Ang kahulugan ng diksyunaryo ng salitang "soberano" ay:
(pangngalan) isang pinakamataas na pinuno, lalo na ang isang monarko.
(pang-uri) na may pinakamataas na kapangyarihan o awtoridad; malaya; autonomous.
Ang terminong "sovereign" ay karaniwang tumutukoy sa isang tao o entity na may hawak ng ganap o pinakamataas na kapangyarihan at awtoridad sa isang partikular na teritoryo o grupo ng mga tao. Sa konteksto ng mga sistemang pampulitika, ang isang soberanya ay kadalasang pinuno ng estado, tulad ng isang hari, reyna, emperador, o pangulo. Sa ibang konteksto, maaaring tumukoy ang termino sa pinakamataas na kapangyarihan o awtoridad na hawak ng isang pamahalaan, institusyon, o indibidwal sa isang partikular na larangan ng aktibidad o kadalubhasaan.
1. By the policy of Ferdinand and Ximenez the sovereign had been made absolute, and the Church and Inquisition adroitly adjusted to keep him so.
2. A gallant knight shows to advantage bringing his lance to bear adroitly upon a fierce bull under the eyes of his sovereign, in the midst of a spacious plaza a knight shows to advantage arrayed in glittering armour, pacing the lists before the ladies in some joyous tournament, and all those knights show to advantage that entertain, divert, and, if we may say so, honour the courts of their princes by warlike exercises, or what resemble them but to greater advantage than all these does a knight-errant show when he traverses deserts, solitudes, cross-roads, forests, and mountains, in quest of perilous adventures, bent on bringing them to a happy and successful issue, all to win a glorious and lasting renown.
3. Then turning to his first minister, who waited behind him with a white staff, near as tall as the mainmast of the Royal Sovereign, he observed how contemptible a thing was human grandeur, which could be mimicked by such diminutive insects as I.
4. I began my discourse by informing his majesty that our dominions consisted of two islands, which composed three mighty kingdoms under one sovereign, besides our plantations in America.
5. Matthaios dropped from his knee to sit flat on the floor, careful to remain lower than his sovereign, as was the custom.
6. Matthaios returned to work in the palace of his sovereign.
7. de Villefort but, like the feudal barons who rebelled against their sovereign, he dwelt in an impregnable fortress.
8. Like every other sovereign in the Elládosi world, they reigned at his mercurial sufferance.
9. de Baisemeaux, sovereign dispenser of gastronomic delicacies, head cook of the royal fortress, whose trays, full-laden, were ascending the steep staircases, carrying some consolation to the prisoners in the shape of honestly filled bottles of good vintages.
10. Having retired to rest a crowned sovereign, he will awake a captive.