Scrabble?! THALASSOCRATS

Definitions of THALASSOCRATS in various dictionaries:

A thalassocracy (from Classical Greek θάλασσα (thalassa), meaning "sea", and κρατεῖν (kratein), meaning "power", giving Koine Greek θαλασσοκρατία (thalassokratia), "sea power") is a state with primarily maritime realms, an empire at sea (such as the Phoenician network of merchant cities) or a seaborne empire. Traditional thalassocracies seldom dominate interiors, even in their home territories: Phoenician Tyre, Sidon and Carthage or Srivijaya and Majapahit in Southeast Asia. One can distinguish this traditional sense of thalassocracy from an "empire", where the state's territories, though possibly linked principally or solely by the sea lanes, generally extend into mainland interiors: the Bruneian Empire (1368–1888) in Asia. Compare to tellurocracy "land-based hegemony".The term thalassocracy can also simply refer to naval supremacy, in either military or commercial senses of the word supremacy. The Ancient Greeks first used the word thalassocracy to describe the government of the Minoan civilization, whose power depended on its navy. Herodotus distinguishes sea-power from land-power and spoke of the need to counter the Phoenician thalassocracy by developing a Greek "empire of the sea".