chieftaincy

English

Etymology

From chieftain +‎ -cy. Piecewise doublet of captaincy.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈtʃiːftənsi/

Noun

chieftaincy (plural chieftaincies)

1. The position or period of rule of a chief.
   • 1969, Bessie Head, When Rain Clouds Gather, Heinemann, published 1995, pages 40–41:

     At first Matenge had hated his brother because he felt the chieftaincy should be his, and this hatred drove him to overreach himself until he was discovered in a plot to assassinate his brother.

   • 1994, Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela, London: Abacus, published 2010, page 22:

     The two principles that governed my life at Mqhekezweni were chieftaincy and the Church.

2. The area or population ruled by a chief.
   • 2009 March 2, David W. Dunlap, “Broadway Traffic Cure Elusive Since the 1800s”, in New York Times‎:

     And it does not help that the lowermost part of Broadway was originally laid out as a footpath by the people of the Wickquasgeck chieftaincy, long before Europeans arrived.