Word.ws English Dictionary

sceptre

Syllables: scep·tre/ˈsɛptə/US/ˈsɛptɚ/

sceptre noun: an ornamental staff held by a ruling monarch as a symbol of power.

sceptre: an ornamental staff held by a ruling monarch as a symbol of power
Image: Pedro Américo, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

sceptre (plural sceptres)

  1. An ornamental staff held by a ruling monarch as a symbol of power.
    • “Divine receptacle of excellence, let it not be deemed impertinent, or deviating from the rules of propriety, if I propound one queſtion which now labours in my breaſt; aſſuring me firſt, you will not let the ſceptre of true judgment depart from your right hand.”1769, Firishta, translated by Alexander Dow, Tales translated from the Persian of Inatulla of Delhi, volume I, Dublin: P. and W. Wilson et al., page 11
    • To the fleet he came / Bearing rich ranſom glorious to redeem / His daughter, and his hands charged with the wreath / And golden ſceptre of the God shaft-arm’d.1791, Homer, “[The Iliad.] Book I.”, in W[illiam] Cowper, transl., The Iliad and Odyssey of Homer, Translated into Blank Verse, […], volume I, London: […] J[oseph] Johnson, […], →OCLC, page 3

Verb

sceptre (third-person singular simple present sceptres, present participle sceptring, simple past and past participle sceptred)

  1. To give a sceptre to.
    • To Britain's queen the sceptred suppliant bends.1713, Thomas Tickell, On the Prospect of Peace
  2. (figuratively) To invest with royal power.

Proper noun capitalized: Sceptre

Sceptre

  1. A hamlet (special service area) in the Rural Municipality of Clinworth, Saskatchewan, Canada.

sceptre meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Malayalam and Kannada

sceptre in Tamil

ornamental staff
செங்கோல் ceṅkōl

sceptre in Urdu

عصا

sceptre in Malayalam

ornamental staff
ചെങ്കോൽ ceṅkōl

sceptre in Kannada

ರಾಜದಂಡ, ರಾಜಚಿಹ್ನೆ
More languagesFewer languages
sceptre in Sanskrit
शास्ति śāsti
sceptre in Tagalog
setro
sceptre in Arabic
صَوْلَجَان ṣawlajān
sceptre in Malay
cogan
sceptre in Indonesian
jogan
sceptre in Thai
คทา ká-taa
sceptre in Vietnamese
trượng, quyền trượng

Synonyms of sceptre

Forms of sceptre

Noun
pluralsceptres
alternative USscepter
Verb
third-person singular presentsceptres
present participlesceptring
past participlesceptred
pastsceptred

Origin of sceptre

From Middle English septre, sceptre, from Old French sceptre, from Latin scēptrum, from Ancient Greek σκῆπτρον (skêptron, “staff, stick, baton”), from σκήπτω (skḗptō, “to prop, to support, to lean upon a staff”).

Words formed from sceptre

Phrases with sceptre

Questions about sceptre

What does sceptre mean?
Sceptre means an ornamental staff held by a ruling monarch as a symbol of power.
What is sceptre in Tamil?
Sceptre in Tamil is செங்கோல் (ceṅkōl). See Sceptre meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is sceptre?
Sceptre can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce sceptre?
Sceptre is pronounced /ˈsɛptə/ (UK).
What is the plural of sceptre?
The plural of sceptre is sceptres.

Words near sceptre in the dictionary

  1. scepticizing
  2. sceptick
  3. scepticks
  4. sceptics
  5. sceptral
  6. sceptre
  7. sceptred
  8. sceptredom
  9. sceptreless
  10. sceptres
  11. sceptrin

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sceptre (page history and authors); Sceptre (page history and authors); sceptre (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); sceptre (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); शास्ति (Sanskrit) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-sceptre.wav.

Cite this entry: “sceptre.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sceptre. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.