king
Part of speech: noun
verb
Morphological type: derivation
Topics: board-games
card-games
chess
games
graph-theory
mathematics
sciences
Etymology: From Middle English king, kyng, kynge, from Old English cening, cing, cining, cuning, cyncg, cyneg, cyng, cyngc, cynig, cyning, king, kining, kuning, kyning, kyningc (“king”), from Proto-West Germanic *kuning, from Proto-Germanic *kuningaz, *kunungaz (“king”), from *kunją (“clan, family, kin”), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵenh₁- (“to produce; to beget”). Equivalent to kin + -ing. Doublet of cyning and knez.
Cognates
Cognate with Yola king, kinge (“king”), North Frisian kining, köning (“king”), Saterland Frisian Kening, König, Köänig (“king”), West Frisian kening (“king”), Alemannic German Chüng, Künig (“king”), Bavarian Kini (“king”), Central Franconian Künning (“king”), Cimbrian khuuneg (“king”), Dutch koning (“king”), German König (“king”), Luxembourgish Kinnek (“king”), Vilamovian kyng (“king”), Yiddish קעניג (kenig), קיניג (kinig, “king”), Danish kong, konge, konning (“king”), Elfdalian kunungg (“king”), Faroese kongur (“king”), Icelandic kóngur, konungur (“king”), Norwegian Bokmål konge (“king”), Norwegian Nynorsk konge (“king”), Scanian káng (“king”), Swedish konung, kung (“king”), Latgalian and Latvian kungs (“gentlemen”), Lithuanian kunigas (“priest”), Belarusian, Russian, and Ukrainian князь (knjazʹ, “prince; duke”), Bulgarian кнез (knez), княз (knjaz, “prince”), Czech kněz (“priest”), kníže (“prince”), Macedonian кнез (knez, “prince”), Polish ksiądz, xiądz (“priest; prince”), Serbo-Croatian кне̑з, knȇz (“prince”), Slovak kňaz (“priest”), knieža (“prince”), Slovene knez (“prince”), Estonian and Finnish kuningas (“king”), Ingrian kunigas, kunikas, kuningas (“king”), Veps kunigaz (“king”), Votic kunikõz (“king”), Võro kuning (“king”), Inari Sami kunâgâs (“king”), Kildin Sami коа̄нгэсс (kåångess), ко̄нгэс (kōnges, “bridegroom; king”), Lule Sami and Pite Sami gånågis (“king”), Northern Sami gonagas (“king”), Skolt Sami koonǥõs (“king”), Ter Sami конагас (konâgas, “king”); also Breton genel (“to bear”), Irish and Scottish Gaelic gin (“birth; fetus; offspring”), Welsh geni (“to be born”), Latin genō (“to bear, beget; to produce, yield”), Greek γενεά (geneá), γενιά (geniá, “ancestry, kin; generation”), Albanian dhen, dhën (“caprids, small livestock”), Lithuanian žentas (“son-in-law”), Belarusian зяць (zjacʹ, “brother-in-law; son-in-law”), Bulgarian and Macedonian зет (zet, “brother-in-law; son-in-law”), Czech zeť (“son-in-law”), Polish zięć (“son-on-law”), Russian зять (zjatʹ, “brother-in-law; son-in-law”), Serbo-Croatian зе̏т, zȅt (“brother-in-law; son-in-law”), Slovak zať (“son-in-law”), Slovene zet (“son-in-law”), Ukrainian зєть (zjetʹ), зять (zjatʹ, “brother-in-law; son-in-law”), Armenian ծնել (cnel, “to bear”), Avestan 𐬰𐬄𐬚𐬀𐬭 (ząθar, “father, progenitor; Creator”), Pashto زېږېدل (zeǵedël, “to be born”), Persian زادن (zādan / zâdan), زاییدن (zāyīdan / zâyidan, “to give birth”), Sanskrit जनति (janati, “to beget, create, produce; to assign, procure”).
Eclipsed non-native Middle English roy (“king”) (Early Modern English roy), borrowed from Old French rei, roi, roy (“king”).
The verb is inherited from Middle English kingen, kyngen (“to perform the duties of a king”), itself from the noun.
Base: kin
Affixes: -ing
Inflected forms:
form: kings
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: kinge
pos: noun
tags: alternative
obsolete
form: kyng
pos: noun
tags: alternative
obsolete
form: kynge
pos: noun
tags: alternative
obsolete
form: kings
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: kinging
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: kinged
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: kinged
pos: verb
tags: past
form: kinge
pos: verb
tags: alternative
obsolete
form: kyng
pos: verb
tags: alternative
obsolete
form: kynge
pos: verb
tags: alternative
obsolete
Senses:
gloss: A male monarch; a man who heads a monarchy; in an absolute monarchy, the supreme ruler of his nation.
pos: noun
examples: Henry VIII was the king of England from 1509 to 1547.
