camerlengo

• camarlengo, camerlingo

Borrowed from Italian camerlengo (“chamberlain”). Doublet of chamberlain.

camerlengo (plural camerlengos)

1. The cardinal who administers the Roman Catholic Church in the interregnum between Popes.
   • 2013 February 26, Gaia Pianigiani, Elisabetta Povoledo, “Benedict XVI to Be Known as Emeritus in Retirement”, in New York Times‎^[1]:

     Benedict will also stop using the so-called fisherman’s ring to seal documents. It will be destroyed by the cardinal camerlengo, the acting head of state of Vatican City during the “sede vacante,” the canon law term used when the papacy is vacant.

   • 2025 May 3, Amy Kazmin, Jude Webber, “The cardinal running the papal conclave”, in FT Weekend, page 3:

     For the conclave, the camerlengo is now responsible for ensuring an “orderly election and its privacy”, according to Universi Dominici Gregis—the apostolic constitution governing papal succession.

• camerlengo on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

From Old Italian camarlingo, inherited from Medieval Latin camarlingus. Doublet of ciambellano.

Cognates include Old High German chamarling and French chambellan.

• IPA^(key): /ka.merˈlen.ɡo/
• Rhymes: -enɡo
• Hyphenation: ca‧mer‧lén‧go

camerlengo m (plural camerlenghi)

1. chamberlain

• → English: camerlengo

• camerlengo in Treccani.it – Vocabolario Treccani on line, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana

Borrowed from Italian camerlengo.

• Rhymes: -ẽɡu
• Hyphenation: ca‧mer‧len‧go

camerlengo m (plural camerlengos)

1. (Roman Catholicism) camerlengo (cardinal who presides over the Apostolic Chamber and, in a pontifical interregnum, is responsible for governing the Church in the administrative field)

• “camerlengo”, in Dicionário infopédia da Língua Portuguesa (in Portuguese), Porto: Porto Editora, 2003–2025
• “camerlengo”, in Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa (in Portuguese), Lisbon: Priberam, 2008–2025