oligarch
/ˈɑləɡɑɹk/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.69 in modern English
14
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
3
Syllables
8
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A very wealthy business owner who wields political power.
noun
A protoplanet formed during oligarchic accretion.
Example Sentences
- "In thus ruling the issue out of court, Lenin implied that there was no problem about the relationship between a class and a party, or a party and its leaders, and that government by a handful of oligarchs can properly be called government by the class they claim to represent […]"
- "Millions of people were starving, while the oligarchs and their supporters were surfeiting on the surplus."
- "Economic disaster loomed, as the rotting remains of the Soviet economy were exposed to free-market reforms, which brought inflation and the sale of state-owned assets at low prices to a new class of ultra-rich businessmen called "oligarchs," who made America's robber barons of the late nineteenth century look like Puritan preachers."
- "But then, this is Ukraine. Since the country won its independence in the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Parliament has become dominated by the oligarchs - enormously wealthy industrial managers who have interests in steel, iron, coal, the media and soccer clubs."
- "Ukraine's oligarchs emerged in parallel to Russia's, who have been more closely studied, and they were quite similar."
- "The astronomical sales of the tome have proven once and for all that for teen girls and young women in Russia, the allure of marrying an oligarch is many times more powerful than acquiring fame or intellectual status."
Etymology
From French oligarque, olygarche, from Late Latin oligarcha, from Ancient Greek ὀλιγάρχης (oligárkhēs). By surface analysis, olig- (“few”) + -arch (“ruler, leader”).
Origin
- Source language: French
Word Breakdown
- Root: oligarque, oligarcha, ὀλιγάρχης
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈɑləɡɑɹk/
- British English: /ˈɒlɪˌɡɑːk/