kuningaskunta

Kuningaskunta is the Finnish term for a kingdom, a sovereign state headed by a king. In Finnish, the word denotes a political realm whose head of state is a king, and it is used to describe both historical monarchies and contemporary states that retain a royal office. The form is distinguished from republics and other forms of government, and in many cases the king’s powers are largely ceremonial in today’s constitutional monarchies.

The word is formed from kuningas, meaning “king,” and the suffix -kunta, which is used in Finnish to name political entities and realms. This construction is common in encyclopedic and formal writing when naming a specific state in its royal form.

Usage and examples include the Kingdoms of Sweden, Norway, and the Netherlands. In Finnish, these are commonly rendered as Ruotsin kuningaskunta, Norjan kuningaskunta, and Alankomaiden kuningaskunta. For the United Kingdom, Finnish usually uses Yhdistynyt kuningaskunta. The term can also apply to other historic or present-day kingdoms, though in modern practice many such states are constitutional monarchies where the monarch acts in a largely ceremonial role.