Meanings
plural locum tenentes · plural locos tenentes
- A professional person (such as a doctor or clergyman) who temporarily fulfills the duties of another.
"I expected better things of you, Professor Summerlee." "You must remember," said Summerlee, sourly, "that I have a large class in London who are at present at the mercy of an extremely inefficient locum tenens."
1912, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Lost World […], London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC1 more example
[…] who speedily installed his Son […] into the office of Collector of Taxes, as a warming-pan, or locum tenens, till his Father-in-Law's twelvemonths of mock-heroic dignity had expired—or he should think proper to resume the Collectorship.
1820, The Steeliad, a Poem, in Three Cantos, page 35
Synonyms & antonyms
nounA professional person (such as a doctor or clergyman) who temporarily fulfills the duties of another.
More synonyms by meaning
nounsomeone (physician or clergyman) who substitutes temporarily for another member of the same profession
Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.
Origin
- Medieval Latinlocum tenēns
- Englishlocum tenens
Existing in English since the seventeenth century: from Medieval Latin locum tenēns (literally “one holding a place”). Doublet of lieutenant.
More words from Medieval Latin
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Danish stedfortræder
- stedfortrædersomeone who temporarily fulfills the duties of another
Esperanto anstataŭisto
- anstataŭistosomeone who temporarily fulfills the duties of another
German Stellvertreter, Vertretungsperson
- Stellvertretersomeone who temporarily fulfills the duties of another
- Vertretungspersonsomeone who temporarily fulfills the duties of another
- Vertretersomeone who temporarily fulfills the duties of another
Icelandic staðgengill
- staðgengillsomeone who temporarily fulfills the duties of another
Cite this entry
locum tenens. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/locum%20tenens
“locum tenens.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/locum%20tenens. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “locum tenens,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/locum%20tenens.
Source: locum tenens on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.