An autocracy is a system of government in which a supreme political power is concentrated in the hands of one person, whose decisions are subject to neither external legal restraints nor regularized mechanisms of popular control (except perhaps for the implicit threat of coup d'état or mass insurrection).

Autocracy is any form of government in which one person is the supreme power within the state. It is derived from the Greek αὐτοκρατία: αὐτός ("self") and κρατεῖν ("rule"), and may be translated as "one who rules by himself". It is distinct from oligarchy ("rule by the few") and democracy ("rule by the people"). Like "despot", "tyrant", "strongman" and "dictator", "autocrat" has become a loaded word with a negative value judgment in contemporary English usage.

The term autokratōr was employed in antiquity to translate the Latin imperator into Greek. It was the primary word used by grecophones to refer to the Roman Emperor during the later Roman Empire through the seventh century CE and continued to be used in the Byzantine period, although it lost favor to Sebastos ("augustus") and Basileus (obscure: prob. "chieftain;" later "king") as synonyms for "emperor".^{[citation needed]} This use remains current in the modern Greek language, where the term is used for anyone holding the title "emperor," regardless of the actual power of the monarch.

Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO (13 May 1842 – 22 November 1900) was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado. Sullivan composed 23 operas, 13 major orchestral works, eight choral works and oratorios, two ballets, incidental music to several plays, and numerous hymns and other church pieces, songs, and piano and chamber pieces. The best known of his hymns and songs include "Onward Christian Soldiers" and "The Lost Chord".

The son of a military bandmaster, Sullivan composed his first anthem at age eight. He was selected as soloist in the boys' choir of the Chapel Royal. The Reverend Thomas Helmore, the choirmaster, encouraged Sullivan and arranged for the publication and performance of his early compositions. In 1856, the Royal Academy of Music awarded the first Mendelssohn Scholarship to the 14-year-old Sullivan, allowing him to study first at the Academy and then in Germany, at the Leipzig Conservatoire. His graduation piece was a suite of incidental music to Shakespeare's The Tempest. When it was performed in London in 1862, it was an immediate sensation. Sullivan began his composing career with a series of ambitious works, interspersed with hymns, parlour ballads and other light pieces. Among his best received early pieces were a ballet, L'Île Enchantée (1864), and his Irish Symphony, Cello Concerto and Overture in C (In Memoriam) (all in 1866). From 1861 to 1872, he supplemented his income by working as a church organist and as a music teacher.