grandee
/ɡɹænˈdiː/
Etymology
Borrowed from Spanish grande (adjective), from Latin grandis (“large, great”). Doublet of grand and grande.
Why this word is great
GRANDEE — [Noun] A high-ranking nobleman in Spain or Portugal, or more generally, a person of high rank. From Spanish grande ("great, noble"), from Latin grandis ("large, great"). Unlike "aristocrat" (which broadly denotes nobility) or "peer" (which anchors itself to British titles), "grandee" evokes the sun-baked hierarchies of Iberia—the gilded weight of lineage and land. It is the slow rustle of a silk cape in the halls of the Escorial, the deliberate tilt of a chin above a ruffled collar, and the way a name, centuries old, can still command a room with nothing more than its whispered syllables. Some titles are worn; this one is inherited like a throne.
noun
- A high-ranking nobleman in Spain or Portugal.“Grandees of Spain are of two sorts, this Honour being sometimes personal, sometimes hereditary. The first, the King bids be covered themselves; the second, themselves and Heirs for ever. This is all the Ceremony in making a Grandee, neither do any other priviledges belong to it; so that it is but a Chimerical and Airy Honour, without any profit; they which marry the Heiress of a Family of a Grande”
- A person of high rank.“I indicated a chair, and he sat down. This grandee was the grandson of an American of considerable note in his day, and not wholly forgotten yet,—a man who came so near being a great man that he was quite generally accounted one while he lived.”