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• beadle
  beadle

  noun

  a parish officer having various subordinate duties, as keeping order during services, waiting on the rector, etc.
• Beadle
  Beadle

  noun

  George Wells, 1903–1989, U.S. biologist and educator: Nobel Prize in Medicine 1958.

beadle

¹ American  

[beed-l] / ˈbid l /

noun

1. a parish officer having various subordinate duties, as keeping order during services, waiting on the rector, etc.

2. sexton.

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Beadle ² American  

[beed-l] / ˈbid l /

noun

1. George Wells, 1903–1989, U.S. biologist and educator: Nobel Prize in Medicine 1958.

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beadle ¹ British  

/ ˈbiːdəl /

noun

1. (formerly, in the Church of England) a minor parish official who acted as an usher and kept order

2. (in Scotland) a church official attending on the minister

3. Judaism a synagogue attendant See also shammes

4. an official in certain British universities and other institutions

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Beadle ² British  

/ ˈbiːdəl /

noun

1. George Wells . 1903–89, US biologist, who shared the Nobel prize for physiology or medicine in 1958 for his work in genetics

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Other Word Forms

• beadleship
  noun
• subbeadle
  noun
• underbeadle
  noun

Etymology

Origin of beadle

before 1000; Middle English bedel, dial. (SE) variant of bidel, Old English bydel apparitor, herald (cognate with German Büttel ), equivalent to bud- (weak stem of bēodan to command) + -il noun suffix

Explanation

A beadle is a church leader. Often, a beadle serves as an usher or manages charities for the church. The noun beadle isn't used very often in American English, though it's still a fairly common term in Britain, where beadles hold symbolic or ceremonial jobs in parishes or at universities. Perhaps the most famous fictional beadle is found in Charles Dickens' novel "Oliver Twist," the cruel Mr. Bumble. Beadle comes from an Old English root word, bydel, which means "a person who makes a proclamation."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

beadle Beadle

Mr. Bumble, the workhouse beadle, asks gleefully, in six-eight rhythm.

From New York Times ● May 4, 2023

From the west door of the Abbey, Westminster's beadle led the ranking clergy of Great Britain to the foot of the altar steps.

From Time Magazine Archive

Its surprise benefactor was the House, which earlier had played the beadle.

From Time Magazine Archive

A beadle, an archdeacon, a priest in a red biretta.

From Time Magazine Archive

The coroner, in Mr. Wopsle’s hands, became Timon of Athens; the beadle, Coriolanus.

From "Great Expectations" by Charles Dickens

Nicholas Mongiardo-Cooper’s Beadle Bamford, the judge’s henchman, has a malicious ebullience all his own.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 3, 2026

England under-21 keeper James Beadle will compete with Ryan Allsop between the sticks.

From BBC ● Aug. 7, 2025

Barkley reiterated to Beadle and Decker that calling him would be the best way for anyone to break the news to him, particularly if it’s bad news.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 5, 2024

The family recorded the EP at a studio in nearby Dripping Springs, Texas, with Nate and Jay reprising their usual roles and Brian Beadle, a family friend, on drums.

From New York Times ● Apr. 1, 2024

In the late 1930s, Beadle and Tatum reasoned that isolating the actual eye pigment of a fruit fly might solve the riddle of gene action.

From "The Gene" by Siddhartha Mukherjee