royalty

/ˈrɔɪəlti/

/ˈrɔjəlti/

Other forms: royalties

Royalty is a good word for describing a family of kings, queens, princes, and princesses. If you are in the music business, you may expect a payment, or royalty every time your song is played. How's that for royal treatment?

The noun royalty means a group of royals, or kings and their extended families. Queen Elizabeth of England is a member of Britain's royalty, for example. You can also use royalty to describe the payment a writer receives whenever her book is sold, or that a musician gets when his song is played in a grocery store. The word comes from the Latin regalis, "regal," which in turn comes from rex, "king."

Definitions of royalty

1. noun

   royal persons collectively
   “the wedding was attended by royalty”

   synonyms: royal family, royal house, royal line

   types:

   Hanover, Hanoverian line, House of Hanover

   the English royal house that reigned from 1714 to 1901 (from George I to Victoria)

   Habsburg, Hapsburg

   a royal German family that provided rulers for several European states and wore the crown of the Holy Roman Empire from 1440 to 1806

   Hohenzollern

   a German noble family that ruled Brandenburg and Prussia

   House of Lancaster, Lancaster, Lancastrian line

   the English royal house that reigned from 1399 to 1461; its emblem was a red rose

   Plantagenet, Plantagenet line

   the family name of a line of English kings that reigned from 1154 to 1485

   Romanoff, Romanov

   the Russian imperial line that ruled from 1613 to 1917

   Saxe-Coburg-Gotha

   the name of the royal family that ruled Great Britain from 1901-1917; the name was changed to Windsor in 1917 in response to anti-German feelings in World War I

   Stuart

   the royal family that ruled Scotland from 1371-1714 and ruled England from 1603 to 1649 and again from 1660 to 1714

   House of York, York

   the English royal house (a branch of the Plantagenet line) that reigned from 1461 to 1485; its emblem was a white rose

   type of:

   house

   aristocratic family line
2. noun

   payment to the holder of a patent or copyright or resource for the right to use their property
   “he received royalties on his book”

   type of:

   payment

   a sum of money paid or a claim discharged