hierarchy

[hahy-uh-rahr-kee, hahy-rahr-] /ˈhaɪ əˌrɑr ki, ˈhaɪ rɑr-/

noun, plural hierarchies.

any system of persons or things ranked one above another.

government by ecclesiastical rulers.

the power or dominion of a hierarch.

an organized body of ecclesiastical officials in successive ranks or orders:

the Roman Catholic hierarchy.

one of the three divisions of the angels, each made up of three orders, conceived as constituting a graded body.

Also called celestial hierarchy. the collective body of angels.

government by an elite group.

Linguistics. the system of levels according to which a language is organized, as phonemic, morphemic, syntactic, or semantic.

Origin

1300-50; < Medieval Latin hierarchia < Late Greek hierarchía rule or power of the high priest, equivalent to hier- hier- + archía -archy; replacing Middle English jerarchie < Middle French ierarchie < Medieval Latin ierarchia, variant of hierarchia

Related forms

antihierarchy, noun, plural antihierarchies, adjective

Examples from the web for hierarchy

It was an age in which social hierarchy was considered a reflection of the divine order of the universe.
Nonetheless, in the hierarchy of serious spirits, single malt Scotch whiskey still rules.
What is missing here is social science research on the hierarchy of the values.
Roman citizens sat according to their place in the social hierarchy.
With the advent of agriculture and writing in Mesopotamia came social hierarchy.
The familiar bright colors of Indian textiles were once used to represent hierarchy in social standing.
The gist is that higher education is built around hierarchy, order, and stability.
There is an unofficial hierarchy among photo galleries, and the oldest tend to be at the top of the heap.
They found that the higher up someone was in the social hierarchy, the more aggressive they were as a bully.
On the other hand, there is a hierarchy among tutelary and ancestral gods.

British Dictionary definitions for hierarchy

hierarchy

/ˈhaɪəˌrɑːkɪ/

noun (pl) -chies

a system of persons or things arranged in a graded order

a body of persons in holy orders organized into graded ranks

the collective body of those so organized

a series of ordered groupings within a system, such as the arrangement of plants and animals into classes, orders, families, etc

(linguistics, maths) a formal structure, usually represented by a diagram of connected nodes, with a single uppermost element Compare ordering, heterarchy, tree (sense 6)

government by an organized priesthood

Derived Forms

hierarchical, hierarchic, adjective
hierarchically, adverb
hierarchism, noun

Word Origin

C14: from Medieval Latin hierarchia, from Late Greek hierarkhia, from hierarkhēs high priest; see hiero-, -archy

Word Origin and History for hierarchy

mid-14c., from Old French ierarchie, from Medieval Latin hierarchia "ranked division of angels" (in the system of Dionysius the Areopagite), from Greek hierarkhia "rule of a high priest," from hierarkhes "high priest, leader of sacred rites," from ta hiera "the sacred rites" (neuter plural of hieros "sacred;" see ire) + arkhein "to lead, rule" (see archon). Sense of "ranked organization of persons or things" first recorded 1610s, initially of clergy, sense probably influenced by higher. Related: Hierarchal; hierarchical.

hierarchy in Technology

An organisation with few things, or one thing, at the top and with several things below each other thing. An inverted tree structure. Examples in computing include a directory hierarchy where each directory may contain files or other directories; a hierarchical network (see hierarchical routing), a class hierarchy in object-oriented programming.
(1994-10-11)