alderman

noun

1. A member of a municipal legislative body in a city or town.
2. (UK, historical, obsolete, slang)A half-crown coin; its value, 30 pence.

   “The price of a case (five shillings piece bad) from the smasher is about one shilling; an alderman (two and sixpence) about sixpence; a peg (shilling) about threepence; a downer or sprat (sixpence) about twopence.”

   “Half-a-crown is known as an alderman, half a bull, half a tusheroon, and a madza caroon; whilst a crown piece, or five shillings, may be called either a bull, or a caroon, or a cartwheel, or a coachwheel, or a thick-un, or a tusheroon.”

3. A long pipe for smoking.

   “In one part of Cockaigne an amalgamation of these two last has lately taken place; and the pleasure experienced by the parishioners of Walbrook is unbounded when smoking an alderman and churchwarden.”

4. (US, slang)A large, protruding, or swollen abdomen; a paunch, a potbelly.

   “He'd exercise, get the fat off, because if he let it go, he'd have too much on and maybe make his heart worse, and you looked like hell with an alderman. […] And she wouldn't want a guy who stuck out in front like a balloon.”

5. Synonym of starosta

   “The chief man of a vollost is a Zasidatil; the chief man of a village is a Starosta, or alderman.”

   “Both the Council and the Department are presided over by a District Alderman (starosta) nominated by the Ministry of the Interior, and performing a series of purely administrative duties.”

   “The family name of a person is but rarely used and sometimes it is almost ignored, people being addressed and spoken of by the name of the farm to which they belong. The family names represented in the village are either derived from Christian names: Filip (Philip), Janacek (Jacky): or they designate a position or occupation: Pohúnek (farm-apprentice), Starosta (alderman), Dráb (constable), or they are borrowed from natural history: Zízala (dew-worm), Skvor (earwig), Vosicky (aspen-tree).”

   “Sometimes envoys, noblemen (dvorjane), summoners (podvojskie), aldermen (starosty), and merchants also appear under their first name only: for example, the dvorjane Stepanko and Ivanko (Doc. No. †92, dated 1400/25), the podvojskie Olferei and Feodor (Doc. No. 327, 15th c.), the starosta Vasilʹ (Doc. No. †922, 15th c.), the kupcy Makarьja, Oksentei and Grigorьja (Doc. No. †56, before 1417).”

name

1. An English surname originating as an occupation.