king's counsel
noun
Simple meaning
An honorific status officially conferred on senior or meritorious barristers during the reign of a king.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
kingzkownsuhlSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈkɪŋzˈkaʊnsəl
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
UKCanadaNew Zealandoccasionally Australia
An honorific status officially conferred on senior or meritorious barristers (and occasionally other kinds of lawyer) during the reign of a king.
ukhistorical
A barrister or advocate appointed by the Crown during the reign of a king.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
This meaning: (UK, Canada, New Zealand, occasionally Australia) An honorific status officially conferred on senior or meritorious barristers (and occasionally other kinds of lawyer) during the reign of a king.
Used this way, king's counsel is a specialist word with a clearly warm, approving pull. It turns up most in technical or specialist writing contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Positive
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Gentle
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Keen and enthusiastic
- Usage feel
- Clinical and detached
Where it naturally appears
- Technical/specialist writing
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.