Chancellor (Latin: cancellarius) is a title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the cancellarii of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the cancelli or lattice work screens of a basilica or law court, which separated the judge and counsel from the audience. A chancellor's office is called a or chancery. The word is now used in the titles of many various officers in all kinds of settings (government, education, religion, etc.). Nowadays the term is most often used to describe:
The Chancellor of Germany or Bundeskanzler (official German title which means "Federal Chancellor"), is the title for the head of government in Germany. Bundeskanzlerin is the exclusively feminine form. In German politics the Bundeskanzler position is equivalent to that of a prime minister and is elected by the Bundestag, ("Federal Diet", the lower house of the German Federal Parliament), every four years on its first session after general elections. Between general elections, the Federal Chancellor (together with the whole cabinet) can only be removed from office by a konstruktives Misstrauensvotum ("constructive motion of no confidence") which consists in the candidacy of an opposition candidate for the office of Chancellor in the Bundestag. If this candidate gets a majority of the entire membership of the Bundestag, he (or she) will be sworn in immediately as new Federal Chancellor.
The current German Bundeskanzlerin is Angela Merkel of the CDU (Christian Democratic Union).