mandarin

Etymology 1

From Portuguese mandarim, mandarij, from Malay menteri, manteri, and its source, Sanskrit मन्त्रिन् (mantrin, “minister, councillor”), from मन्त्र (mantra, “counsel, maxim, mantra”) + -इन् (-in, an agent suffix). In Chinese folk etymology, the word originates from Mandarin 滿大人／满大人 (Mǎndàrén, literally “Manchu important man”).

noun

1. (historical) A high government bureaucrat of the Chinese Empire.
   LIKE THE MANDARINS of old, the rulers of China live behind high walls. When they emerge, which they rarely do, they travel in cars with rear windows curtained like sedan chairs. They live in the Chung Nan Hai, a walled park adjacent to the Forbidden City from where ancient dynasties ruled the Celestial Empire. 1991, Chris Mullin, The Year of the Fire Monkey (Fiction), London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC, page 252
2. A pedantic or elitist bureaucrat.
3. (often derogatory) A pedantic senior person of influence in academia or literary circles.
   Its sting preserved to literature a fierce peculiar genius [Waugh] who, in the 40 years before his death last week at 62, achieved recognition as the grand old mandarin of modern British prose and as a satirist whose skill at sticking pens in people rates him a roomy cell in the murderers’ row (Swift, Pope, Wilde, Shaw) of English letters. 1966, “The Beauty of His Malice”, in Time
   When mandarins on the court pointed to obscure language in the Constitution to overturn a century of precedent and declare the income tax unconstitutional, Harlan sided with precedent[.] June 23 2021, Peter S. Canellos, “Why The ‘Trump Court’ Won’t Be Like Trump”, in Politico
4. (ornithology) Ellipsis of mandarin duck.
5. (informal, Britain) A senior civil servant.

adj

1. Pertaining to or reminiscent of mandarins; deliberately superior or complex; esoteric, highbrow, obscurantist.
   A mandarin impassivity had descended over Smiley's face. The earlier emotion was quite gone. 1979, John Le Carré, Smiley's People, Folio Society, published 2010, page 58
   Though alert to riddles' strong roots in vernacular narrative, Cook's tastes are mandarin, and she gives a loving account of Wallace Stevens's meditations on the life of poetic images and simile […]. 2007, Marina Warner, “Doubly Damned”, in London Review of Books, 29:3, p. 26

Etymology 2

From French mandarine, feminine of mandarin, probably formed as Etymology 1, above, from the yellow colour of the mandarins' costume.

noun

1. Ellipsis of mandarin orange.:
   1. A small, sweet citrus fruit.
   2. A tree of the species Citrus reticulata.
2. (color) An orange colour.
   mandarin: