Word of the Week: panjandrum (păn-JĂN-drəm)

Definition

(Noun) (A mock title for) a mysterious (frequently imaginary) personage of great power or authority; a pompous or pretentious official; a self-important person in authority.

In Context

“During several months, hardly a week passed that Louis did not have occasion to greet some panjandrum alighting at a railroad depot and lead him in military pomp to the Tuileries Palace, where gala after gala preempted other, more banal affairs of state.”

Frederick Brown, For the Soul of France: Culture Wars in the Age of Dreyfus, 2010.