fem. forms sextress, sextrice are recorded 15c., but the usual form is sextoness (early 15c.).