pasha, title of a man of high rank or office in the Ottoman Empire and North Africa. It was the highest official title of honour in the Ottoman Empire, always used with a proper name, which it followed. It was given to soldiers and high civil officials, not to men of religion, and was purely personal and not hereditary, except in 19th-century Egypt. Very occasionally in early times it was applied to a woman; Validepasha was the title of the mother of the pasha of Egypt.
The title first appeared in the 13th century among the Seljuqs. Among the Ottomans it was given to a brother and son of Sultan Orhan. Later it became the prerogative of provincial governors and the viziers of the central administration. In the Tanzimat period (19th century) its use was extended to the four highest grades of the civil and military services.
On the fall of the Ottoman dynasty, pasha was reserved only for soldiers but, even after the Turkish Republic finally abandoned its use in 1934, the title survived in former Ottoman possessions—e.g., in Egypt until 1952. By Turks it is still used in conversation as a mark of respect to a social superior.