regicide
Americannoun
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the killing of a king.
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a person who kills a king or is responsible for his death, especially one of the judges who condemned Charles I of England to death.
noun
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the killing of a king
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a person who kills a king
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of regicide
Explanation
Regicide is the killing of a king (or queen). The word derives from the Latin regis, meaning "king," and the ancient French cide, meaning "killer." Today, the word regicide can also be applied to politicians who topple a president or prime minister. People had been killing kings and queens (think Cleopatra) long before the term regicide really took off, which was after the execution of King Charles I in England in 1649. He was executed by guillotine, but a far worse fate awaited those who had signed off on his killing: they were hung, drawn, and quartered. Dangerous profession, regicide.
Vocabulary lists containing regicide
Banned Book Club
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Children of Virtue and Vengeance
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A Storm of Swords
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Commoner Katherine Worsley, 28, a descendant of Regicide Oliver Cromwell, seemed hardly a likely captor, yet for four years, the couple sporadically courted.
From Time Magazine Archive
There are no explosions of political wrath, such as animate the 'Letters on a Regicide Peace,' or of a deep religious emotion, which breathes through many of our greatest prose writers.
From Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) by Stephen, Leslie, Sir
They were, indeed, very like that dreadful scaffold at which the Regicide was not afraid to point.
From A Short History of England by Chesterton, G. K. (Gilbert Keith)
But the Regicide banditti knew that this was not the first time they have been obliged to give such assurances, and had as often falsified them.
From The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 06 (of 12) by Burke, Edmund
Probably none of his writings are so familiar to the general public as those which this crisis produced, such as the 'Thoughts on the French Revolution' and the 'Letters on a Regicide Peace.'
From Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 by Warner, Charles Dudley
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
