god-king

plural god-kings · alternative god king

1. historicalhuman sciencesA king who is of divine descent; a monarch who is also worshiped as a god.

   the god-kings of Ancient Egypt

   3 more examples

   The effigies on our coins, the signs over shops, the figures that fill every ledger, the coats of arms outside the carriage panel, and the placards inside the omnibus, are, in common with dolls, blue-books, paper-hangings, lineally descended from the rude sculpture-paintings in which the Egyptians represented the triumphs and worship of their god-kings.

   1865, Herbert Spencer, “Progress: Its Law and Cause”, in Illustrations of Universal Progress: A Series of Discussions

   “There is no other such book as this,” he said, “for it was written by the greatest of wizards who lived before Mena, when the god-kings ruled in Egypt, and I, myself, took it from among his bones, a terrible task for his Ka rose up in the grave and threatened me.

   1910, H[enry] Rider Haggard, Morning Star

   The gods, the god-king, the idea of the tribe, the idea of the city; here are ideas that have claimed and held for a time the devotion of men, ideas in which they have a little lost their individual selfishness and escaped to the realization of a more enduring life.

   1919 November – 1920 November, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, The Outline of History: Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind […], volume I, London: George Newnes […], published July 1920, →OCLC, page 222

   Synonyms: God Emperor

2. broadlyA statesman who holds all the state's powers and has religious significance to his constituency.
3. A mogul, someone with godlike powers.

   One might assume that it is contradictory for Trump, elected on a flag-waving “America first” platform, to lend credence to this vision of sovereign territories ruled over by billionaire god-kings.

   2025 April 13, Naomi Klein, Astra Taylor, “The rise of end times fascism”, in The Guardian, →ISSN

4. derogatorycomputingA tyrannical maintainer of a collaborative project.