Pharaoh
name, noun ·Uncommon ·College level
Definitions
- 1 The supreme ruler of Ancient Egypt; a formal address for the sovereign seat of power as personified by the "king" in an institutional role of Horus son of Osiris; often used by metonymy for Ancient Egyptian sovereignty countable, historical, uncountable
"Instances: see Thesaurus:pharaoh"
- 2 Alternative letter-case form of pharaoh. alt-of
- 3 the title of the ancient Egyptian kings wordnet
- 4 The card game faro. uncountable
""I pray, when I play pharaoh at White's, that the cards fall as they have come to my hand in this large gamble," Anstis said."
- 1 Any specific pharaoh.
"And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, when I have gotten me honour upon Pharaoh, upon his chariots, and upon his horsemen."
Example
More examples"The Egyptians built this temple to honour the Pharaoh Ramses II."
Etymology
From Middle English pharao (also as pharaon, farao, faraon, etc.), from Old English Pharao, from Late Latin Pharaō, from Koine Greek Φαραώ (Pharaṓ), from Biblical Hebrew פַּרְעֹה (Parʿō), from Egyptian pr:aA (pr-ꜥꜣ, “palace; pharaoh”, literally “pr (“house”) + ꜥꜣ (“great, big”)”)
Related phrases
More for "pharaoh"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.