janitor

jan·i·tor

(jăn′ĭ-tər)

1. One who attends to the maintenance or cleaning of a building.

2. A doorman or doorwoman.

[Latin iānitor, doorkeeper, from iānua, door, from iānus, archway; see ei- in Indo-European roots.]

jan′i·to′ri·al (-tôr′ē-əl) adj.

Word History: In Latin iānus was the word for "archway, gateway, or covered passage" and also for the god of gates, doorways, and beginnings in general, known in English as Janus. Our month January—a month of beginnings—is named for the god. Latin iānitor, the source of our word janitor and ultimately also from iānus, meant "doorkeeper or gatekeeper." Probably because iānitor was common in Latin records and documents, it was adopted into English. In an early quotation Saint Peter is called "the Janitor of heaven." The term can still mean "doorkeeper," but in Scots usage janitor also referred to a minor school official. Apparently this position at times involved maintenance duties and doorkeeping, and the maintenance duties took over the more exalted tasks, giving us the position of janitor as we know it today.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

janitor

(ˈdʒænɪtə)

1. Scot and US and Canadian the caretaker of a building, esp a school

2. chiefly US and Canadian a person employed to clean and maintain a building, esp the public areas in a block of flats or office building; porter

[C17: from Latin: doorkeeper, from jānua door, entrance, from jānus covered way (compare Janus¹); related to Latin īre to go]

janitorial adj

ˈjanitress, ˈjanitrix fem n

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

jan•i•tor

(ˈdʒæn ɪ tər)

n.

1. a person employed in an apartment house, office building, school, etc., to keep the public areas clean and do minor repairs; caretaker.

2. Archaic. a doorkeeper or porter.

[1575–85; < Latin jānitor doorkeeper =jāni-, comb. form of jānus doorway, covered passage + -tor -tor]

jan`i•to′ri•al (-ˈtɔr i əl, -ˈtoʊr-) adj.

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

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Noun

janitor - someone employed to clean and maintain a building

custodian, keeper, steward - one having charge of buildings or grounds or animals

janitor

noun caretaker, porter, custodian, concierge, doorkeeper My mother was the janitor in the town school.

Collins Thesaurus of the English Language – Complete and Unabridged 2nd Edition. 2002 © HarperCollins Publishers 1995, 2002

Translations

Spanish / Español

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conserje portera portero bedel

janitor

[ˈdʒænɪtəʳ] N (= doorkeeper) → portero/a m/f; (= caretaker) → conserje mf

Collins Spanish Dictionary - Complete and Unabridged 8th Edition 2005 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1971, 1988 © HarperCollins Publishers 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2005

janitor

(ˈdʒӕnitə) – feminine ˈjanitress – noun

a caretaker or a doorkeeper. conserje, portero; conserje, portera

janitor

→ conserje

Multilingual Translator © HarperCollins Publishers 2009

Mentioned in ?

References in classic literature ?

At the first meeting of the Board he was mistaken for one of the exhibits, and the janitor was ordered to remove him to his appropriate glass case.

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To pay my way I worked as a janitor. My sister helped me, too; and I was not above mowing anybody's lawn or taking up and beating carpets when I had half a day to spare.

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At Notre-Dame it was a tiny cell situated on the roof of the side aisle, beneath the flying buttresses, precisely at the spot where the wife of the present janitor of the towers has made for herself a garden, which is to the hanging gardens of Babylon what a lettuce is to a palm-tree, what a porter's wife is to a Semiramis.

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Mackie, the head teacher, offered me a position as janitor. This, of course, I gladly accepted, because it was a place where I could work out nearly all the cost of my board.

I was determined from the first to make my work as janitor so valuable that my services would be indispensable.

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Had King Solomon been the janitor, with all his treasures piled up in the basement, Jim would have pulled out his watch every time he passed, just to see him pluck at his beard from envy.

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At the expiration of that time, wheels were heard whirling up to the gate--the young janitor went out with his gate-keys.

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Among the many billets which I have filled in America during my wandering life, I was once janitor and sweeper out of the laboratory at York College.

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"'G'wan an' see the janitor. I don't know nothin' about the gas.'

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Up went her head, and the look that she gave me took all the majesty out of me, and left me feeling more like the palace janitor--if palaces have janitors.

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The waiting-rooms of that Department soon began to be familiar with his presence, and he was generally ushered into them by its janitors much as a pickpocket might be shown into a police-office; the principal difference being that the object of the latter class of public business is to keep the pickpocket, while the Circumlocution object was to get rid of Clennam.

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At the British Museum the pigeons were crooning among the shadows of the grimy colonnade, and the stalwart janitors looked less stalwart than usual, as though their medals were too heavy for them.

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