maharaja, (from mahat, “great,” and rājan, “king”), an administrative rank in India; generally speaking, a Hindu prince ranking above a raja. Used historically, maharaja refers specifically to a ruler of one of the principal native states of India. The feminine form is maharani (maharanee).
The title seems to have been introduced sometime in the first century bc by the Kushāns. They had been influenced by the Śaka (Scythian) and Persian-Mongolian rulers of northwestern India and preferred the honorific “great king” to “king.” Chandra Gupta I, the third king of the Gupta period (c. ad 320–540), took the title mahārājādhirāja (“great king of kings”), a Sanskrit rendering of the Persian shahanshah. Other, still more inflated honorifics followed, and during certain periods even vassal kings with relatively small holdings were known as maharajas.