Word.ws English Dictionary

jan

/d͡ʒæn/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

British/d͡ʒan/

jan is the obsolete form of jinn.

Meaning of jinn

Noun

jinn (plural jinns or jinn or jawan or jinnan or jinnah)

  1. (Arabic culture) A human-like spiritual or immaterial being, as opposed to al-ins (people), often invisible but able to manifest in form and also inhabit people or animals; origin of the genie of Western literature, film etc.
    • Even the sad jinn within the graven image slept[.]1961, Xavier Herbert, Soldiers' Women, Netley, SA: Fontana Books, published 1978, page 342
    Synonyms:
    jann, jinni, genie

Proper noun (1) capitalized: Jan

Jan

  1. (abbreviation) Abbreviation of January.
  2. A male given name from Dutch.

Proper noun (2) capitalized: Jan

Jan

  1. (dated) A male given name from Hebrew.

Proper noun (3) capitalized: Jan

Jan

  1. A female given name.
    • "Yes, Mommy," answered Janice. Then she turned to her friend and asked, "Shall I wear my light chintz and kenton kerchief, or my purple and white striped Persian?" "Sufficiently smart for a country lass, Jan," cried her friend.1899, Paul Leicester Ford, chapter 1, in Janice Meredith
    • She's startled. How long has it been since he called her Jax instead of Janet or Jan? The last is a nickname she secretly hates. It makes her think of that syrupy-sweet actress on Lassie when she was a kid, the little boy (Timmy, his name was Timmy) always fell down a well or got bitten by a snake...2008, Stephen King, Just after Sunset, Simon and Schuster, published 2009, →ISBN, page 129

Proper noun (4) capitalized: Jan

IPA/jɑːn/

Jan

  1. A male given name, equivalent to English John.
    • Jan Petter Vala is serving part of a 10-year murder sentence on a posh island in southern Norway.2012 May 24, John D. Sutter, “Welcome to the world’s nicest prison”, in CNN

Proper noun (5) capitalized: JAN

JAN

  1. Alternative letter-case form of Jan (“January”).

Noun capitalized: JAN

JAN (plural JANs)

  1. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of Japanese Accepted Name.

Forms of jan

alternative formjân
alternative formjann
pluralJANs

Origin of jan

Borrowed from Arabic جَنّ (jann).

From Old French Jehan (“John”). Doublet of John.

A clipping or hypochoristic form of Janet, Janice, Janine, Janis, etc. Doublet of Ivanka, Janelle, Janet, Janey, Janine, Jeanette, Jeanie, Jeannette, Jeannine, Jen, Jenna, Jenny, Jessie, Jo, Jody, Juanita, Shanae, Sinead, and Vanna.

Words formed from jan

Phrases with jan

Words that rhyme with jan

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about jan

What does jan mean?
Jan means a male given name from Dutch.
What is jan the obsolete form of?
Jan is the obsolete form of jinn.
What part of speech is jan?
Jan can be a proper noun or a noun.
How do you pronounce jan?
Jan is pronounced /d͡ʒæn/ (UK).

Words near jan in the dictionary

  1. jamwich
  2. jamwiches
  3. jamwood
  4. Jamy
  5. jamón ibérico
  6. jan
  7. Jan Juc
  8. jan ken po
  9. Jan Mayen
  10. Jan.
  11. Jana

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: jan (page history and authors); Jan (page history and authors); JAN (page history and authors); jinn (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-Jan.wav.

Cite this entry: “jan.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/jan. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.