undertaker
nounattested in dialogue
- //ˈʌndə(ɹ)ˌteɪkə(ɹ)//
A funeral director; someone whose business is to manage funerals, burials and cremations.
noun
- 1
A funeral director; someone whose business is to manage funerals, burials and cremations.
- 2
historicalA person receiving land in Ireland during the Elizabethan era, so named because they gave an undertaking to abide by several conditions regarding marriage, to be loyal to the crown, and to use English as their spoken language.
In 1588, Edmund Spenser became an undertaker in the first Elizabethan plantation, receiving the forfeited Irish estate of Kilcolman Castle.
- 3
historicalA contractor for the royal revenue in England, one of those who undertook to manage the House of Commons for the king in the Addled Parliament of 1614.
- 4
rareOne who undertakes or commits to doing something.
A company shall not be appointed to be a water undertaker unless it is a limited company or a statutory water company and shall not be appointed to be a sewerage undertaker unless it is a limited company.
The undertaker of the enterprise is usually known today by the French term entrepreneur because we have surrendered the English word to the undertakers of funerals.
Etymology
From undertake (verb) + -er.
Forms
- plural
- undertakers
undertaker · A funeral director; someone whose business is to manage funerals, burials and cremations.
undertaking · The business of an undertaker, or the management of funerals.underwater · Beneath the surface of the water; of or pertaining to the…underway · In motion, in progress; being done or carried out; on a…