totem pole

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a tall carved and often painted wooden pole made by Indigenous peoples of the Northwest Coast of North America to represent family lineage, crests, histories, or important events

   The community raised a newly carved totem pole that recorded the clan's histories and crests.

2. 2
   noun

   figurative: a hierarchy or order of rank, especially as described by someone's position near its top or bottom

   As the newest assistant, he was still near the bottom of the office totem pole.

A compound of totem and pole, recorded in English in the late nineteenth century. Totem was borrowed from Ojibwa ototeman, 'his totem,' referring to a clan emblem or ancestral symbol; pole comes through Old English pal from Latin palus, 'stake.' The figurative hierarchy sense draws on the vertical arrangement of figures.

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