sheriff

See also: Sheriff

English

English Wikipedia has an article on:

sheriff

Wikipedia

Alternative forms

• sherriff, shrieve (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English shirreve, from Old English sċīrġerēfa, corresponding to shire +‎ reeve. There is no etymological connection to Sharif (شَرِيف (šarīf)), an Arabic title of honour that has cognates in other languages including Hindi, Urdu, Portuguese, etc.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈʃɛɹɪf/, /ˈʃɛɹəf/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛɹɪf, -ɛɹəf

Noun

sheriff (plural sheriffs)

1. (British, except Scotland) (High Sheriff) An official of a shire or county office, responsible for carrying out court orders, law enforcement and other duties.
2. (Scotland) A judge in the sheriff court, the court of a county or sheriffdom.
3. (US) A government official, usually responsible for law enforcement in their county and for administration of the county jail, sometimes an officer of the court, usually elected.

Derived terms

• high sheriff
• sheriffalty
• sheriffdom
• Sheriff Hutton
• sheriffry
• sheriffship
• sheriffwick
• there is a new sheriff in town

Descendants

• → Portuguese: xerife

Translations

all meanings

Arabic: شَرِيف m (šarīf) Armenian: շերիֆ (hy) (šerif) Belarusian: шэры́ф m (šerýf) Bulgarian: шери́ф m (šeríf) Catalan: xèrif (ca) Chinese: Mandarin: 郡治安官 (zh) (jùnzhì'ānguān) Czech: šerif (cs) m Dutch: sheriff (nl) m Esperanto: ŝerifo Finnish: šeriffi (fi), seriffi (fi), sheriffi (fi) French: shérif (fr) m Galician: shériff m Georgian: შერიფი (šeripi) German: Sheriff (de) m Greek: σερίφης (el) m (serífis) Hebrew: שֶׁרִיף m (šeríf) Hindi: शेरिफ़ m (śerif), शरीफ (hi) m (śarīph) Hungarian: seriff (hu), (US sense) megyei rendőrfőnök Icelandic: fógeti (is), skerfari m Ido: ushero (io) Irish: sirriam m Italian: sceriffo (it) m Japanese: 保安官 (ja) (ほあんかん, hoankan), シェリフ (sherifu), 郡治安官 (gunchiankan) Korean: 보안관 (ko) (boan'gwan), 형사 (ko) (hyeongsa) Malay: syerif Marathi: शेरिफ m (śeriph) Norwegian: sheriff m, lensmann (no) m Ojibwe: dakoniwewinini Persian: کلانتر (fa) (kalântar), شریف (fa) (šerif) Polish: szeryf (pl) m Portuguese: xerife (pt) m Romanian: șerif (ro) m Russian: шери́ф (ru) m (šeríf) Scottish Gaelic: siorram m Serbo-Croatian: Cyrillic: шѐриф m Roman: šèrif (sh) m Spanish: sheriff (es) m, alguacil (es) m Swedish: sheriff (sv) c Tagalog: serip Turkish: şerif (tr) Ukrainian: шери́ф m (šerýf) Urdu: شیرف m (śerif) Welsh: siryf m

Verb

sheriff (third-person singular simple present sheriffs, present participle sheriffing, simple past and past participle sheriffed)

1. (transitive) To carry out the duties of a sheriff. (The addition of quotations indicative of this usage is being sought:)

See also

• hatti-sherif (etymologically unrelated)

Anagrams

• Shiffer

Spanish

Spanish Wikipedia has an article on:

sheriff

Wikipedia ^es

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English sheriff.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈʃeɾif/ [ˈʃe.ɾif]
• Rhymes: -eɾif

Noun

sheriff m (plural sheriffs)

1. sheriff (all senses)

   Synonym: alguacil

Usage notes

According to Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) prescriptions, unadapted foreign words should be written in italics in a text printed in roman type, and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available. In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.

Further reading

• “sheriff”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 10 December 2024
• Manuel Seco; Olimpia Andrés; Gabino Ramos (3 August 2023), “sheriff”, in Diccionario del español actual [Dictionary of Current Spanish] (in Spanish), third digital edition, Fundación BBVA [BBVA Foundation]