Charles the third became the new king of England from 2022.
gloss: The monarch with the most power and authority in a monarchy, regardless of sex.
pos: noun
examples: The British Parliament has had made it for it in the past the claim that it could do anything excepting convert a woman into a man.[…]And the high court [of Amsterdam] has done it by deciding that all officials and public servants shall take their oath of allegiance not to Queen Wilhelmina but to King Wilhelmina.
Hatshepsut was ruling as a king, not queen and she needed to be recognised as such.
The act of perforating one’s ears could be read as a gendering performance—a modification from an overt masculinity (king) to a tempered female masculinity (king with female traits)—in which the male king was expected to adopt the quintessence of Omeppa’s female king wife, Ebulejonu, and by so doing, embody the true essence of womanhood.[…]Attah-Ebulejonu, like Hatshepsut of Egypt before her, ruled as (and was remembered as) a king, not queen, perhaps setting the precedent for the coronation of another female king, Ahebi Ugbabe, about four centuries later.[…]This time, the female king would not rule in the Igala kingdom nor would she be of Igala origin. Instead, the king would be an Igbo woman who had lived in Igalaland for many years, who had come of age and matured there and in the process had imbibed the cultural values and mores of the people with whom she had lived in exile.
gloss: A male leader of a traditional Aboriginal group, often used as a title by colonists.
pos: noun
tags: Australia
historical
examples: Old Culwaddy the ‘king’, squatting by the galley fire, looked up questioningly[.]
gloss: A powerful or majorly influential person; someone who holds the preeminent position.
pos: noun
examples: Howard Stern styled himself as the "king of all media".
"I wish we were back in Tenth Street. But so many children came[…]and the Tenth Street house wasn't half big enough; and a dreadful speculative builder built this house and persuaded Austin to buy it. Oh, dear, and here we are among the rich and great; and the steel kings and copper kings and oil kings and their heirs and dauphins.[…]"
I'd been the dodgem car king at the Brisbane Ekka in 1975 and all those skills can flooding back[.]
The truth is that [Isaac] Newton was very much a product of his time. The colossus of science was not the first king of reason, Keynes wrote after reading Newton’s unpublished manuscripts. Instead “he was the last of the magicians”.
gloss: Something that has a preeminent position.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: In times of financial panic, cash is king.
It would be difficult, for example, to imagine a bigger, more obvious subject for comedy than the laughable self-delusion of washed-up celebrities, especially if the washed-up celebrity in question is Adam West, a camp icon who can go toe to toe with William Shatner as the king of winking self-parody.
gloss: A component of certain games.
pos: noun
examples: The objective of each player is to place the opponent’s king ‘under attack’ in such a way that the opponent has no legal move. […] If the arbiter observes both kings are in check, or a pawn stands on the rank furthest from its starting position, he/she shall wait until the next move is completed.
gloss: A component of certain games.
pos: noun
gloss: A component of certain games.
pos: noun
gloss: A component of certain games.
pos: noun
examples: In knockemdowns and bowls ten pins are used, the centre one being called the king, and the ball has to be grounded before it reaches the frame.
gloss: A king skin.
pos: noun
tags: UK
slang
examples: Oi mate, have you got kings?
gloss: A male dragonfly; a drake.
pos: noun
gloss: A king-sized bed.
pos: noun
examples: Try asking for a king-size bed next time because kings are usually firmer.
gloss: A vertex in a directed graph which can reach every other vertex via a path with a length of at most 2.
pos: noun
gloss: To crown king, to make (a person) king.
pos: verb
examples: 1982, South Atlantic Modern Language Association, South Atlantic Review, Volume 47, page 16,
The kinging of Macbeth is the business of the first part of the play […] .
One narrative is the kinging and unkinging of Macbeth; the other narrative is the attack on Banquo's line and that line's eventual accession and supposed Jacobean survival through Malcolm's successful counter-attack on Macbeth.
gloss: To rule over as king.
pos: verb
examples: And let us do it with no show of fear; / No, with no more than if we heard that England / Were busied with a Whitsun morris-dance; / For, my good liege, she is so idly king’d, / Her sceptre so fantastically borne / By a vain, giddy, shallow, humorous youth, / That fear attends her not.
gloss: To perform the duties of a king.
pos: verb
examples: 1918, Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen, The Railroad Trainman, Volume 35, page 675,
He had to do all his kinging after supper, which left him no time for roystering with the nobility and certain others.
