Secretariat

How to spell secretariat

11 letters · 5 syllables

How to pronounce secretariat

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does secretariat mean?

1. nounThe permanent administrative office or body of officials that runs the affairs of a large organisation.

Secretariat in a sentence

• The United Nations secretariat coordinates the work of its many agencies.

• Every policy proposal is reviewed by the secretariat before the council votes.

Where does secretariat come from?

Language of origin: French

This word traces back to the Latin secretus, the past participle of secernere, meaning 'to set apart' or 'to separate out', which gave a sense of something kept private or confidential. From that came the Medieval Latin secretarius, a person entrusted with private or confidential matters, the direct ancestor of our everyday 'secretary'. By the eighteenth century French had built secretariat to name the office, post, or body of officials headed by such a secretary, and English borrowed that French form intact in the early nineteenth century. The meaning broadened to cover the permanent administrative staff of a large organisation, which is why bodies like the United Nations have a Secretariat. The spelling trap lives in the middle and the ending: the unstressed vowels blur in speech, so the careful 'secre-' opening and the French '-ariat' close (not '-eriat') are easy to scramble.

How the word is built

• secret- (from Latin secretus: set apart, confidential)
• -arius (agent: one entrusted with it)
• -atus/-iat (office or body)