Shahzada
/ˌʃɑːzˈɑːdə/noun
A son of a king or other male member of a royal Persianate dynasty.
Did you know?The word’s Persian element shāh also traveled into European chess vocabulary, giving English chess and check their royal, Persian connection.
Etymological Timeline
Proto-Indo-Iranian, before 1000 BCE
Proto-Indo-Iranian
*kšāyati
“To rule or possess power; the proposed ancestral root of the royal title”
6th Century BCE
Old Persian
xšāyaθiya
“King; the title used by Achaemenid rulers”
3rd–7th Century CE
Middle Persian
šāh
“King”
Middle Persian to Early New Persian
Persian
zād / zāda
“Born; offspring, from the verb meaning “to give birth””
9th–12th Century
New Persian
šāhzāda
“A king’s child or prince, literally “king-born””
18th–19th Century
Urdu and English
shāhzāda / shahzada
“A prince or male royal descendant; later adopted as an English loanword”