Louis XIV

American  

noun

1. the Greatthe Sun King, 1638–1715, king of France 1643–1715 (son of Louis XIII).

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Louis XIV British  

noun

1. known as le roi soleil (the Sun King). 1638–1715, king of France (1643–1715); son of Louis XIII and Anne of Austria. Effective ruler from 1661, he established an absolute monarchy. His attempt to establish French supremacy in Europe, waging almost continual wars from 1667 to 1714, ultimately failed. But his reign is regarded as a golden age of French literature and art

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Louis XIV Cultural  

1. A king of France in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Louis was known as the Sun King for his power and splendor. By inviting French nobles to live in luxury at his palace at Versailles, he removed them as threats and greatly increased his own power. He is known for saying, “L'état, c'est moi” (“I am the state”).

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Example Sentences

The decrees, the first of which were written under Louis XIV, ruled over the lives of enslaved people in the colonies.

From Barron's • May 28, 2026

Louis XIV realized that the production and export of luxury goods could be big business, and Paris has been a point of pilgrimage for fashion lovers ever since.

From The Wall Street Journal • May 10, 2026

Maria Carolina – whose title carries no legal standing in the Italian Republic - is a distant descendant of France's Sun-King Louis XIV.

From BBC • Apr. 9, 2026

Saint-Simon knew that when kings embrace their own flattery, they open themselves to manipulation, and the writer viewed Louis XIV as an illusory absolutist who was in fact controlled by fawning scoundrels.

From Slate • May 30, 2025

“Oh nonsense,” Greta Betchel, a petite woman who fancied herself both a nineteenth-century graveyard poet and the world’s last jardiniere supreme a la Louis XIV, replied.

From "The Milagro Beanfield War" by John Nichols