King and Queen - Titles of Power in Japanese

Ever wondered how to spell queen or king in Japanese? How do you say princess in Japanese? Or how about president, mayor, noble, governor and others? In this article, we will get to know some power titles in the Japanese language.

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How do you say Rei in Japanese?

There are several ways to say King and Queen in Japanese, the main character used is [王] which literally means King. The ideogram also conveys the idea of sovereign, monarch, tycoon, champion and master.

This ideogram [王] can be understood as “mediator between Heaven and Earth,” where the upper horizontal stroke symbolizes heaven and the lower stroke symbolizes earth. Its reading is an "ō" elongated that I like to romanize as "ou" [おう] and another obsolete kimi [君].

Generally, the ideogram for king [王] is accompanied by an honorific title like ousama [王様] or with some type of suffix that identifies the type of king, as in the case of kokuou [国王], which literally means king of a country.

In the anime One Piece, we often see the word kaizokuou [海賊王], which literally means King of the Pirates. Below, we will see some related words to the ideogram for king [王], which can also indicate a person of power or king of a certain thing:

Ookimi [大君] - Emperor; King; Prince;
I hear [王女] - Princess;
Ouji [王子] - Prince;
Oushitsu [王室] - Royal Family;
out [王手] - No Xadrex check;
Ouhi [王妃] - Queen
Oukoku [王国] - Kingdom; Monarchy;
Oujya [王者] - King; Monarch; Ruler; Champion;
heard [王朝] - Dynasty;
Shukun [主君] - Lord; Senhor; Mestre;
Kunshu [君主] - Monarch; sovereign;

There are many other words related to royalty or power that use the ideogram [王], but we cannot be stuck just to that. If you want to delve deeper into these words, just use the online dictionary jisho.

King and queen - titles of power in Japanese — japanese castle

How do you say Queen in Japanese?

In Japanese, "queen" can be Joou [女王] or also ouhi [王妃], but in the second case, it refers to a "queen consort" or the wife of the king, which means she holds the same position and designation as her husband, but does not have the same political or military powers.

We have other words like sasaki [後] which means Empress and Queen. For Japanese queens and empresses, we have the term kougou [皇后], while we have the general term kouhi [皇妃] for royalty regardless of their nationality.

See below for other words involving queens and empresses:

Oujoubachi [女王蜂] - Queen bee;
Oujouari [女王蟻] - Queen of insects;
Jokou [女皇] - Queen;
Koutaigou [皇太后] - Mother Queen; Dowager Empress;
Seioubo [西王母] - Queen Mother of the West (an ancient Chinese goddess);
Kuiin [クイーン] - Queen in English;
Kokubo [国母] - Empress; Dowager Empress;
Jotei [女帝] - Empress;
puresu [エンプレス] - Empress;

How do you say prince and princess in Japanese?

There are different ways to say prince or princess in Japanese, with the most common for princess being oujo [王女] and the most common for prince being ouji [王子]. One should not forget to always use the honorifics of address sama [様] like oujosama [王女様].

In the West, it is common to hear the expression hime [姫] to refer to a princess or lady. Although it is a very common word, it is not often used to refer directly to princesses who are daughters of kings. Do not forget the formal himesama [姫様].

Generally, hime is used as a generic term to refer to daughters of nobles, for this reason it should not always be taken as literally meaning princess. The word hime can also be used as a prefix for cute and small things.

Fans of anime in the West tend to translate the word otome as princess, although there is some truth to this in the past, the word is generally used to refer to young girls, maidens, and virgins who are between 17 and 20 years old.

List of words related to princess and prince: