How to Use potentate in a Sentence

potentate

noun

• Charles inherited the position of potentate of the Holy Roman Empire from his grandfather, as well that of king of Spain from his father.
• At 56, Mr Aliyev is the youngest of the Eurasian potentates.
  — The Economist, 12 Apr. 2018
• The swells, the potentates would have gone off with their concubines and pet slaves and soldier guards . . .
  — Lance Morrow, WSJ, 14 Dec. 2018
• The new potentates in Washington may feel that the dream is within reach.
  — Alex Ross, The New Yorker, 7 Apr. 2017
• If not a foreign potentate, then the guy in charge of delivering the mail.
  — Rich Lowry, National Review, 18 Aug. 2020
• Arrows of desire: Jerusalem has been aiming them at the hearts of pilgrims, tourists and potentates for thousands of years.
  — Holland Cotter, New York Times, 22 Sep. 2016
• Her father was a Shriner and member of El Korah and its former potentate.
  — Maria L. La Ganga, idahostatesman, 12 July 2018
• One narrative of the modern Middle East is of potentates trying to stamp their imprint across these often volatile states.
  — Scott Peterson, The Christian Science Monitor, 18 Dec. 2017
• Bowing down is a symbol of obeisance, and Americans do not bend our knees for our own leaders, much less for foreign potentates.
  — Judith Martin, oregonlive, 18 Apr. 2023
• Halls that once swirled with cigar smoke and tulle frocks started welcoming PowerPoint potentates in plastic name-tags.
  — New York Times, 21 Apr. 2018
• The petty squabbles and rivalries of the country’s minor potentates have led to human rights abuses.
  — Ishaan Tharoor, Washington Post, 15 Sep. 2023
• Especially when said potentate is already 80 and shows no signs of slowing down.
  — Dallas News, 26 Jan. 2023
• Meanwhile, the Shriners learned Friday that the cost of the damage, which includes reattaching the man’s head and repairing the girl’s head and arm, as well as replacing bolts in the pedestal will be around $2,000, said John Taylor, a past potentate.
  — Steven Goode, courant.com, 30 Oct. 2020
• But as a certain political potentate has learned, saying and doing everything that comes to mind has more drawbacks than pluses in the long run.
  — Kerry Reid, chicagotribune.com, 12 June 2017
• From Jordan’s Abdullah to Egypt’s Sadat, peace-minded potentates were slain.
  — Josef Joffe, WSJ, 27 Jan. 2020
• Here, the people are not eccentric collectors or sadistic potentates, but twin brothers, farmers and sons of a farmer, who, through first the Great War and then the next, never leave home for any significant period of time.
  — Hanya Yanagihara, New York Times, 7 Sep. 2017
• As the world’s oldest and largest management consulting firm, McKinsey has advised a long list of corporate giants, princes and potentates.
  — azcentral, 9 Nov. 2019
• Until the late 19th century, popes chose the bishops of central Italy, but almost all other bishops around the world were picked by secular potentates or elected by local clergy.
  — Francis X. Rocca, WSJ, 29 Apr. 2018
• Another Muslim potentate, the Aga Khan, is among the largest thoroughbred breeders and owners in France, where racing remains super populaire.
  — William Finnegan, The New Yorker, 15 May 2021
• As potentate, the highest elected position within the Tripoli Shrine, Michael Geiger had nearly sovereign power, his attorney told a jury.
  — Bruce Vielmetti, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 28 Feb. 2018
• In close to three years in power, the administration has courted or hosted virtually all the region’s unelected potentates, yoking its anti-Iranian agenda in part to the concerns of a clutch of Arab sheikhs and princes.
  — Ishaan Tharoor, Washington Post, 1 Nov. 2019
• That may be cold comfort to many Pakistanis, who live in what by some measures is South Asia’s most unequal society, one long dominated by influential, quasi-feudal potentates.
  — Ishaan Tharoor, Washington Post, 21 June 2023
• Trump received a potentate’s welcome in Saudi Arabia, with his image burnished everywhere.
  — Michael Brendan Dougherty, National Review, 13 July 2017
• Orlando Gutierrez, media potentate at Los Al, volunteered and penned this season preview.
  — John Cherwa, latimes.com, 28 June 2018
• All these decades later, Moses remains ensconced in the popular imagination as the singularly Mephistophelean figure of planning, a potentate whose legacy continues to shape our days.
  — Curbed, 5 Oct. 2022
• As with the region’s other long-serving potentates, stability has been a cornerstone of Mr. Rohman’s political image.
  — Andrew E. Kramer, New York Times, 2 Apr. 2020
• Governors, who like presidents serve one six-year term, control state legislatures, state auditors and state prosecutors — a dominance that gives them the power of a modern potentate.
  — Elisabeth Malkin, New York Times, 19 Apr. 2017
• After his reign, his empire disintegrated and smaller potentates took over minting.
  — The Economist, 10 July 2019
• But like any self-respecting potentate, King Tucker manifested no mercy.
  — Washington Post, 7 Jan. 2022
• Many newspaper and radio journalists, especially in far-flung provinces, have been murdered because of their work, often by drug-traffickers or other local potentates.
  — The Economist, 14 July 2018

Last Updated: 24 Jul 2024