Tsar

Tsar (Bulgarian, Serbian: цар, Russian царь , in scientific transliteration respectively car and car' ), occasionally spelled Czar or Tzar and sometimes Csar or Zar in English, is a Slavonic term designating certain monarchs.

Originally, and indeed during most of its history, the title tsar (derived from Caesar) meant Emperor in the European medieval sense of the term, i.e., a ruler who has the same rank as a Roman or Byzantine emperor (or, according to Byzantine ideology, the most elevated position next to the one held by the Byzantine monarch) due to recognition by another emperor or a supreme ecclesiastical official (the Pope or the Ecumenical Patriarch). Occasionally, the word could be used to designate other, non-Christian supreme rulers. In Russia and Bulgaria, the imperial connotations of the term were blurred with time and by the 19th century it had come to be viewed as an equivalent of king,. The modern languages of these countries use it as a general term for a monarch. For example, the title of the Bulgarian monarchs in the 20th century was not generally interpreted as imperial.