Dean n.
 1. A dignitary or presiding officer in certain ecclesiastical and lay bodies; esp., an ecclesiastical dignitary, subordinate to a bishop.
 Dean of cathedral church, the chief officer of a chapter; he is an ecclesiastical magistrate next in degree to bishop, and has immediate charge of the cathedral and its estates.
 Dean of peculiars, a dean holding a preferment which has some peculiarity relative to spiritual superiors and the jurisdiction exercised in it. [Eng.]
 Rural dean, one having, under the bishop, the especial care and inspection of the clergy within certain parishes or districts of the diocese.
 2. The collegiate officer in the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, England, who, besides other duties, has regard to the moral condition of the college.
 3. The head or presiding officer in the faculty of some colleges or universities.
 4. A registrar or secretary of the faculty in a department of a college, as in a medical, or theological, or scientific department. [U.S.]
 5. The chief or senior of a company on occasion of ceremony; as, the dean of the diplomatic corps; -- so called by courtesy.
 Cardinal dean, the senior cardinal bishop of the college of cardinals at Rome. --Shipley.
 Dean and chapter, the legal corporation and governing body of a cathedral. It consists of the dean, who is chief, and his canons or prebendaries.
 Dean of arches, the lay judge of the court of arches.
 Dean of faculty, the president of an incorporation or barristers; specifically, the president of the incorporation of advocates in Edinburgh.
 Dean of guild, a magistrate of Scotch burghs, formerly, and still, in some burghs, chosen by the Guildry, whose duty is to superintend the erection of new buildings and see that they conform to the law.
 Dean of a monastery, Monastic dean, a monastic superior over ten monks.
 Dean's stall. See Decanal stall, under Decanal.
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 Fac·ul·ty n.; pl. Faculties
 1. Ability to act or perform, whether inborn or cultivated; capacity for any natural function; especially, an original mental power or capacity for any of the well-known classes of mental activity; psychical or soul capacity; capacity for any of the leading kinds of soul activity, as knowledge, feeling, volition; intellectual endowment or gift; power; as, faculties of the mind or the soul.
 But know that in the soul
 Are many lesser faculties that serve
 Reason as chief.   --Milton.
    What a piece of work is a man ! how noble in reason ! how infinite in faculty !   --Shak.
 2. Special mental endowment; characteristic knack.
    He had a ready faculty, indeed, of escaping from any topic that agitated his too sensitive and nervous temperament.   --Hawthorne.
 3. Power; prerogative or attribute of office. [R.]
 This Duncan
 Hath borne his faculties so meek.   --Shak.
 4. Privilege or permission, granted by favor or indulgence, to do a particular thing; authority; license; dispensation.
    The pope . . . granted him a faculty to set him free from his promise.   --Fuller.
    It had not only faculty to inspect all bishops' dioceses, but to change what laws and statutes they should think fit to alter among the colleges.   --Evelyn.
 5. A body of a men to whom any specific right or privilege is granted; formerly, the graduates in any of the four departments of a university or college (Philosophy, Law, Medicine, or Theology), to whom was granted the right of teaching (profitendi or docendi) in the department in which they had studied; at present, the members of a profession itself; as, the medical faculty; the legal faculty, etc.
 6. Amer. Colleges The body of person to whom are intrusted the government and instruction of a college or university, or of one of its departments; the president, professors, and tutors in a college.
 Dean of faculty. See under Dean.
 Faculty of advocates. Scot. See under Advocate.
 Syn: -- Talent; gift; endowment; dexterity; expertness; cleverness; readiness; ability; knack.
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