KINGDOM

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does kingdom mean? 

• KINGDOM (noun)
  The noun KINGDOM has 6 senses:

1. a domain in which something is dominant

2. a country with a king as head of state

3. the domain ruled by a king or queen

4. a monarchy with a king or queen as head of state

5. the highest taxonomic group into which organisms are grouped; one of five biological categories: Monera or Protoctista or Plantae or Fungi or Animalia

6. a basic group of natural objects

  Familiarity information: KINGDOM used as a noun is common.

 Dictionary entry details 

• KINGDOM (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A domain in which something is dominant

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Synonyms:

kingdom; land; realm

Context example:

the rise of the realm of cotton in the south

Hypernyms ("kingdom" is a kind of...):

area; arena; domain; field; orbit; sphere (a particular environment or walk of life)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "kingdom"):

lotus land; lotusland (an idyllic realm of contentment and self-indulgence)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A country with a king as head of state

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Hypernyms ("kingdom" is a kind of...):

country; land; state (the territory occupied by a nation)

Instance hyponyms:

Israel (an ancient kingdom of the Hebrew tribes at the southeastern end of the Mediterranean Sea; founded by Saul around 1025 BC and destroyed by the Assyrians in 721 BC)

Britain; Great Britain; U.K.; UK; United Kingdom; United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (a monarchy in northwestern Europe occupying most of the British Isles; divided into England and Scotland and Wales and Northern Ireland; 'Great Britain' is often used loosely to refer to the United Kingdom)

Sense 3

Meaning:

The domain ruled by a king or queen

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Synonyms:

kingdom; realm

Hypernyms ("kingdom" is a kind of...):

demesne; domain; land (territory over which rule or control is exercised)

Instance hyponyms:

Numidia (an ancient kingdom (later a Roman province) in North Africa in an area corresponding roughly to present-day Algeria)

Derivation:

king (a male sovereign; ruler of a kingdom)

Sense 4

Meaning:

A monarchy with a king or queen as head of state

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Hypernyms ("kingdom" is a kind of...):

monarchy (an autocracy governed by a monarch who usually inherits the authority)

Derivation:

king (a male sovereign; ruler of a kingdom)

Sense 5

Meaning:

The highest taxonomic group into which organisms are grouped; one of five biological categories: Monera or Protoctista or Plantae or Fungi or Animalia

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Hypernyms ("kingdom" is a kind of...):

taxon; taxonomic category; taxonomic group (animal or plant group having natural relations)

Meronyms (members of "kingdom"):

phylum ((biology) the major taxonomic group of animals and plants; contains classes)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "kingdom"):

animal kingdom; Animalia; kingdom Animalia (taxonomic kingdom comprising all living or extinct animals)

kingdom Monera; kingdom Prokaryotae; Monera; Prokayotae (prokaryotic bacteria and blue-green algae and various primitive pathogens; because of lack of consensus on how to divide the organisms into phyla informal names are used for the major divisions)

kingdom Protoctista; Protoctista (in most modern classifications, replacement for the Protista; includes: Protozoa; Euglenophyta; Chlorophyta; Cryptophyta; Heterokontophyta; Rhodophyta; unicellular protists and their descendant multicellular organisms: regarded as distinct from plants and animals)

kingdom Plantae; plant kingdom; Plantae ((botany) the taxonomic kingdom comprising all living or extinct plants)

Fungi; fungus kingdom; kingdom Fungi (the taxonomic kingdom including yeast, molds, smuts, mushrooms, and toadstools; distinct from the green plants)

Sense 6

Meaning:

A basic group of natural objects

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Hypernyms ("kingdom" is a kind of...):

group; grouping (any number of entities (members) considered as a unit)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "kingdom"):

mineral kingdom (all inorganic objects; contrasts with animal and plant kingdoms)

 Context examples 

The king was terrified; he threw himself on the soldier’s mercy, and merely to be allowed to live at all, gave him his kingdom for his own, and his daughter to wife.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

She gave me the name of Grildrig, which the family took up, and afterwards the whole kingdom.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

I send now a message to our cousin Charles which his whole kingdom may read.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I tell you that I would give one of the provinces of my kingdom to have that photograph.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

A major division of a biological kingdom, consisting of closely-related classes; represents a basic fundamental pattern of organization and, presumably, a common descent.

(Phylum, NCI Thesaurus)

Any sterol found in the plant kingdom.

(Phytosterol, NCI Thesaurus)

But now that each of them has had what he most desired, and each is happy in having a kingdom to rule besides, I think I should like to go back to Kansas.

(The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum)

If I had not rearranged mine there would not be one tied in the whole kingdom now, and a great art would have been prematurely lost.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

So seldom that a letter, among the thousands that are constantly passing about the kingdom, is even carried wrong—and not one in a million, I suppose, actually lost!

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

Any organism assigned to the kingdom Bacteria.

(Bacteria, NCI Thesaurus/CDISC)