From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishimperialim‧pe‧ri‧al /ɪmˈpɪəriəl $ -ˈpɪr-/ adjective [only before noun] 1 PGCOUNTRY/NATIONrelating to an empire or to the person who rules it Britain’s imperial expansion in the 19th century2 TMrelating to the system of weights and measurements based on pounds, inches, miles etc
Examples from the Corpus
imperial• Without a territorial base the papacy could not be independent of imperial and other influences.• The second, the Code, consisted of the imperial constitutions and edicts.• History is full of attempts at imperial domination.• Perhaps the sight of his footlocker had provoked her-a white man moving in to bombard the local ovaries with blue-eyed imperial genes.• Those who favour a depiction of the fortunes of the imperial house have to reckon with the difficulty of recognising Augustus.• the imperial jewels• Second, it shows how in antiquity an absolute imperial monarch used the arts to bolster his rule.• Unlike many of his time Charlemagne had the skill of writing, as in his imperial signature on a document dated 775.• But he would not break with tradition, for he knew that innovation would bring down his imperial structure.Origin imperial (1300-1400) French Late Latin imperialis, from Latin imperium “command, empire” 