kaiser
n. countablen. the German word for emperor. You use it to talk about the rulers of Germany before 1918.
n. the title of the German emperor, specifically the monarchs of the German Empire from 1871 to 1918.
The Kaiser ruled the country for many years.
History books often discuss the Kaiser's role in starting the First World War.
The abdication of the Kaiser marked the end of the imperial era and the beginning of the Weimar Republic.
Inherited from Middle English kayser, from Old High German keisar (“emperor”), from Proto-West Germanic kaisar, from Proto-Germanic kaisaraz. The native Old English descendant of that Proto-Germanic word was cāser (“emperor”), but the shape of Middle English kayser (“emperor”) (versus the expected caser, coser) suggests it was borrowed from another Germanic language rather than inherited, and the modern English spelling and sense seem to be modified after modern German rather than a direct continuation of Middle English. Compare tsar, which was borrowed from Slavic. Doublet of Caesar and tsar.