Khatun

Khatun (Mongolian: хатан khatan; Persian: خاتون‎‎ khātūn; Urdu: خاتون‎ khātūn, plural خواتين khavātīn; Turkish: hatun) is a female title of nobility and counterpart to "khan" prominently used in the First Turkic Empire and in the subsequent Mongol Empire. It is equivalent to 'queen' or 'empress', approximately.

Before the advent of Islam in Central Asia, Khatun was the title of the Queen of Bukhara. According to the Encyclopaedia of Islam:^[1]

Khatun [is] a title of Sogdian origin borne by the wives and female relatives of the T'u-chüeh and subsequent Turkish rulers.

British Orientalist Gerard Clauson (1891–1974) defines "xa:tun" as "'lady' and the like" and says there is "no reasonable doubt that it is taken from Sogdian xwt'yn (xwatēn), in Sogdian xwt'y ('lord, ruler') and xwt'yn 'lord's or ruler's wife'), "which is precisely the meaning of xa:tun in the early period."^[2]

In Turkish, it is written hatun. The general Turkish word for 'woman', kadın, is a doublet derived from the same origin.^[3]

In Urdu, the word khatun is used commonly to refer to any woman. The female title khanum is also used as the feminine counterpart of khan.

Notable Khatuns

• Börte
• Töregene Khatun
• Doquz Khatun
• Buluqhan Khatun
• Bulugan
• Mandukhai Khatun
• Po Beg
• Despina Khatun

See also

• Hatun
• Khan
• Khanum
• Begum
• Beg
• Begzadi
• List of Mongol khatuns

References

1. Mernissi, Fatima (1993). The Forgotten Queens of Islam. University of Minnesota Press. p. 21. "... Khatun 'is a title of Sogdian origin borne by the wives and female relatives of the Tu-chueh and subsequent Turkish Rulers ..."
2. Clauson, Gerard (1972). An Etymological Dictionary of Pre-Thirteenth-Century Turkish. Oxford: Clarendon Press. pp. 602–603.
3. Clauson, p. 602.