shogun

Etymology

It is borrowed from Japanese 将軍 (shōgun, “general”),^{[2][1][3][4][5]} short for 征夷大将軍 (seii taishōgun, “barbarian-subduing great general”), a title first bestowed in 1192.^[2][1][6][7] The Japanese word is a sound substitution for Chinese 將軍 (jiāngjūn, “general, leader of an army”),^[2][8][9][1] formed from the words for "to lead" and "army".^[2][6][10] The American Heritage Dictionary takes the Japanese word from the Middle Chinese form, the source of the Mandarin one as well.^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The hereditary commander-in-chief of the Japanese army, until 1867 the real ruler of Japan: 1615, in the diary of R. Cocks,^[2][5] who wrote Shongo Samme.^[7] Etymonline dates the word to the 1610s and Dictionary.com to 1605–15,^[6][12] while Merriam-Webster Unabridged gives 1727.^[4]

Semantic evolution

Collins distinguishes the chief military commanders of Japan from 794 from the line of hereditary military dictators who ruled from about 1192 to 1867 and left the emperors only a theoretical supremacy.^[10] Evans's Japanese Loanwords notes that Yoritomo took the old title of Seii Taishogun, which had become an anachronism, and that it was normally shortened to shogun.^[7] The shogun was also called the tycoon by foreigners.^[4][2] From 1889 shogun was used attributively of fashions and art of the Japanese feudal period.^[2]

Timeline

• 1615 – the hereditary commander-in-chief of the Japanese army.^[2][5]
• 1889 – attributive, of the fashions or art of feudal Japan.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. (history) Any of the hereditary military rulers of Japan who held real power from about 1192 until 1867, while the emperor was nominally supreme.^{[10][4][2][13]}
2. (history) A chief military commander of Japan, from the 8th century.^[10]

Word family

• shogunal
• shogunate

Related words

• tycoon

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c Evans, Tom (1997), A Dictionary of Japanese Loanwords, Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press
8. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
11. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
12. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
13. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin