royalty

[roi-uh l-tee] /ˈrɔɪ əl ti/
noun, plural royalties.
1.
royal persons collectively.
2.
royal status, dignity, or power; sovereignty:
to be elevated to royalty.
3.
a person of royal lineage; member of a royal family.
4.
royalties, Archaic. prerogatives, rights, or symbolic emblems of a king, queen, or other sovereign.
5.
a royal domain; kingdom; realm.
6.
character or quality proper to or befitting a sovereign; nobility.
7.
a compensation or portion of the proceeds paid to the owner of a right, as a patent or oil or mineral right, for the use of it.
8.
an agreed portion of the income from a work paid to its author, composer, etc., usually a percentage of the retail price of each copy sold.
9.
a royal right, as over minerals, granted by a sovereign to a person or corporation.
10.
the payment made for such a right.
Origin
1350-1400; Middle English roialte < Old French. See royal, -ty2
Related forms
nonroyalty, noun, plural nonroyalties.
preroyalty, noun, plural preroyalties.
Examples from the web for royalty
  • However, the tradition of nobility and royalty was based upon the same.
  • Songwriters and music publishers get royalty payments, but musicians and record companies do not.
  • Rare is the academic author who considers likely royalty payments before embarking on a research project.
  • They certainly leave open the potential of subsequent development at royalty rates that make sense to investors.
  • The populace lines up on the main thoroughfare to watch hours of marching bands, homemade floats and home-crowned royalty.
  • Publishers have already figured this out and enacting more copyright laws and complicated royalty hurdles.
  • These are some of the foundational concepts of royalty.
  • The utter failure of the webcasting business hasn't slowed down the recording industry's insistence on a higher royalty rate.
  • Although royalty rates have come down they are a hefty burden on companies that have attracted customers at such a rate.
  • Fortunately there's not much pressure to perform for royalty anymore.
British Dictionary definitions for royalty

royalty

/ˈrɔɪəltɪ/
noun (pl) -ties
1.
the rank, power, or position of a king or queen
2.
  1. royal persons collectively
  2. one who belongs to the royal family
3.
any quality characteristic of a monarch; kingliness or regal dignity
4.
a percentage of the revenue from the sale of a book, performance of a theatrical work, use of a patented invention or of land, etc, paid to the author, inventor, or proprietor
Word Origin and History for royalty
n.

c.1400, "office or position of a sovereign," also "magnificence," from or modeled on Old French roialte (12c., Modern French royauté), from Vulgar Latin *regalitatem (nominative *regalitas), from Latin regalis (see royal). Sense of "prerogatives or rights granted by a sovereign to an individual or corporation" is from late 15c. From that evolved more general senses, such as "payment to a landowner for use of a mine" (1839), and ultimately "payment to an author, composer, etc." for sale or use of his or her work (1857). Cf. realty.

royalty in Culture

royalty definition


A payment made for some right or privilege, as when a publisher pays a royalty to an author for the author's granting the publisher the right to sell the author's book.

Encyclopedia Article for royalty

in law, the payment made to the owners of certain types of rights by those who are permitted by the owners to exercise the rights. The rights concerned are literary, musical, and artistic copyright; patent rights in inventions and designs; and rights in mineral deposits, including oil and natural gas. The term originated from the fact that in Great Britain for centuries gold and silver mines were the property of the crown; such "royal" metals could be mined only if a payment ("royalty") were made to the crown

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