inquisitor
/ɪnˈkwɪzɪtə
/noun
1A person making an inquiry, especially one seen to be excessively harsh or searching: the professional inquisitors of the press...
- He jokes casually with old acquaintances and tackles each question head on, his bright brown eyes searching the faces of his inquisitors.
- For these kindly inquisitors, all romantic beginnings set the full context for everything that followed (never mind what really happened as the couple came to truly know each other).
- I'm also surprised at how confident my inquisitors are that I will naturally have to slam the President, which is the prospect the left seems to be anticipating with some glee.
1.1 historical An officer of the Inquisition.With almost no more native and very few foreign Protestants to prosecute, inquisitors began to target other sorts of religious 'deviants'....
- Having heard their confessions, the inquisitor could impose a penance or punishment, which ranged from wearing yellow crosses to indicate that a witness had been guilty of heretical activities, to being burned alive at the stake.
- Theologians and inquisitors attributed these offenses to the devil's work, to which socially marginal, uneducated women were seen as especially susceptible.
Origin
Late Middle English: from French inquisiteur, from Latin inquisitor, from the verb inquirere (see enquire).
Rhymes
- valuably
- valuate
- valuation
- valuation date
- valuation day
- valuative
- valuator
- value
- value added
- value-added network
- value added tax
- value-adding
- value analysis
- value analyst
- value calling
- value chain
- valued
- valued policy
- value engineering
- value for money
- value-free
- value freedom
- value judgement
- value-laden
- value-ladenness