sectary

Either from the French sectaire or directly from its etymon, the Medieval Latin sectārius, from secta (“sect”). Cognates include the Italian settario and the Portuguese and Spanish sectario.

sectary (plural sectaries)

1. A member of a particular sect, school of thought or practice, party, or profession; a sectarian.
   • 1872, John Greenleaf Whittier, “The Pennsylvania Pilgrim”, in The Pennsylvania Pilgrim, and Other Poems, Boston, Mass.: James R. Osgood and Company, late Ticknor & Fields, and Fields, Osgood, & Co., →OCLC, page 44:

     Be it as it may: within the Land of Penn / The sectary yielded to the citizen, / And peaceful dwelt the many-creeded men.

   • 1953, T.V. Smith, “Democratic Apologetics” in Ethics LXIII, № 2 (January 1953), page 106, left column:

     It is this spirit which inspires sectaries to deprecate the public schools and, if they cannot divert part of the tax support, then to foist upon this free system the shadow of their own beclouded vision.

2. (Christianity) A Protestant dissenter or nonconformist.

• “sectary”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• “sectary”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.

• Treacys