ござる

Shift from ござある (gozaaru),^[1] composed of ご (honorific prefix) +‎ ざ (“seat”) +‎ ある (“to be, to have”), literally “to have one's honorable seat”.

According to Kōjien, the above is derived from the Sino-Japanese reading of (the kanji in the ateji spelling of) 御座す (owasu) + あり (ari) (the classical form of ある (aru)).^[2]

• (Tokyo) ござる (Nakadaka – )
• IPA^(key):

ござる • (gozaru) intransitive godan (stem ござり (gozari) or ござい (gozai), past ござった (gozatta))

1. (archaic) to exist, to be, to have

• In classical Japanese, ござる (gozaru) was the polite form of ある (aru) applicable to both animate and inanimate objects. It survives in modern Japanese only in the inflected forms ございました (gozaimashita), ございましたら (gozaimashitara), ございます (gozaimasu), and です (desu), which may originate from a contraction of でございます (de gozaimasu). ご (go-) is a politeness prefix, ざ (za) is the equivalent of ある (aru) in Sino-Japanese, and finally る (-ru) is a suffix for verbs. Another opinion is that it is a contraction of ござある (gozaaru), composed of 御座 (goza, “noble seat”) and ある (aru, “to exist”, literally “to be on a noble seat”).
• In modern popular culture, it is associated with ninja.