Second, Mentor (the old man) combined the wisdom of experience with the sensitivity of a fawn in his attempts to convey kinging skills to young Telemachus.
gloss: To assume or pretend preeminence (over); to lord it over.
pos: verb
examples: The seating arrangement of the temple was the Almanach de Gotha of Congregation Emanu-el. Old Ben Reitman, patriarch among the Jewish settlers of Winnebago, who had come over an immigrant youth, and who now owned hundreds of rich farm acres, besides houses, mills and banks, kinged it from the front seat of the center section.
gloss: To promote a piece of draughts/checkers that has traversed the board to the opposite side, that piece subsequently being permitted to move backwards as well as forwards.
pos: verb
examples: If the machine does this, it will lose only one point, and as it is not looking far enough ahead, it cannot see that it has not prevented its opponent from kinging but only postponed the evil day.
I was about to make a move that would corner a piece that she was trying to get kinged, but I slid my checker back[…].
gloss: To dress and perform as a drag king.
pos: verb
examples: Through the ex-centric diaspora, kinging in postcolonial Australia has become a site of critical hybridity where diasporic female masculinities have emerged through the contestations of "home" and "host" cultures.
Synonyms: Rex
roy
Related words: ♔
♚
Derived words: a cat can look at a king
a cat may look at a king
antiking
archking
bare king
bean king
California king
cash is king
Charlton Kings
chicken à la King
chicken à la king
client king
complain king
divine right of kings
drag king
dragonking
drama king
elf-king
elf king
erl-king
every king needs a queen
Fisher King
fit for a king
foreking
ghostking
god-king
god king
God Save the King
good-king-henry
Good King Henry
high-king
high king
history of the four kings
Homecoming King
in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king
King and Queen County
King and Queen Court House
King Arthur
king-at-arms
king bare
King Billy
kingbird
kingbolt
king brown
king cab
king cake
king card
King Charles Land
King Charles's head
King Charles spaniel
king cheetah
king cobra
king consort
King Cotton
king-count
King Country
king crab
kingcraft
king cricket
kingcroaker
king crow
kingcup
king-cure
King David's harp
kingdom
King Edward
king eider
king fern
kingfish
kingfisher
king fox
King Frederick VIII Land
King George
King George County
King George whiting
king-hell
king hit
king-hit
kinghood
king-hunter
Kingian
kingite
King James Bible
King James Version
King Kong
kinglet
kinglike
kingling
kinglist
king mackerel
kingmaker
kingmaking
King Mob
Kingo
king of all one surveys
king-of-arms
king of arms
king of beasts
king of birds
king of clubs
king of diamonds
king of hearts
king of herrings
king of insects
king of instruments
king of kings
King of Kings
king of metals
King of Pop
king of six
king of spades
king of spices
king of the castle
king of the doos
king of the forest
king of the herrings
king of the hill
King of the Jungle
king of the meadow
king of the mountains
king of the north
king-of-the-salmon
King Otter
king oyster mushroom
king pair
king parrot
king penguin
kingpin
king post
king prawn
king quail
king rail
king regnant
kingric
King Richard
Kings
King Salmon
king salmon
Kingsbury
King's Caple
King's Cliffe
king's coin
King's Counsel
Kings County
King's Cross
King's Daughters
kings draw
King's Dyke
King's English
king's evil
Kings Forest
King's Gambit
Kings Heath
Kings Hill
kingship
king shit of fuck mountain
King Shit of Turd Island
kingside
King's Inch
King's Indian Defence
king-sized
king size
king-size
king skin
king's knight's pawn
Kings Langley
kingslayer
King's Lynn
kingsman
King's Meaburn
king snake
kingsnake
Kings Newton
Kings Norton
King's Norton
King's Nympton
King's Park
king's pawn
Kings Plains
king's ransom
king's rook's pawn
King's shilling
King's Somborne
King's Sutton
Kings Sutton
Kingston
Kingstown
