realm

From Middle English rewme, realme, reaume, from Old French reaume, realme (“kingdom”), of unclear origins. A postulated *rēgālimen (“domain, kingdom”), Late Latin or Vulgar Latin cross of regimen with rēgālis is usually cited.

• (UK, US) enPR: rĕlm, IPA^(key): /ɹɛlm/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛlm

realm (plural realms)

1. An abstract sphere of influence, real or imagined.
   • 1907, Tada Kanai, “The World and How to Pass Through It”, in Arthur Lloyd, transl., Seven Buddhist Sermons:

     Why should we despise anything in the realm of Buddha?

   • 2006 November 22, Christian Neef, “Diary of a Collapsing Superpower”, in Spiegel Magazine:

     At home in Moscow, Mikhail Sergeyevitch Gorbachev, who had launched a campaign to rejuvenate the Soviet realm  […]

   • 2013 May 17, George Monbiot, “Money just makes the rich suffer”, in The Guardian Weekly‎, volume 188, number 23, page 19:

     In order to grant the rich these pleasures, the social contract is reconfigured. […]  The public realm is privatised, the regulations restraining the ultra-wealthy and the companies they control are abandoned, and Edwardian levels of inequality are almost fetishised.

2. The domain of a certain abstraction.
   • 1922, Judson Eber Conant, “Truth Must be Classified Scientifically”, in The Church The Schools and Evolution:

     One thing more which the scientific man does is to accord primacy to that realm of truth which is primary in importance.

3. (computing) A scope of operation in networking or security.
4. (formal or law) A territory or state, as ruled by a specific power, especially by a king.
   • 1874, Horatio Alger, “Chapter XXXI”, in Brave and Bold:

     And, of this island realm, he and his companion were the undisputed sovereigns.

   • 1913, Leslie Alexander Toke, Catholic Encyclopedia, "St. Dunstan",

     Then seeing his life was threatened he fled the realm and crossed over to Flanders, […]

5. (fantasy, roleplaying games) An otherworldly dimension or domain — magical, ethereal, or otherwise — usually ruled or created by a mystical character.
6. (virology, taxonomy) A taxonomic rank in the phylogeny of viruses, higher than kingdoms.

• (a territory or state): country, land, kingdom
• (a sphere of activity or influence): field, province

• Maler, Lamer, meral, Lemar, lamer, Armel, maerl, Almer, maler, marle, Lerma