Chief

How to spell chief

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce chief

What does chief mean?

1. nounThe person with the highest rank or authority in a group or organisation.
2. adjectiveMost important or principal among several things.

Chief in a sentence

• noun

  The fire chief ordered the building to be evacuated.

• adjective

  Poor planning was the chief reason the project failed.

• noun

  She reported the security breach directly to the chief of police.

• adjective

  His chief concern was keeping the budget under control.

Where does chief come from?

Language of origin: French

This word travelled into English from the Old French chief, which literally meant 'head' and, by extension, the most important person or thing. That French word descended from the Latin caput, meaning the physical head, the very same root that gives us 'capital', 'captain', and 'decapitate'. English adopted it in the 1200s, first as a noun for a leader or ruler and soon afterwards as an adjective meaning 'principal' or 'foremost'. The spelling preserves the Old French 'ie' vowel pairing, which is exactly why it follows the familiar 'i before e' pattern and trips up writers who expect 'ei'. Over the centuries the idea of 'the head' broadened from a literal body part to anyone at the top of an organisation, from a tribal chief to a fire chief.

How the word is built

• chief (whole word, from Old French chief meaning 'head', ultimately Latin caput 'head'); no separable prefix or suffix