Etymology

emperor

em·pe·ror
E1M3P3E1R1O1R1

Today it means: The male monarch or ruler of an empire. Full definition →

Middle English emperour ← Anglo-Norman emperour ← Latin imperātorem
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Latin · derived fromimperātorem
  2. Anglo-Norman · derived fromemperour
  3. Middle English · inherited fromemperour
  4. English todayemperor

From Middle English emperour, from Anglo-Norman emperour, from Latin imperātorem, derived from imperō (“to command”). Doublet of imperator. Displaced earlier Old English casere, from Latin Caesar.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.