pontiff

American  

[pon-tif] / ˈpɒn tɪf /

noun

1. any pontifex.

2. any high or chief priest.

3. Ecclesiastical.

   1. a bishop.

   2. the Roman Catholic pope, the Bishop of Rome.

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pontiff British  

/ ˈpɒntɪf /

noun

1. a former title of the pagan high priest at Rome, later used of popes and occasionally of other bishops, and now confined exclusively to the pope

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pontiff Cultural  

1. Another name for the pope. Pontiff comes from a Latin word, meaning “bridge builder,” that was used as a title for some of the priests of ancient Rome.

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Etymology

Origin of pontiff

1600–10; earlier pontife < French, short for Latin pontifex pontifex

Example Sentences

People aren’t ordinarily carried in chairs in New Hampshire, and as they raised him up he looked very strange to me, like some tragic and exalted personage, a stricken pontiff.

From Literature

Now, with his hands folded over his stomach, answering questions with the pacific smile of a pontiff granting dispensations, he was so perfectly at his ease that there was something palpably dishonest about it.

From Literature

Therefore, with his impetuous move, Julius accomplished what no other pontiff would ever have achieved with the greatest of human prudence.

From Literature

The 70-year-old pontiff said the trip would allow him to "continue the discourse of dialogue and bridge-building between the Christian and the Muslim worlds".

From Barron's

It is a chance for him to set out his spiritual and geopolitical vision after six months as pontiff, notable for its relative quiet after years of turbulence in the Catholic Church.

From The Wall Street Journal

Related Words

• pope