House Manse Word Lives Clergy Large Imposing Old Fashioned

Manse is an old-fashioned word used to describe the house a Protestant minister lives in. It can also refer more informally to a grand house or the main house of an estate.

The housing that a church provides for a member of its clergy can be called a clergy house, parish house, parsonage, rectory — or a manse, in the case of a Presbyterian minister's home. If your best friend lives in a twelve-bedroom house with a staff of servants, you might call her home a manse as well. The word manse, like mansion, comes from the Medieval Latin mansus, "dwelling."