There are numerous words denoting a head or leader of a state in Uyghur, such as kaghan (qaghan/xaqan,xan) “king”, shah “king’, padishah “king’, rä’is “president’, zhuxi “chairman’, zongtong “president’, prezident“ president”, etc. However, only the term kaghan (qaghan/xaqan, xan) is a genuine Uyghur word in terms of its etymology, all the others are borrowed from other languages in the different periods of time. Thus this paper conducts a survey on the etymology of the word kaghan (qaghan/xaqan, xan) and comes to the conclusion that its origin can be traced back to the common Altaic word *ka-（~*ko-） which meant “to cover, to enclose, to control, to look after, to protect, to surround, to seal off” etc., or which might have almost the same meaning of English verb to cover and its extended meanings.

Keywords: Term for State Leader Kaghan/Qagan Etymology Uyghur