Noun

(en noun)

A part, portion, or subdivision.

A distinct course of life, action, study, or the like.

* {{quote-news, year=2014

, date=November 14 , author=Stephen Halliday , title=Scotland 1-0 Republic of Ireland: Maloney the hero , work=The Scotsman citation , page= , passage=Flair and invention were very much at a premium, suffocated by the relentless pace and often fractious nature of proceedings. The absence of James Morrison from the centre of Scotland’s midfield, the West Brom man ruled out on the morning of the game by illness, had already diminished the creative capacity of the home side in that department .}}

* (and other bibliographic particulars), (Thomas Babington Macaulay)

A subdivision of an organization.

# One of the principal divisions of executive government

the Treasury Department'''''; ''the '''Department''' of Agriculture''; ''police '''department

# One of the divisions of instructions

the physics department'''''; ''the gender studies '''department

A territorial division; a district; especially, in France, one of the districts composed of several arrondissements into which the country is divided for governmental purposes.

* 2002 , , The Great Nation: France from Louis XV to the 1715-99 , Penguin 2003, p. 427:

The departments were the bricks from which the edifice of the nation was to be constructed.

(label) A military subdivision of a country; as, the Department of the Potomac.

(label) Act of departing; departure.

* (and other bibliographic particulars), Wotton

sudden 'departments from one extreme to another

Noun

(en noun)

A committee that leads or governs (e.g. city council, student council).

* {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham)

, title=(The China Governess) , chapter=Foreword citation , passage=He turned back to the scene before him and the enormous new block of council dwellings. The design was some way after Corbusier but the block was built up on plinths and resembled an Atlantic liner swimming diagonally across the site.}}

Discussion or deliberation.

* Milton

Satan void of rest, / His potentates to council called by night.

* Alexander Pope

O great in action and in council wise.