Czar

zar, the ordinary title of the emperor of Russia. It has long been considered a corruption of the word Caesar, used by the emperors of Rome and the East, as Caesar Augustus. Modern scholarship is rather of the opinion, however, that the word, czar or tsar, is of Tartar origin--a survival of the time when that people occupied eastern Europe. The czar is not only the arbitrary ruler of his people; but he is the sacred head of the Greek Church, the national church of Russia.