Kingstree
Kings Worthy
king tide
king trumpet mushroom
king vulture
kingward
kingwards
King William
King William County
King William pine
King Winter
kingwood
kingy
live like a king
Mad King George
make-king
merking
Monkey King
more royalist than the king
Musang King
New Zealand king shag
nonking
one-eyed king
overking
palm king
pearly king
philosopher king
philosopher-king
priest-king
prom king
pumpking
rat king
rice king
sea king
Shelsley Kings
shepherd king
shepherd kings
short king
silver king
snail king
sofa king
sport of kings
squirrel king
subking
suicide king
Tchang-king
Three Kings
Three Kings Islands
underking
unking
war-king
who died and made you king
wing king
woman king
Translations:
lang: Afrikaans
word: koning
lang: Albanian
word: mbret
lang: Arabic
word: مَلِك
roman: malik
lang: Armenian
word: արքա
roman: arkʻa
lang: Asturian
word: rei
lang: Asturian
word: re
lang: Azerbaijani
word: şah
lang: Basque
word: errege
lang: Belarusian
word: каро́ль
roman: karólʹ
lang: Bengali
word: শাহ
roman: śah
lang: Bengali
word: রাজা
roman: raja
lang: Breton
word: roue
lang: Bulgarian
word: цар
roman: car
lang: Burmese
word: ကင်း
roman: kang:
lang: Burmese
word: မင်းကြီး
roman: mang:kri:
lang: Catalan
word: rei
lang: Chinese Cantonese
word: 王
roman: wong⁴
lang: Chinese Cantonese
word: 國王 /国王
roman: gwok³ wong⁴
lang: Chinese Mandarin
word: 王
roman: wáng
lang: Chinese Mandarin
word: 國王 /国王
roman: guówáng
lang: Czech
word: král
lang: Danish
word: konge
lang: Dutch
word: koning
lang: Esperanto
word: reĝo
lang: Estonian
word: kuningas
lang: Faroese
word: kongur
lang: Finnish
word: kuningas
lang: French
word: roi
lang: Galician
word: rei
lang: Georgian
word: მეფე
roman: mepe
lang: German
word: König
lang: Greek
word: βασιλιάς
roman: vasiliás
lang: Hebrew
word: מֶלֶךְ
roman: mélekh
lang: Hindi
word: राजा
roman: rājā
lang: Hindi
word: बादशाह
roman: bādśāh
lang: White Hmong
word: vaj
lang: Hungarian
word: király
lang: Icelandic
word: kóngur
lang: Indonesian
word: raja
lang: Irish
word: rí
lang: Italian
word: re
lang: Japanese
word: キング
roman: kingu
lang: Javanese
word: ratu
lang: Kabuverdianu
word: rei
lang: Kazakh
word: патша
roman: patşa
lang: Kazakh
word: король
roman: korol
lang: Khmer
word: ខុន
roman: khon
lang: Korean
word: 킹
roman: king
lang: Northern Kurdish
word: şah
lang: Kyrgyz
word: король
roman: korol
lang: Lao
word: ຂຸນ
roman: khun
lang: Lao
word: ຄິງ
roman: khing
lang: Lao
word: ຄີງ
roman: khīng
lang: Latin
word: rex
lang: Latvian
word: karalis
lang: Lithuanian
word: karalius
lang: Low German
word: König
lang: Low German
word: Keunig
lang: Macedonian
word: крал
roman: kral
lang: Malay
word: raja
lang: Malay
word: syah
lang: Malayalam
word: രാജാവ്
roman: rājāvŭ
lang: Maltese
word: sultan
lang: Manx
word: ree
lang: Marathi
word: राजा
roman: rājā
lang: Mongolian
word: ноён
roman: nojon
lang: Navajo
word: hastiin naatʼááh
lang: Norwegian Bokmål
word: konge
lang: Norwegian Nynorsk
word: konge
lang: Occitan
word: rei
lang: Ojibwe
word: ogimaa
lang: Iranian Persian
word: شاه
roman: šâh
lang: Middle Persian
word: 𐭬𐭫𐭪𐭠
lang: Polish
word: król
lang: Portuguese
word: rei
lang: Romanian
word: rege
lang: Russian
word: коро́ль
roman: korólʹ
lang: Scottish Gaelic
word: rìgh
lang: Serbo-Croatian
word: кра̑љ
lang: Serbo-Croatian
word: krȃlj
lang: Sinhalese
word: රජු
roman: raju
lang: Slovak
word: kráľ
lang: Slovene
word: kralj
lang: Spanish
word: rey
lang: Swahili
word: shehe
lang: Swahili
word: shaha
lang: Swahili
word: mfalme
lang: Swahili
word: kete kuu
lang: Swedish
word: kung
lang: Tajik
word: шоҳ
roman: šoh
lang: Tatar
word: шаһ
roman: şah
lang: Telugu
word: రాజు
roman: rāju
lang: Thai
word: ขุน
roman: kǔn
lang: Thai
word: คิง
roman: king
lang: Turkish
word: şah
lang: Turkmen
word: şa
lang: Ukrainian
word: коро́ль
roman: korólʹ
lang: Urdu
word: بَادْشَاہ
roman: bādśāh
lang: Uzbek
word: shoh
lang: Uzbek
word: korol
lang: Venetan
word: re
lang: Vietnamese
word: vua
lang: Walloon
word: rwè
lang: Welsh
word: brenin