Steward

How to spell steward

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce steward

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does steward mean?

1. nounA person who manages a household, estate, or organisation, or who attends to passengers aboard a ship or aircraft.
2. verbTo manage or look after something carefully on behalf of others.

Steward in a sentence

• noun

  The steward on the flight brought a tray of drinks to the cabin.

• verb

  The trustees must steward the charity's funds with great care.

• noun

  The family hired a steward to run the country estate and its accounts.

• verb

  Local farmers work to steward the land for future generations.

Where does steward come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The word descends from the Old English stigweard, a compound of stig, meaning a house or hall (and related to the word for a pig enclosure, the 'sty'), and weard, meaning a keeper or guardian. Literally, then, a steward was 'the keeper of the hall', the trusted servant who managed a great household and its provisions. Over the medieval centuries the role grew in prestige until a steward could oversee an entire estate or even royal affairs; the Scottish royal house of Stewart (later Stuart) took its very name from the hereditary office of High Steward. The sense later widened to cover an attendant who serves food and drink aboard a ship or aircraft, and a verb sense, 'to manage carefully on someone's behalf', emerged in modern times. The spelling preserves that old guardian element 'ward', which is the same 'ward' found in warden and toward, a useful anchor against confusing it with the surname Stewart.

How the word is built

• sti- (from Old English stig: house, hall)
• ward (from weard: keeper, guardian)