Attila the Hun

Cultural  

1. A king of the Huns in the fifth century. Attila's forces overran many parts of central and eastern Europe. His armies were known for their cruelty and wholesale destruction, and Attila himself was called the “scourge of God.”

---

Example Sentences

Unfortunately, sanitized politicians have this shortcoming—they are not quite as interesting on stage as Attila the Hun or Boris Godunov.

From The Wall Street Journal • May 7, 2026

In AD 452, when Attila the Hun sacked city after city in his conquest of the known world, it was the Catholic Church, not the Roman military, that met him in a show of diplomacy.

From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 13, 2026

In one section, the narrator sets out to poison Attila the Hun, using ingredients including an “Octorok eyeball” and “the tail of the red lizalfos and four Hylian shrooms”.

From The Guardian • Aug. 3, 2020

“If Attila the Hun were alive today, he’d be a drama critic,” he said in 1988.

From New York Times • Sep. 16, 2016

Liszt spearheaded a shift from orchestral to illustrative music, using this 1850 painting of Attila the Hun in battle as the basis for his symphonic poem Hunnenschlacht.

From "The Story of Music" by Howard Goodall