Added 9 October 2026
censor
/ˈsɛnsə/ noun
In Latin: cēnsor Wiktionary
noun Definition from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). Pronunciation from Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org. More about censor at Wordnik → Where our words come from →
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One of the two magistrates who originally administered the census of citizens, and by Classical times (between the 8th century B.C.E. and the 6th century C.E.) was a high judge of public behaviour and morality.
The Ancient Roman censors were part of the cursus honorum, a series of public offices held during a political career, like consuls and praetors.
- A high-ranking official who was responsible for the supervision of subordinate government officials.
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An official responsible for the removal or suppression of objectionable material (for example, if obscene or likely to incite violence) or sensitive content in books, films, correspondence, and other media.
The headmaster was an even stricter censor of his boarding pupils’ correspondence than the enemy censors had been of his own when the country was occupied.
verb
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To review for, and if necessary to remove or suppress, content from books, films, correspondence, and other media which is regarded as objectionable (for example, obscene, likely to incite violence, or sensitive).
The people responsible for censoring films have seen some startling things in their time.
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To partially obscure an observation.
Early dropout is one cause of right-censoring.
noun
- A hypothetical subconscious agency which filters unacceptable thought before it reaches the conscious mind.
Origin
The noun is borrowed from Latin cēnsor (“magistrate; critic”), from cēnseō (“to give an opinion, judge; to assess, reckon; to decree, determine”) + -sor (variant of -tor (suffix forming masculine agent nouns)). Ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ḱens- (“to announce, proclaim; to put in order”). The English word is cognate with Late Middle English sensour, Proto-Iranian *cánhati (“to declare; to explain”), Sanskrit शंसति (śaṃsati, “to declare”). The verb is derived from the noun.
From Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org (CC BY-SA)