khagan
/kɑˈɡɑn/noun
khagan is a noun meaning “A khan of khans, a ruler of a khaganate; (the holder of) an imperial rank used among certain Turkic and Mongolian peoples, equal in status to an…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled K-H-A-G-A-N, and it appears about once in every 72 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of khagan is khagans.
What does khagan mean?
noun
- 1
A khan of khans, a ruler of a khaganate; (the holder of) an imperial rank used among certain Turkic and Mongolian peoples, equal in status to an emperor.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce khagan?
- /kɑˈɡɑn/
- /ˈkɑɡɑn/
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-khagan.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of khagan
- khagans plural
- kagan
- kaghan
- khaqan
- qagan
- qaghan
- qaqan
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is khagan?
Khagan appears about once in every 72 million words in written English, the 269,040th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Khagan in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense title of imperial rank:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | khagan, grand khan |
| German | Khagan |
| Portuguese | khagan |
| Spanish | jaghan, gran jan |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does khagan come from?
Ultimately from Old Turkic 𐰴𐰍𐰣 (qaɣan). Doublet of khan.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).