bureau
Americannoun
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a chest of drawers, often with a mirror at the top.
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a division of a government department or an independent administrative unit.
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an office for collecting or distributing news or information, coordinating work, or performing specified services; agency.
a travel bureau; a news bureau.
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Chiefly British. a desk or writing table with drawers for papers.
noun
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a writing desk with pigeonholes, drawers, etc, against which the writing surface can be closed when not in use
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a chest of drawers
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an office or agency, esp one providing services for the public
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a government department
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a branch of a government department
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Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of bureau
1710–20; < French: desk, office, originally a kind of cloth (used to cover desks, etc.), Anglo-French, Old French burel, equivalent to bur- (probably < *būra, variant of Late Latin burra wool, fluff ; cf. bourrée) + -el noun suffix
Explanation
When you put your socks away, you'll most likely put them in a bureau, or a chest of drawers used for storing clothes. Hopefully you've washed them. A dresser or a chest of drawers can also be called a bureau, a piece of furniture with drawers for storing things. Another meaning of bureau is "an office or government agency." These two definitions seem unrelated, but the original meaning of the French word bureau, "cloth covering for a desk" helps explain. Bureau gradually evolved to mean first just "desk" (and eventually "dresser"), and around 1720 it also started being used to mean a room full of desks, or an office.
Vocabulary lists containing bureau
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"The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The average repair time for a streetlight was one year, bureau officials said in February.
From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 26, 2026
Many years ago, when I was a newbie newspaper reporter in the Boston Globe’s Washington bureau, one of my colleagues, Tom Oliphant, gave me a tip that I’ve cherished ever since.
From Slate • Jun. 24, 2026
A top FBI official recently revealed that the bureau does have the authority to make such intercepts.
From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 18, 2026
Ellie Davis is a reporting intern with The Wall Street Journal's Detroit-based autos bureau and part of the summer 2026 newsroom intern class at the Journal.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 12, 2026
For Hoover, the Osage murder investigation became a showcase for the modern bureau.
From "Killers of the Flower Moon" by David Grann
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
