Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Privy \Priv"y\, a. [F. priv['e], fr. L. privatus. See Private.]
Of or pertaining to some person exclusively; assigned to private uses; not public; private; as, the privy purse. `` Privee knights and squires.''
--Chaucer.Secret; clandestine. `` A privee thief.''
--Chaucer.Appropriated to retirement; private; not open to the public. `` Privy chambers.''
--Ezek. xxi. 1-
4. Admitted to knowledge of a secret transaction; secretly cognizant; privately knowing.
His wife also being privy to it.
--Acts v. 2.Myself am one made privy to the plot.
--Shak.Privy chamber, a private apartment in a royal residence.
Privy council (Eng. Law), the principal council of the sovereign, composed of the cabinet ministers and other persons chosen by the king or queen.
--Burrill.Privy councilor, a member of the privy council.
Privy purse, moneys set apart for the personal use of the monarch; also, the title of the person having charge of these moneys. [Eng.]
--Macaulay.Privy seal or Privy signet, the seal which the king uses in grants, etc., which are to pass the great seal, or which he uses in matters of subordinate consequence which do not require the great seal; also, elliptically, the principal secretary of state, or person intrusted with the privy seal. [Eng.]
Privy verdict, a verdict given privily to the judge out of court; -- now disused.
--Burrill.
WordNet
n. allowance for a monarch's personal expenses
Wikipedia
The Privy Purse is the British Sovereign's private income, mostly from the Duchy of Lancaster. This amounted to £13.3 million in net income for the year to 31 March 2009. The Duchy is a landed estate of approximately 46,000 acres (200 square kilometres) held in trust for the Sovereign since 1399. It also has 190 miles (500 kilometres) of foreshore. The Duchy is valued at approximately £322 million in 2009. The land is organised into the Lancashire Survey, the Yorkshire Survey, the Crewe Survey, the Nedwood Estate and the South Survey. The Sovereign is not entitled to the Duchy's capital, but the net revenues of the Duchy are the property of the Sovereign in right of the Duchy of Lancaster. While the income is private, the Queen uses the larger part of it to meet official expenses incurred by other members of the British Royal Family. Only the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh receive payments from Parliament that are not reimbursed by the Queen.
Usage examples of "privy purse".
When your nation has no standing army, there is nothing for it but to defend it yourself, with your tenants at your back, and hired swords and foreign mercenaries to eke out, depending on what the privy purse can afford.
Were he to ask His Royal Highness of Normandy to spare my services for a short while, he would be obligated to pay my salary from his own Privy Purse.
Moreover, Roger had purchased the lands with funds from his privy purse, assuring that the Flats would remain private and undeveloped.
And even if the King's Privy Purse was a real purse, he could not collect enough silver to make an entire ship.
The Treasurer of the Mint actually managed to slip away, laden with all the gold in Queen Jane's privy purse, and his escape inspired his colleagues to 'resolve to open their bosoms to one another' and discuss how they could outwit the Duke.
Show her a batch of 'Citizen Commodore Clignets,' and she'll find the reinforcements she needs to hold the Cluster even if she has to buy them from the Sollies out of the Privy Purse!
But that'll be all right now, heh, because we'll transfer the gunpowder in the royal arsenal to our privy purse at a forced-sale price.
Myste introduced them by such titles as, 'Lord of Commerce', and, 'Lord of the Privy Purse'.