Bailiff vs. Beadle — What's the Difference?

A bailiff (from Middle English baillif, Old French baillis, bail "custody, charge, office"; cf. bail, based on the adjectival form, baiulivus, of Latin bajulus, carrier, manager) is a manager, overseer or custodian; a legal officer to whom some degree of authority or jurisdiction is given.

A beadle, sometimes spelled bedel, is an official of a church or synagogue who may usher, keep order, make reports, and assist in religious functions; or a minor official who carries out various civil, educational, or ceremonial duties on the manor. The term has pre-Conquest origins in Old English, deriving from the Old English bydel ("herald, messenger from an authority, preacher"), itself deriving from beodan ("to proclaim", which has a modern descendant in the English verb bid).

A court attendant entrusted with duties such as the maintenance of order in a courtroom during a trial.

A minor parish official formerly employed in an English church to usher and keep order during services.

An official who assists a British sheriff and who has the power to execute writs, processes, and arrests.

A parish constable, a uniformed minor (lay) official, who ushers and keeps order.

Chiefly British An overseer of an estate; a steward.

An attendant to the minister.

(law enforcement) An officer of the court, particularly:

A warrant officer.

A reeve, (specifically) the chief officer executing the decisions of any English court in the period following the Norman Conquest or executing the decisions of lower courts in the late medieval and early modern period.

A messenger or crier of a court; a servitor; one who cites or bids persons to appear and answer; - called also an apparitor or summoner.

(UK) A high bailiff: an officer of the county courts responsible for executing warrants and court orders, appointed by the judge and removable by the Lord Chancellor.

An officer in a university, who precedes public processions of officers and students.

(UK) A bound bailiff: a deputy bailiff charged with debt collection.

An inferior parish officer in England having a variety of duties, as the preservation of order in church service, the chastisement of petty offenders, etc.

(US) Any law enforcement officer charged with courtroom security and order.

A minor parish official who serves as an usher and preserves order at services

A huissier de justice or other foreign officer of the court acting as either a process server or as courtroom security.

United States biologist who discovered how hereditary characteristics are transmitted by genes (1903-1989)

A public administrator, particularly:

(obsolete) A king's man: any officer nominated by the English Crown.

(historical) hundredman: The chief officer of a hundred in medieval England.

The title of the mayor of certain English towns.

The title of the castellan of certain royal castles in England.

The chief justice and president of the legislature on Jersey and Guernsey in the Channel Islands.

The High Bailiff of the Isle of Man.

(obsolete) A bailie: an alderman in certain Scottish towns.

(historical) An appointee of the French king administering certain districts of northern France in the Middle Ages.

(historical) A head of a district ("bailiwick") of the Knights Hospitaller; a head of one of the national associations ("tongues") of the Hospitallers' headquarters on Rhodes or Malta.

(historical) A landvogt in the medieval German states.

A private administrator, particularly Steward

(historical) A steward: the manager of a medieval manor charged with collecting its rents, etc.

(historical) An overseer: a supervisor of tenant farmers, serfs, or slaves, usually as part of his role as steward (see above).

The foreman or overman of a mine.

Any debt collector, regardless of his or her official status.

Originally, a person put in charge of something; especially, a chief officer, magistrate, or keeper, as of a county, town, hundred, or castle; one to whom powers of custody or care are intrusted.

A sheriff's deputy, appointed to make arrests, collect fines, summon juries, etc.

An overseer or under steward of an estate, who directs husbandry operations, collects rents, etc.

An officer of the court who is employed to execute writs and processes and make arrests etc.